Table of Contents:
Chapter One, The King of the Dead, begins below.
Chapter Two, Intermission - Preparations for Round Two, beginning here.
Chapter Three, And There Was No Taking It Back, beginning here.
Chapter Four, Genocide Countdown, beginning here.
Disclaimer: No copyright is mine, thus no copyrighted character is.
Art of Love; Art of Death
By Pale Wolf
Chapter One
The King of the Dead
---N====================>V---
Sunday, June 11, New Calendar Year 0076 (2017 CE)
Interdimensional Space
Time-Space Administration Bureau Patrol Cruiser 'Albion'
While she could claim to be pondering the philosophical significance of the dimensional sea and the many worlds within it that they guarded, if she were honest, she was just trying to see if she could figure out the pattern to the constantly roiling purple and black... stuff. She knew there was a technical term, but had never managed to study much interdimensional physics... she'd probably need to hit the books.
"So how are you settling in, Tea?"
Teana Lanster blinked, turning from the viewport to look up to the captain's platform - Captain Amelia Noin, a tallish blonde woman of about twenty-five.
Teana shrugged, brushing her hair back behind her blue uniform - it was a lot easier to manage when tied back, but it felt a lot nicer free. "I suppose all right so far, Captain. I seem to have gotten the hang of my duties. It's not too different from my last posting, to be honest, just a bit more on the analytical side."
Amelia nodded. "And how's the education going?"
Teana looked down. "Not that well. My flight skills are... iffy."
"Mm, it's only been a few months. That you have them at all is a good start."
"Thank you, Captain."
Amelia chuckled. "Am I butting in? I've been told many a time that I have a bad habit of sticking my nose in other peoples' business."
Teana shook her head. "No, not at all, Captain! I just believe I'm still too inexperienced to merit that praise."
Amelia sighed - it was such a pronounced sigh that she had to be exaggerating it. "You know, you're allowed to call me Amelia, the Enforcer staff isn't really-"
"Sorry to interrupt, Captain, but I've got something." That was the sensor operator on this shift, William Cadrel.
Amelia sighed again - not exaggerated this time - and shifted her attention to Cadrel's position in the crew pit. Teana turned to him as well. "Go ahead."
"It's a large mass signature - to the bow, on the port side and passing to starboard. Seems to be a ship." He tossed it up on the main viewscreen - there was no visual yet, just a computer representation, a small blob racing across the front arc of the ship.
Amelia hummed. "Well now. What do you think, Tea? No reference just yet."
Teana frowned, cupping her chin. The rangefinder said it was about a hundred vecs away... "The rate it's closing at is way too high... that's well beyond TSA regulation speeds. Either criminal or non-administrated... and a signature we can pick up at this range means it's fairly large for a ship that fast. Eclair-class, from the Argene Theocracy?"
Amelia snapped her fingers. "So close! You're right on it being above regulation speeds, but it's not an Eclair - it's a bit faster than that. And I cheated on this a little bit and checked it on my own monitor, but the magical readouts are a bit too high for an Eclair - the Argene don't use magical reactors or engines. Still, very good job, extreme long-range sensor signatures are very hard to read and the Eclair has a very similar mass shadow."
Teana bowed her head. "Thank you ma'am."
"Could you call Enforcer Hallaoun up here? Tell her there's a faster-than-regulation Teufel moving across our bow. They probably haven't picked us up yet, we don't generate as large a mass shadow."
Teana tsked. A Teufel - old Velkan-design ship, but the fastest thing in interdimensional space. With a quick thought, she composed the message and sent it more or less verbatim down to her commander - who was, thankfully, awake right now. Shari was the one sleeping at the moment.
Fate sent back her acknowledgement, and Teana turned her attention back to the viewscreen. Partially, at least, she was also having Cross Mirage look up the Teufel to refresh herself on it.
"Still... what's a Teufel doing out here...? And at that speed... it's trying to get somewhere in a rush."
Teana pursed her lips. "Well... Teufels are popular among smugglers... Mister Cadrel, can you pick up any pursuit?"
The sensor operator shook his head. "Nothing. There are no recorded hazards back that way in any reasonable range, and there's nothing else on the scanners just yet. At their speed... anything we can't detect wouldn't be able to detect the Teufel either."
Amelia frowned, leaning her head on her palm. "This is the clear zone, there is no sentient life for a thousand vecs, so they can't be rushing on a delivery, either..."
"Maybe a criminal operation, or a hideaway? They tend to love uninhabited worlds like we've got out here." Cadrel suggested.
Teana shook her head, though most of her attention was on the Teufel information Cross Mirage had brought up, projecting as a small 'screen' in front of her. "It's going port to starboard, right? Starboard is closer to the main bulk of administrated worlds, so if they're going there, that puts them closer to authorities. A hideout would go towards the center of the clear zone, that's pretty much just non-advanced planets and empty land."
Amelia nodded. "They could be leaving their hideout, but if so, you'd think they would be saving the energy for blowing past border guards, not wasting it in an all-out dash in empty territory. That's going to redline their engines fast."
Teana's eyes widened, and she looked up from her view window. "Um... Captain?"
"Hm?"
"It's not redlining."
Amelia blinked, straightening up. "What do you mean? That speed is redline for a Teufel, isn't it?"
Teana nodded. "It is, but... look at the heat signature we're getting. That's fairly cool - I just checked, and that's about how hot a Teufel runs at normal cruise speed."
Amelia whistled. "That is definitely not standard-issue. Someone's been doing some aftermarket modifications."
"Good job, Teana," a new voice commented.
Teana flushed slightly. "You heard, Fate?"
Enforcer Fate T. Hallaoun smiled as she stepped onto the bridge. "Of course. I'm glad you didn't wait for me to do some analysis of your own. What do you think it is?"
Teana could hear that 'I know the answer, but this is training' tone in her voice... ah well, she'd already been wrong once about this ship. "If I had to guess, I'd say that someone improved the efficiency of the mana reactor so it can put out this amount of power without strain... and the engines, so they can take the power put through them. But a reactor jacked up like that wouldn't last for long, so we'd be right back to the redlining problem... So I think it's a Suvota Compact ship. They're the experts at reactor technology, and a reactor like that should be within their normal parameters."
Fate nodded, walking up to stand beside Teana. "While I can't say whether or not you're correct, I can say that you've made the same guess I have. A lot of Suvota ships built around the dawn of the new calendar used foreign hulls with their own domestic reactors swapped in - the end result is actually a fairly good ship, after some more dedicated modification goes into it."
"That design policy is because of the civil war they had around then, right? I doubt they'd be able to get a hold of advanced shipyards in that kind of situation, and a quick kludge at least lets them put something in the air."
"You're right. Of course... the question remains why a Suvota ship is approaching the TSA side of the clear zone. Diplomatic messenger, perhaps? Amelia, can we trail them?"
Amelia shrugged. "Only if they stop pretty soon, if they run out of our detection range we'll never find them again and there's no way we can keep up. Andrew, bring us around on 80 mark 13 for one minute, then level off to 80 mark 20. And bring engines to full, let's keep after them as long as we can."
Teana did a quick calculation in her head. The listed course should bring the Albion slightly 'above' the Teufel's path (without a visual they didn't know the Teufel's orientation, so for all they knew they were actually below it or to the side, but at the least the Teufel was below Albion - the XV-class cruisers were harder to detect from beneath), and then following. It wasn't quite parallel, though, Albion would be crossing slightly portward to try and get closer to the ship.
Fate nodded. "Thank you. It's worth a try, and I want to see what they're up to."
"They're not going to like TSA ships snooping around their business," Amelia warned.
"True, but then maybe they shouldn't be doing that business within spitting distance of the TSA's administrated worlds."
Amelia snickered. "Right enough on tha-"
"Another reading, captain!" Cadrel shouted out, putting it up on the viewscreen. The first thing Teana could think was 'large'... the signature positively dwarfed the Albion, and it was moving faster. There was still no visual, but... sheer size said a lot.
Amelia's face went slack. "... Fate, that's a Sakhalin-class battlecruiser."
"Yes... it is..."
"Joking aside, I'm not getting close enough to piss off a Sakhalin. That thing can eat Albion for breakfast and go back for seconds, thirds, and ninths."
... Somehow, the pictures Teana had seen of the Sakhalin - the pride of the Suvota Naval Service, the most powerful warship class in the dimensional sea - hadn't quite gotten across how big it was. And this was just a glimpse on sensors at extreme range...
Fate nodded faintly. "Don't worry... we won't... Hm..."
Cadrel licked his lips, raising a hand like he was in class. "Uh, Captain, Enforcer?"
"Yes, William?"
"I've got a possible ID on the Sakhalin. Helm got us onto a good course, and I was able to pick up the IFF. The signal quality's not very good right now, but the database says 80% of the signal is a match for SX-005 Aigaion."
Amelia hissed softly.
Fate closed her eyes.
Teana blinked. "Um... Fate? Captain? Am I missing something...?"
Fate opened her eyes and looked over at Teana. "Not something they teach in Enforcer courses, so don't worry about having missed it... It's not really within our regular duties, more diplomatic and military. Aigaion is the flagship of Admiral Alaya."
Amelia leaned forward. "Alaya is the commander of Strigon - a Special Parliamentary Services naval squadron. Alaya is something like the Suvota Parliament's hatchet-man."
Fate nodded. "She's a bit young for a Suvota admiral, but absolutely trusted. Parliament - specifically, Prime Minister Zheleznyj - sends her to take care of the especially sensitive tasks. Black operations, covert diplomacy... when discretion and possible firepower are required, SPS squadrons are sent out, and Alaya's Strigon is the foremost among them."
Teana blinked. "But... what could need the attention of someone like that out here? They're not insane enough to attack administrated worlds, especially not with their own ships."
Fate nodded. "Either way... Central command is going to want answers on this... Amelia, sorry, but we're going to have to stay after them."
Amelia nodded. "Right... I can't bring us in much closer than this, though, even if they slow down, so we can't get much precise data. If we get detected they'll either cover up what they're doing before we ever get close enough to see, or just blow us out of the sky."
Fate hummed to herself. "Detected... okay. Don't worry about that. Just keep us after them. When they stop, we'll fly out personally and get a close look."
Amelia blinked, pointing at herself. "We?"
Fate laid a hand on Teana's shoulder. "We."
Teana blinked, whipping her head up to look at Fate. "But... Fate, I'm nowhere near good enough at flying yet... I'd just slow you down!"
Fate nodded. "Don't worry, if you falter I can catch and carry you. But there is something you can do that I can't."
Teana's eyes widened. "You mean...?"
"Right. We can't be seen if we're going to get a close look. I have no expertise in stealth or illusion magic, but if you can cover us, we can get close enough to get a good view of whatever they're doing."
Teana frowned, holding up a finger. "Optic Hide doesn't work against strong scanning, and there's a limit on how much magic it can cover. Forceful movements, drawing a lot of mana, or just them actively searching for us... any of those and we'll be caught."
"Yes, this is risky, and beyond what you're really required to do as an Enforcer's aide, so I won't order you to do this. But..."
"I will," Teana cut her off. "But I just want you to understand I can't guarantee we'll be unseen."
"Better decide if you're sneaking or not soon," Amelia spoke up. "They just stopped."
---N====================>V---
22:17 Sunday, June 11, 2017 CE
Tokyo, Japan, Earth - Non-Administrated World #97
His name was Kanata Shirahime. Though he supposed that wasn't all that important, since he was dying.
He didn't believe in monsters.
Apparently, that one wasn't all that important either, since the death blow - a spike of... something... through his breastbone, shattering his ribcage - had been delivered by one.
Well, he wasn't really that good at biology - he might, in fact, not be dying, but it sure felt like it. Even if it weren't, he could feel nothing below his face. That spike had shot straight through his body, and out the other end - his spine was in at least two discrete pieces, so he was probably paralyzed for life.
He couldn't really do anything other than open his eyes and stare at the building across from him - he was, at the moment, in a standing position, due less to the strength and stability of his legs, and more to the fact that the spike was still there, pinning him to a dumpster like an insect in a collection. He'd never had much taste for that method of storage... he found himself with even less now.
His hearing wasn't working, either, there was a loud ringing filling his ears.
Somehow, he'd never really been expecting to die alone in a backstreet alley on the way home. Though... the alone part didn't surprise him.
Apparently, he wasn't quite qualified to play the hero. The girl he'd tried to save... well, he'd outlived her, but only because... whatever it was had focused on her after smashing him down, and then just... left. The only evidence it had ever been there, other than the two corpses, was a large smear of black... Kanata presumed it was blood, or at least its equivalent, since it had spurted out, burning his face and arms, when he'd shoved a broken table leg into its... limb. The dumpster and its contents had at least provided a few weapons to make his useless last stand with.
Only he would have the luck of interrupting what he'd thought was a mugging, only to run into a beast out of... he couldn't even get a clear idea of what it looked like.
Just... too many eyes. Too many teeth. Too many eyes with teeth.
And that wonderful image was the last thing he'd ever have in his mind's eye, because his vision was starting to tunnel - just blackness creeping across his peripheral vision, spots of dark crossing his eyes...
With one last sigh, his eyes drifted shut. They were useless anyway, now, so he didn't fight it.
"Well, this isn't really the best you've ever been, has it?"
Kanata's eyes opened... and he blinked. "... Am I hallucinating now?" That was a pretty strong contender, since... he didn't seem to be pinned to a wall. In fact he could hear and speak, and there were no walls in sight, just swirling purple in a completely black background. Beneath his feet was nothing but plain silver, as far as the eye could see. And in front of him was... a young-looking Japanese woman, short-haired and fit, dressed in a brilliant motley of colours, seemingly sewn together from dozens of different-coloured patches.
"That's the question, isn't it?" She bounced up and down on her toes. "Actually, it's not. The real question is, are you okay with this?"
Kanata laughed, sitting down on the silver. "What, is this the afterlife? This my hell?"
"Oh, not yet." She smiled. "I'll ask again: Are you okay with this?"
"What, dying? Failing to save that girl?" Kanata laid back. "The question isn't if I'm okay with it. The question is, what can I do about it?"
"And thus we come to the topic."
Kanata's eyes narrowed, and he focused on her. "If you're going to offer me my life back, no thanks. I don't know if you're the devil or an angel, but what I do know is that I'll die no matter what. The only thing I get to choose is how, and there are a lot of things I won't trade just for my life."
The woman grinned, leaning over to look down into his face. "Devil or angel? Let's not limit ourselves to a two-way street. The true powers have far more interesting concerns than your soul's fate one way or the other."
"That was... a pretty bad answer."
She laughed. "Oh, let me have my fun. Let's put it another way, then. Whether I'm a devil, an angel, or something else entirely, the deal I'll offer you is the same. Are you listening?"
Kanata pursed his lips, levering himself up to a sitting position - the woman stepped back to continue to meet his gaze. "... I am listening."
"There are a lot of things you won't trade, and I understand that. Really, I do, you humans are so filled with pride."
"... I would not call it that."
The woman waved it off. "Oh, however you want to describe it, I do understand. So I'll tell you up front what you're giving up, and what you're getting." She raised a finger. "First... I don't want your 'soul'. Seriously, what would I do with it, hang it on my mantelpiece?"
Kanata blinked. "You know, I am not Catholic. I do not believe any soul goes to some outside 'devil'. Hell is in your heart, not some outside place."
"I know, but it's best to get the common preconceptions out of the way... I really don't understand that one, but it's so very, very common..." She shook her head. "Regardless. First, you will have to give up your body. I cannot revive you in your present form."
Kanata frowned. "So... be a floating ghost of some kind?"
"Oh no, I'd give you a replacement. Humanoid enough to go about your daily life with. That is easily within my power. There's one other favour I'll ask of you, but that will come much later."
"... What kind of favour?"
The woman shrugged. "I'd tell you, but to be honest, you'll need to be a great deal more educated than you are now to understand it. I'll tell you when the time comes, and if you don't like it?" She shrugged. "Go ahead and turn me down."
"So... what exactly do you get out of this? I somewhat doubt that you are helping me out of the goodness of your heart."
The woman smirked. "There's something only you can do. I need you alive to do it. That's all. If you don't want to, you may as well keep the life - do understand, this works entirely by your will."
"... This sounds far too good to be true."
"Well, there's one other cost - you'll have to give up your life as it is now. You'll probably never be able to go home again."
Kanata closed his eyes. "That is... not much of a cost..." Going home had been something he'd avoided where possibly anyway...
The woman clapped her hands together. "Now! Here's the fun part - what you get out of it. Of course, you live again, with all the fun that entails. But, there's an extra bonus. I'll throw in a companion, and enough strength that you'll never again have to choose whether to walk away, or to give up your life for nothing."
Kanata blinked. "... You are making this sound more and more ominous."
The woman covered her mouth as she giggled. "This isn't a bargain for power, I need you strong so you don't get yourself killed again. Remember that monster?"
Kanata froze.
"Nothing exists in a vacuum. There are more. And not many on Earth with the strength to stop them. I can't do anything more than choose people."
"And you're choosing... me?"
"Why not? You had the courage to face one even without a dollop of power, and you managed to scar it just the same. I can't think of a better choice."
Kanata swallowed heavily, and made the sign of the cross. God, I truly pray that this is the right choice... "... All right."
"Then open your eyes."
---N====================>V---
Sunday, June 11, New Calendar Year 0076 (2017 CE)
Close Orbit, Uninhabited World
Teana was not precisely comfortable right now.
Physically there wasn't really anything wrong, other than the slow wobbling stagger that she presently called flight.
But mood... it was hard not to be intimidated when a black-painted-and-red-trim giant floated overhead, five connected hulls of sharp angles, and long, bladelike curves... That monster wasn't very different from the Cradle in size, and unlike the only time she'd gotten close to that one... this battlecruiser was fully operational, not mostly crippled, sitting quite comfortably in the vastly-upper reaches of the planet's atmosphere.
Teana shivered in its shadow, and tried to increase her speed - she knew Fate was lagging to keep from outpacing her.
'Well... if there's anything on this planet, it isn't in the database. There isn't even life, beyond maybe some fungus,' Fate whispered telepathically - they had to keep the transmission strength down to keep from being detected.
Teana nodded, turning slightly to aim Cross Mirage at the gigantic hulk of a battlecruiser. 'I've got pictures, and I got a glimpse of its registry while we passed across it... It's Aigaion.'
'That's what those Suvota letters were? Well, you're better at languages, so I'll take your word for it. Do you have any idea where the Teufel went?'
'I haven't seen it... I can't tell if the Sakhalin has dropped any shuttles or teleported anyone, either.' It had taken them some time to get close enough to fly out of Albion, and the Teufel's mass shadow had essentially disappeared off their sensors as soon as it slowed down - it was a relatively small frigate, and the mass shadow only appeared so large because of its speed. And between Teana's iffy flight skills and the need to move gently, it had taken them even more time to get from Albion's standoff position to the battlecruiser's position in orbit. When they'd gotten out to Aigaion, the Teufel was nowhere in sight.
Fate nodded. 'Okay. Let's move around the perimeter and see if we can get a trace.' She gently swung out, moving away from Aigaion, her barrier jacket's white cloak rustling in the planet's atmosphere.
Teana moved to follow... and then gasped as she suddenly began falling. She could already see the hole in the flight spell... she hadn't been applying enough mana along point 314 on the y-axis and it'd given way as soon as she tried maneuvering, shattering the whole thing... and dropping her from near-orbital altitude.
Fate's expression was plain...
Teana's eyes widened, and she sent a quick telepathic message. 'I've got time! Don't move too fast or you'll break the Hide!' Then she was focusing on rebuilding her spell. She did have at least a few kilometers of fall to get it right, but she'd rather not use up any more of that than she had to.
Fate looked... less than happy with Teana's request, but seemed to have come to a similar conclusion, that Teana wouldn't die if she gave her a few minutes to handle it herself and if she couldn't, Fate could still intervene. She still followed her aide down, though she kept the speed low enough not to break the invisibility spell Teana had laid over them.
Teana's long hair whipped past her face, filling her vision with strands of orange as she fell, the winds lashing it every which way. She couldn't feel much more through her barrier jacket, though the complete obscuring of her vision was annoying... maybe she shouldn't have grown it out.
Still, she didn't need to see right now, this work was all mental. She rebuffed Cross Mirage's attempt to help - she needed to master this sooner or later, and with a fall this long and Fate to catch her if she failed, these were pretty close to the safest conditions possible to figure out how to repair a flight spell.
Thread it like that... put in that much mana, keep it circulating... There!
Of course, now that her flight spell was repaired, she was still falling. She had to slow down gently or she might break the spell again... so she slowly... slowly... applied just the slightest touch of upwards thrust to herself.
It took almost as long as actually fixing the spell, before she fully stopped falling. She was almost lying back on a cloud.
Only then, did she dare twist her position in midair so she stood upright. As Fate descended to stand next to her, Teana shook her head wildly, before giving up and bringing her hands up to part her hair, getting it out of her face and back where it belonged.
'Teana, are you all right?'
And then her jaw dropped. 'Uh... I don't know if I just found the Teufel, but I just found something.' She raised a finger to point over Fate's shoulder.
Fate blinked and turned around. 'Oh. My.'
'Something', in this case, was... it was hard to really tell what it was. It was like a gigantic wall of unpainted steel... the most immense ship they had ever seen, stretching across the sky for at least ten kilometers. The shape was fairly irregular, somewhat like a carelessly-sculpted egg, and it didn't seem to be moving much, but...
Teana regained her wits first, largely because she'd lost them a bit sooner. 'This... wasn't on the database, right?'
'I... think I'd have remembered it. Is it even possible to make a ship that size...?'
'Not in atmosphere, I think...'
'Maybe it's a floating city...? I think we can guess what they came for. Let's get closer.'
Teana nodded faintly, and slowly started accelerating towards it.
The flight took some time, but was largely uneventful. Fate spotted the Teufel some distance overhead as they passed... it seemed to be hovering some distance away from the immense blob of steel... but she'd thought the huge object was most likely more worthy of investigation than the Suvota frigate.
They weren't quite there, but they were only perhaps eight kilometers away, when Teana's head jerked up and back. 'Heat source! Seems to be coming from the Aigaion's direction, but... too fast. And...'
'Far too hot...' Fate's eyes widened, as if she'd just figured something out. '...This is a firing range! Move!'
Teana blinked, but fortunately Fate wasn't really depending on being listened to - she'd already accelerated to her full, very considerable speed, grabbed Teana, and started shooting away from the vast expanse of metal.
The invisibility spell was basically useless now, so Teana dropped it... and winced when she figured out what Fate had. She had Cross Mirage start recording.
The closer they'd gotten to the gigantic... 'city', for lack of a better term... the more it had seemed... incomplete. The structure was quite solid, and there was a huge amount of magic emanating from it, but it was completely unpainted, crude, immobile... no doors or any moving segments were visible. It was like a massive block of metal had just had a reactor and engines shoved into it, and left there to float - no effort had been put in, no finishing touches, as if to keep costs down... as if it were expendable. The largest target drone Teana had ever seen. And that heat source, approaching so fast...
Fate was facing away as she tried to get more speed out, so only Teana, braced in her arms, had a view.
They were already far enough away that whatever had been fired - from the Sakhalin's position - was visible as nothing more than a speck. It neared the gigantic drone so fast... faster than any mage could possibly keep up... Teana snapped her eyes shut, and shouted for Fate to do the same.
And then Teana saw nothing. Or rather... the immense flash of white that seared into her vision, even with her eyes closed, covered up anything there may have been to see. At the same time, a huge blast of heat... they were ten kilometers away, and still she could feel it. Even through her barrier jacket she could feel her skin scorching slightly. And even with her eyes closed and protected by her barrier jacket, it was so bright she thought for a second she could see Fate's bones through her skin...
And then the heat faded. There was... no sound. They were too far away.
It was a little longer before Teana dared to open her eyes, though - her flight had only stumbled a little, not faltered, so she knew Fate had made it through.
The first thing she saw was a roiling mass of flame... orange, and black, massive, devouring the target... and rising into the air... slow... stately...
As the fireball rose and expanded, it left something of itself behind... leaving a column of fire below it. With streaks and black clouds, chemicals from the drone, filling the sky around it.
It was somehow... beautiful...
"What... is that...?" Fate muttered from beside her - apparently she'd twisted to see.
"I... have no idea."
They just watched for another moment... and then Teana's eyes widened.
There was a ripple in the air... it looked almost like a clear ring steadily growing out from the fireball, streaked with black clouds and... that looked like shrapnel.
"Cross Mirage, time from blast!" She wasn't waiting for an answer, though, already bringing up and reinforcing a barrier as best she could. Thankfully, her barriers had progressed a lot better than her flight had, in her recent training.
"Seventeen seconds." And the fireball still hadn't faded...
Fate got it too, and forced up a shield. "Load Cartridge, Bardiche."
At a ten-kilometer range, it took about twenty-eight seconds for sound to reach.
Teana, for her part, blew every cartridge she had loaded, and quickly slapped another clip into place.
Sound... and the concussion wave.
There was an immense cracking sound, so loud even through her defences it hurt her ears, and then, to put it best, the air slapped her in the face - it wasn't unlike getting whacked by Nanoha's bombardment spells in training, except that this was smashing straight through Fate's and her own cartridge-amplified defensive spells to do it.
Fate's arm was slammed into Teana's chest so hard she was pretty sure it would leave a bruise even after the barrier jacket reduced the impact, and they both went flying across the sky, losing their grip on each other...
Even Fate couldn't really handle controlled flight for a moment, so Teana started falling again.
Which turned out to be a good thing when a twisted, sharp-looking chunk of metal about the size of her flew through the air above her. That definitely would've been death.
Since she was falling, facing up again, Teana had a view of something that Fate did not. Two humanoid shapes in white, dropping rapidly and controlled through the black toxic cloud, straight at them.
"Fate! Above!" She called in both telepathy and through voice, but... she couldn't hear even her own words through the ringing in her ears, and the telepathic call seemed to be cutting through a loud hissing... jamming.
The smaller of the two white-clad mages split off from the other's course, dropping towards Teana - her flight was perfectly controlled, and Teana could see the deep blue glow on her staff-head, pointed straight at her, as the attacker approached.
Teana gritted her teeth, and detonated a cartridge - the raw power solution to getting her flight back up was most definitely a kludge, but it was better than getting shot.
As a quick series of small blue darts came in, Teana's flight started up again and she jerked to the left, letting the burst pass harmlessly beside her.
The attacker's course shifted, and she dropped down towards Teana, the sharp butt of her staff thrusting forward.
It wasn't as quick as usual, but Cross Mirage heard her mental command and created the second gun in her left hand, shifting it into dagger mode, just in time for Teana to sweep it up and deflect the staff.
Still wasn't enough to defend her against the Suvota's mass, though, as the small girl in white slammed headlong into Teana, an angled blue barrier flickering into existence and cutting through Teana's own. And they were falling, Teana unable to control her flight, and the Suvota girl not caring to.
The staff was coming around again, blue crackling at the end of it. Teana spared a thanks for Subaru dragging her through unarmed combat training (though she'd never admit it out loud, of course) and brought her right leg up to kick the Suvota away to the left... actually, given her poorly-anchored flight, Teana probably actually kicked herself away, but either worked.
And for a moment, they stood there... well, fell there, since both were still dropping.
Teana on one side, Cross Mirage's main body held in her right hand and aimed at her opponent, the duplicate in dagger mode up in her left hand and held across herself defensively, long hair flying upward in the wind.
On the other, was a small, young girl, dressed in a white barrier jacket edged with black. Mid-length silver hair tied back in two high ponytails by large black ribbons, green eyes, a long angular staff - the bottom was sharpened, while it split at the top into a wide V-shaped pair of prongs - held in her hands and aimed straight at Teana, blue crackling at the prongs that formed its tip. She looked maybe Caro's age. But Teana could see the slight point to the girl's ears. She wasn't human, she was a Suvota... given how long-lived the Suvota tended to be, this apparent ten-year-old was probably actually thirty, an experienced combat mage.
The Suvota fired first, unloading a burst of darts into near-point-blank range.
So much for negotiations... Teana fixed her aim slightly and fired as fast as she could. Her orange bullets didn't quite come out as fast as the Suvota's darts, but they all hit, demolishing the darts before even one connected.
The Suvota looked... a little surprised, but not too disappointed by the failure to score a hit, and darted in again, stabbing with the sharp end of the staff.
Teana had to get some breathing room... if she didn't get her fall under control in less than a minute, she was probably going to smash into the ground.
---N====================>V---
Sunday, June 11, New Calendar Year 0076 (2017 CE)
Upper Atmosphere, Uninhabited World
Fate hadn't noticed the attack at first - she'd been too busy looking for Teana. Her sensor spells weren't working... but the instinct of a ten-year combat veteran was.
Even as she'd done it, she wasn't quite sure why she'd swung Bardiche backwards, but as she turned around to follow it... well, she figured it out.
Right behind her was a calmly-flying Suvota mage - or cossack, as their term went, who had apparently pulled back at the last second to avoid Fate's instinctive strike. She wasn't that tall, maybe eighteen in appearance (which meant, Fate knew, that she was at least in her fifties), dressed in a white Suvota-style barrier jacket, edged and trimmed with light blue. A little different from standard issue, though... the main torso segment and the white leggings clung tighter to her body than usual, and a short blue-and-white mantle and wide-belled double-layered skirt (a bit of a strange one, composed of two alternating layers of triangular... armour plates, maybe, they were unusually stiff) had been added. Green eyes, blue hair tied back in a ponytail by a cheerful yellow ribbon, and a long staff in her hands, with a V shaped notch at the head holding a largeish blue crystal.
Blue looked a little worried about something... a bit distracted. But Fate didn't have time to worry about that, she had to find her aide.
Bardiche clicked into scythe form, the blazing yellow blade appearing even as she darted in and swung it at the Suvota.
The young-looking woman brought her staff around to interpose between the scythe and her body, braced in both hands. But Fate felt the quiver as she hit - Blue's arms had almost given way.
Suvota were on average a great deal weaker than humans, both physically and magically. And Fate was a great deal above average in raw power, Blue wouldn't be able to keep up.
Blue rose quickly, firing a single shooter bolt back at Fate as she moved away.
Fate didn't even need to deflect it, just letting it glance off her barrier as she let her opponent disengage, turning and starting a dash downward. 'Teana! Where are you?! Call in!' The jamming was too heavy for it to get through, but she called anyway.
Then, just as her first dash ended, she felt magical energies forming around her, very fast... On pure reflex, she triggered another Sonic Move, darting to the left as a slightly blueish ripple in the air formed around where she'd just been... in fact, her hand brushed out of it just before it snapped shut.
Fate whirled around. Blue was maybe half a kilometer away already, and aiming her staff directly at Fate.
... A bind? At that distance, and formed that fast?
It looked like Blue was too good to just turn her back to... and wasn't content to let Fate go after Teana, either.
She didn't really want to fight, but... it sure looked like Blue wanted to, and they had been spying on something that the Suvota seemed to want to keep secret. If they didn't fight back, chances were pretty good that she and Teana would be captured, or killed. Just enough to get away. She had to get the report in.
Fate brought Bardiche back up, switching him to Assault form. She'd prefer to fight in close, but binds were a lot easier to form in melee ranges. If she stayed in there, even a Sonic Move might not get her out before the bind snapped shut. Medium range it was.
She raised her left hand, a yellow control ring forming around her wrist and a crackling ball of electricity forming in front of the hand. A Midchildan rune circle spun out under her feet, and then another spun into existence in front of her. The target wasn't moving yet.
"Trident..."
---N====================>V---
Sunday, June 11, New Calendar Year 0076 (2017 CE)
Interdimensional Space
Time-Space Administration Bureau Main Office
Hayate Yagami leaned back in her chair, rubbing her eyes. "Rein, have I ever mentioned how much I hate prophecies?"
The white-haired chibi looked up. "Um, well..."
"Three times in the past week or so, that I've heard," a man mentioned from behind - as he leaned forward to lay a cup of coffee on her desk.
Hayate leaned forward, cupping it in her hands and soaking in the warmth. "Mmmmm, Vice-kun, you're a life-saver."
The marksman smirked slightly. "No, just bored and between deployments. How's it going?"
Hayate held up a finger. "Love Carim. Hate her ability." Vice was technically not cleared to know about Carim's Prophezeien Shriftlich, but Signum had apparently told him at some point - probably to make sure he could keep a better eye on the forwards during the JS Incident a year ago. While technically not quite within regulations, it was more or less an open secret anyway. "Do you have any idea how many lands can be associated with 'ancient crystals'?"
"I'm going to go out on a limb and say 'a lot'."
"There are less inhabited planets that aren't," Reinforce piped up. "The prophecy just says they have to be there, so everything from Midchilda to Verusea to Earth and Orusia counts."
Vice chuckled. "Any better luck with the rest of the prophecy?"
Hayate shook her head mournfully. "None whatsoever. Holy land, central lands... we don't even know who it's supposed to be holy and central to. Still... at least Ground Force Command is paying attention now, so we don't need to hold Mobile Six in readiness."
Vice leaned back against the edge of Hayate's research cubicle, crossing his arms. "So why're you looking this up, anyway? I thought the JS Incident was what the prophecy was talking about."
Hayate sighed, leaning back in towards the computer and taking a sip of coffee. Ahh... wakefulness. "So did we. Then this year when she was making her prophecies, the same one came out again."
"Carim doesn't see the past, only the future," commented Vita as she stepped into the room, face barely visible over the huge stack of papers in her hands.
"Gah, you okay with that, Lieutenant?" Vice didn't move to help her, though - last time he'd tried that, years ago, she'd whacked him upside the head with what he was offering to help with (at the time, it was a rather large number of books). He'd wait for a request.
Vita just smirked, hefted them up, and let them drop on the desk with a thunk. "No problems." She turned back to Vice. "Anyway, since the prophecy showed up again, we - meaning Chrono, Carim, Lindy, you know - figure it's still about the future and we just missed the mark."
"Either that, or Prophezeien Schriftlich is on the fritz," Hayate added.
Vice winced. "Need any help other than coffee? Research isn't one of my skills, but I don't have anything else to do until Ground Command finds somewhere to put me."
Vita shook her head. "Nah, just keep an eye out for any dancing dead. Knowing your skills at poetry that's probably the only part you'd get anyway." She hopped up into her chair.
"Harsh, but true. I could recite some of the ones I tried to make for my last girlfriend if you wanted proof."
Hayate laughed. "No, no need, we believe you. The coffee's good though, and any other fetch and carry you've got time for would be great."
Vice raised an eyebrow. "You just want a temporary slave, dontcha?"
"You caught me. Now serve!"
"Yes, yes Mistress," Vice chuckled, waving slightly as he left the room.
Hayate covered a giggle. It was fun to goof off every so often. Then she took a sip of coffee - and it was pretty damned good coffee, Vice must be crazily popular for night and morning shifts - and dove back into the TSA world records. Something specific had to show up...
"You sure it's okay?" Vita spoke up. "To tell him and not the others, I mean?"
Hayate took another sip. "Not really, but... if Nanoha knows the prophecy is probably still in force, you know there's no way we'll get her to take a leave of absence. She still hasn't recovered fully from everything she did in the Cradle, and it's been like half a year... I don't want her to finish herself off."
"What about Fate? I mean, she's an investigator too."
Hayate nodded. "Yup. And remember how good Fate is at lying? Especially to Nanoha?"
Vita's pained expression said all that needed be said.
"Yuuno's better at it, at least when it comes to her health. Which is a good thing, since we might need to dig into the Infinite Library."
Rein's turn to wince. "He still hasn't managed to get that organized yet, has he?"
"Nope. If this turns out to be personal to Nanoha, though... Yuuno will tell her, and there's no stopping her from there. For now, though, since the mighty ferret-man keeps a close eye on Vivio, it's not necessary and he won't risk Nanoha's health by getting her worked up again."
Vita snickered. "One of the best defensive mages in the dimensional sea, and he got himself stuck with all his nicknames commenting on his ferret form."
"The perils of learning shapeshifting." Hayate nodded solemnly, keeping the giggle down. "Okay... back to work."
---N====================>V---
Sunday, June 11, New Calendar Year 0076 (2017 CE)
Lower Atmosphere, Uninhabited World
She needed to get away, fighting a veteran almost twice her age in the air when she could barely fly was suicide, and if she could get away she could try to punch through the jamming and tell Fate she was fine, rather than expect Fate to carry the team and protect her.
The Suvota swirled around the Crossfire Shoot bullets Tea had sent to chase her off, flying down after her... catching up pretty easily, too, Teana's speed was garbage. Those darts were coming out again, but not quite hitting at their current range. Though that was less thanks to Teana's attempts at evasive maneuvers as it was the fact that she couldn't fly straight.
Teana swung her left-hand weapon back, switching it to gun form and firing a few more bullets back at the Suvota. Cross Mirage gave a confirmation report of the spell: "Bullet F." She could hear it, too, the ringing in her ears was mostly dying down.
While the target-seeking bullets gave the Suvota something to chew on, Teana angled her flight upward, popping a pair of cartridges to give it some extra thrust. She needed altitude, potential energy was everything in aerial combat and she was starting to doubt she'd get away from a much faster and more experienced opponent like this.
Flying up through the clouds, her eyes watered - the sun was painfully bright, but with her sensory spells jammed, visual was all she had, so she didn't dare close her eyes. The clouds were also shot through with black, making her very, very glad for her barrier jacket's environmental protections - she didn't even want to guess what toxins were in them now.
Cross Mirage reported the Suvota had shot down her bullets and was coming after her again. It'd be nice if she could hide out in the clouds like this, but her path up had left a trail, the Suvota would find her easily... what to do?
'Fate! Can you hear me?!' Nothing. Looked like she was on her own unless the jamming faded... the sky was way too big for her and Fate to find each other at this point, especially if Fate was busy with the other Suvota. And Teana's was on her tail and closing fast... twenty meters now.
"V-Dagger." Teana reversed her flight, dropping back through the cloud at full speed, both her guns switched to dagger mode.
The Suvota's eyes were wide as they slammed into each other, Teana's daggers biting into the Suvota's staff - she'd got it up to block in time, but the Suvota's basic barrier wasn't quite enough to completely deflect Teana's concentrated blades.
The Suvota drew back the staff to protect it, spinning and trying to stab with the sharp end. Teana, though, had switched Cross Mirage back to dual-gun mode, and started firing at point-blank range.
The staff-thrust connected, punching through Teana's barrier and lodging its end in her belly, but it cost the Suvota, as about four magical bullets smashed into her own barrier, crashing it and allowing a fifth to hit her ribcage with a loud 'crack'.
The Suvota gritted her teeth and flew back, away from her opponent, as did Teana. Both were firing at full pace, but while a few bullets and darts glanced off barriers and others shot one another down, as the range grew and both started maneuvering to evade, it was mostly misses... though as Teana jerked her head to the left lest a blue dart lodge itself in her eye, she reflected that the misses still came pretty close.
---N====================>V---
Sunday, June 11, New Calendar Year 0076 (2017 CE)
Upper Atmosphere, Uninhabited World
"... Smasher!" Three wide columns of crackling yellow magic arced out from the point where Fate slammed the charged sphere into the form array in front of her. She still couldn't hear her own words, though.
She'd have really preferred to say they were arrest or the like, but the Suvota Compact was the single largest swathe of space to consistently refuse TSA membership and authority - and had a battlecruiser in orbit. She'd just evoke laughter, if not outright rage. Especially given that she really didn't have much of a case at this point - she had no idea what, precisely, she'd be trying to arrest them - outside of her jurisdiction - for.
And talking things through... she wanted to. She really wanted to. But it was a little difficult when they'd attacked in the first place (and in honesty... she had been spying on them, justifiable but still espionage), let alone when she was temporarily deaf, and jammed too heavily to get a word out.
And she didn't have time to get through to them socially when her apprentice might be falling to her death, if not fighting more of them.
The three beams arced back together, moving to slam into Blue... but the cossack had dropped, accelerating downward, and the bombardment spell only skimmed her boots. No barrier... understandable, since a Suvota probably couldn't put up a barrier strong enough to really do much against one of Fate's bigger spells anyway.
Blue waved her staff in Fate's direction, unleashing a pale blue, almost-invisible ripple of air - a shooter bolt, Fate thought it was just one, but very, very efficient, almost none of its power was wasted as light.
It was coming in pretty fast, too, but evasion at this range, especially for someone as fast as Fate, was very, very easy, simply a matter of floating around the edge of an imaginary five-hundred meter circle centered on the cossack.
Fate was still a little surprised when the bolt continued after her - in this jamming, a mentally-controlled shooter spell shouldn't be controllable... maybe it was a seeker, like Teana's? Those weren't all that common, and fairly difficult to learn.
It was, however, still only one medium-power magical bullet. For all its efficiency and skill... it still didn't have the punch to do anything. Fate just wrapped a small barrier around her left hand - she could hear an echo that she thought might have been Bardiche's report, that he was starting up Thunder Arm - and punched the bullet from the sky, before dashing in at the Suvota cossack.
---N====================>V---
22:34 Sunday, June 11, 2017 CE
Takamachi Residence, Clanagan, Midchilda - Administrated World #1
"Thanks for the help, Yuuno-kun," Nanoha commented, as she finished putting the paper towels away.
The blonde archaeologist chuckled, rubbing the back of his head a little nervously. "No, it's no problem. Fate's on duty, and Vivio can be a bit of a handful, so..."
"Hey! No fair!"
"Whoops." They turned to the door of the kitchen, where Vivio Takamachi stood, pouting. "I don't mean that in a bad way, you know."
"You guys are the handful. Remember last week?"
Nanoha sweatdropped. "I had free time. I wanted a picture."
Yuuno, for his part, had just linked his hands behind his back and studiously refrained from meeting Vivio's gaze.
Vivio just sighed deeply. "It was embarrassing!"
Yuuno blinked, raising a finger. "Actually, it's the duty of a parent to embarrass their children."
"... Seriously?"
Nanoha nodded solemnly. "Ask any."
Vivio looked a little suspicious. "You'd tell them to answer yes."
Nanoha and Yuuno traded glances. 'Way too precocious.'
'Well, you were pretty precocious yourself... Guess it fits that your daughter is too.'
'I'm sorry, mama, if I was ever this precocious.' Nanoha ducked down to meet Vivio face to face (studiously ignoring Yuuno's quick chuckle at her telepathy). "If you want to ask, I promise, I won't."
Vivio looked up. "... You sure?"
"Absolutely. I'm sure about everything, whether I'm right or not."
Yuuno sweatdropped, knowing just how true that one was. Vivio sweatdropped too, though less from knowing the context and more from having no idea how to respond to a comment like that.
Nanoha tossed in her brightest smile for good measure.
"... Okay."
Yuuno leaned down as well. "I'm going to have to head back for a little while, Vivio. Do you want me to bring anything from the library next time I manage to come?"
Vivio tapped her lip. "Um... fiction."
Yuuno nodded. "I'll make sure to bring a few you'll like."
Nanoha rubbed her neck, working away an ache from this morning - one of her students had improved a bit faster than she'd expected. "Are you heading out soon, Yuuno-kun?"
Yuuno sighed as he stood up. "Going to have to, I need to get some sleep in before a meeting in about ten hours."
"Darn... well... I'll see you later." Nanoha stood as well.
"Might be quite a bit later, my schedule's a little crazy for the next week - you going to be okay?"
Nanoha nodded. "Yeah, I'm on free time right now - my last training group just graduated today."
"Oh? How'd they do?"
Nanoha smiled. "They're off to a decent start. One of them scored a hit on me."
Yuuno whistled. "Nice. Was that the one you were talking about before... Anna Roemer, right?"
"Yeah, it was - she's probably had the most potential I've trained since the Forwards. If they keep up the training programs I showed them, they'll be really good in a while."
Yuuno grinned. "I think it might be more you than them, but maybe I'm biased."
Nanoha chuckled. "I'm not that good, all I can do is bring out their potential."
Vivio looked from Yuuno to Nanoha. "... Wow. Totally missed it. Good luck, Yuuno-papa."
---N====================>V---
Sunday, June 11, New Calendar Year 0076 (2017 CE)
Upper Atmosphere, Uninhabited World
Fate blinked Wait... she'd heard that last attack clearly. "Stop this! We have nothing to fight over!"
Blue halted her rearward flight, cocking her head. "If that were the case, you would not be spying on us."
"A black ops battlecruiser going near TSA worlds to perform a weapons test isn't something to spy on?"
"And how would you have known about the weapons test if you weren't spying in the first place?"
Fate winced. She'd made the best decision she could... and it turned out to be right, but that wouldn't really talk the Suvota down. She wasn't that good with words, what could she say... other than the truth? "... You're right. But fighting over this is pointless, and I have the advantage right now... let's just end this and go home."
Blue raised one eyebrow. "Even if you defeat me, can you do it fast enough to escape? Aigaion has a complement of one hundred and eighty cossacks. And while my apprentice is a little careless, she will at the very least keep yours busy for just as long. As soon as the jamming drops, they will find us."
"But just because you can win-"
"Does not mean I should? A decent point, but my orders are simple - to provide security for the test. You infiltrated the testing grounds without permission, and will be taken into custody. There's no need to worry, with your skills the TSAB is quite likely to give a few minor concessions for your release."
"... So that's it?"
"Well, there is one more thing..." Fate suddenly felt magic building up in the space around her. Another one of those long-range binds.
Fate triggered another Sonic Move, flashing around in a circle and coming around with a downward slash from behind Blue... whose instinct was apparently just as quick as Fate's, since she already had her staff braced in both hands behind her head, blocking the axe-head from connecting, before spinning her body and staff, flinging Fate away.
The Suvota took the time granted by tossing Fate to turn around and properly face her, staff glowing, angular bolts of magic forming around her body. "It seems the disruption effect is starting to fade. Which means..."
Her staff had its own comment: "Probnaya Pulya," in a mechanical, rote tone of voice.
Fate sighed and switched Bardiche to scythe mode. She was going to have to cut all of these down, wasn't she?
---N====================>V---
Sunday, June 11, New Calendar Year 0076 (2017 CE)
Lower Atmosphere, Uninhabited World
Teana swung her right-hand gun forward, and fired a few shots into the Suvota's wide-eyed face. Apparently she wasn't that surprised, though, since she had a reasonably solid barrier up and it stayed up until the Suvota had backed away.
Teana floated back herself... she was kind of getting the hang of this, actually. Far fewer wobbles.
For the moment, neither launched an attack, both heaving for breath.
Teana was nursing the pain in her gut, forming a microbarrier to keep too much blood from pouring out - she lacked the time to use bandages. She was also trying to refrain from throwing up after that last hit.
The younger-looking Suvota, for her part, was taking some time to fix her device - Teana hadn't cut into the main core, just the frame. And Teana caught a flash of pain on her face, and her hand jerking towards her ribcage - she caught herself before fully giving it away, but Teana remembered where she'd scored the hit. A little blood was dripping from her right hip, rolling off the triangular armour plates that composed her 'skirt' from the dagger hit Teana had got at the very start of the fight, but it didn't seem too bad.
Teana considered attacking while the Suvota was at a bit of a disadvantage... but she was just as badly-off, and had no particular care to expose herself to a trap while she was recovering - she know she had set up a couple of trap binds before starting her break, and expected much the same from the Suvota.
Ugh... Now that the adrenaline was fading, Teana's right arm was starting to ache... the problem with blocking blunt impact weapons was that whatever you blocked with still got hit full-force.
The Suvota took a deep breath, and stood up straight. "You can surrender, da? You go down, I not sure I able to catch." Her grammar was iffy and her accent very thick, but it was understandable.
Teana straightened up herself, clenching her right hand to see if that made the ache settle a little... it seemed to. "You could've asked before attacking, you know."
The Suvota shrugged. "You deaf at time. And bomb foul up transmitti... trasni... transmissions."
Teana brought her dagger and gun up. "Well, we wouldn't have surrendered anyway, we didn't do anything wrong."
"That matter for politicians. Soldiers follow order." The Suvota raised her - newly-repaired - staff.
"If that's the way you want it."
The Suvota grinned. "Name Planya."
Teana blinked, and shrugged. Nothing to lose, and it was a fair enough trade. "Teana Lanster."
"Back on the clock." Planya brought up her staff, and the tip began glowing dark blue.
Teana switched both of Cross Mirage's bodies to gun mode, and raised them.
"Kalyonaya Strela!" And there was that flurry of darts again.
Teana didn't yell out her own trigger, but Cross Mirage did it for her: "Shoot Bullet."
They traded shots, orange and blue magic lashing out at each other - Planya was trying to shoot at Teana, Teana was shooting down Planya's darts. But even firing at full speed from both guns, she didn't have enough time to get a shot at Planya herself... in fact, she was losing the speed match, the darts were getting steadily closer and closer to her before she hit them.
So Teana leaned back and flew away at full speed. Which wasn't that full a speed, but it was fast enough that Planya's darts were no longer gaining ground on her.
At least, until Planya herself moved after her - she'd stopped firing, though. If she were a typical Suvota, she'd want to save the mana. Since humans had higher average reserves, even though Teana was pretty unspectacular as far as power went, she could probably keep firing longer than Planya could.
Teana turned to face in the direction she was going, and flattened her arms against her torso to minimize drag, increasing her speed just a bit. Her sensors picked up a quick magical buildup behind herself, and she angled to the left as another four dark blue magical bullets shot past her.
Up, up, up! Teana detonated her last two cartridges to put on a burst of speed, climbing straight into the clouds. This time, though, she had a plan, which she put into action as soon as she was above the cloud cover... above the real clouds, anyway, the toxic black ones from the explosion were still there.
Optic Hide. Fake Silhouette. She couldn't reduce her speed too much, a sharp acceleration or deceleration would break her invisibility, but she could slow down a little, sending her illusionary self up ahead of her while she put another clip of cartridges into Cross Mirage. This also wouldn't let her get away, once Planya started actively searching she'd see through Teana's illusions quickly enough. But what it could do...
Planya burst up out of the clouds, not sparing a glance at Teana's real self - why would she, after all? She'd already seen a Teana running away and set off after her. And Planya really couldn't be expected to realize that Teana was the illusionist - a rare and rather difficult skill like that would be expected from the senior Enforcer, not her aide.
Teana shifted to the side slightly to let Planya pass her, and then settled in behind, bringing her guns up. She'd want to give Planya a little more distance, though, the more skilled flyer would be able to retake the advantage a lot easier if they were close together.
And... she was out of time when Planya fired another narrow beam of dark blue up at her illusion... and through it. The illusion winked out instantly, and Planya jerked back slightly, looking around in surprise.
Teana set off two more cartridges, and fired a pair of seeker bullets, before following it up with a fusillade of more regular ones. Her invisibility spell dropped, but Planya had a bit more to worry about right now.
And Teana, pursuing and firing as fast as she could, just watched in awe as the Suvota showed just what an aerial veteran could do. Planya rolled out to the left... then the right... it was so casual, but the normal bullets kept falling short, every time Teana hit the trigger, Planya was already out of her sights. The seekers were still on-target, though... until Planya simply spun her body clockwise at the last second, decelerating sharply and passing between them, smashing both into nothing with quick staff-blows. She curled up into a ball, rolled forward a bit and then stretched back out - completely inverted and facing Teana - before diving at her.
Teana, wide-eyed, snapped off a shot, but they were both charging straight at each other at full speed - Planya's darts, and Teana's bullets, both missed as they flashed past each other, Teana flying above, Planya almost back down to the clouds.
Teana rolled up her own body in an attempt to copy Planya's quick turnaround. It worked, sort of, though Teana was pretty sure that if she tried to decelerate and speed up again that fast, she'd break her flight spell again, so she was still flying backwards - upwards.
Planya had, for her part, not turned around - she seemed to be trying to halt her dive and come back up, but... it was so sluggish...
She shed a lot of velocity on that turn, and she's so low she has nearly zero potential energy... that's about three seconds from stall. Still... she's good, it'll take just a moment for her to get her speed and maneuvering energy back up... Shot like this, I wouldn't forgive myself if I didn't take it.
"Phantom..." Teana aimed both guns at Planya's slowly-accelerating body. The orange target ring swirled out to direct the spell as soon as it was fired... A sphere of magic formed between the guns, projecting a laser sight - the red dot caressed Planya's left leg (hm, she wasn't intimately familiar with Suvota-issue jackets, but she thought they wore pants, not tights... and the huge skirt was definitely unusual), so Tea shifted her aim 'down' a bit (since she was firing from upside-down, that moved the dot up to more solidly on Planya's back).
Planya must've caught sight of the light, because she turned around, still gaining speed, but forming a large magical circle in front of her...
Two cartridges for a bit of kick. "... Blazer!"
As Teana's column of orange magic arced out, her eyes widened - an ice-blue one roared up to meet it. Suvota didn't have enough reserves to cast bombardment spells... shouldn't, that is.
---N====================>V---
Sunday, June 11, New Calendar Year 0076 (2017 CE)
Upper Atmosphere, Uninhabited World
The pattern established so far hadn't changed, much to Fate's frustration. Blue hadn't yet managed to really seize the offensive beyond a few very small, somewhat tentative attacks, but Fate's attacks hadn't quite gotten through her defences either.
Both had separated again for a bit of breathing room before going at it again. Blue seemed content not to speak, and Fate had a feeling she'd put her foot in her mouth if she tried. At the least she needed another angle to argue if she wanted to calm this down...
That was when the first telepathic message that could be heard since the explosion came through. It wasn't words, though. Just a girl... a short scream.
Fate's blood chilled, and she looked down and to the left, in the direction of that call. Teana...
The Suvota cossack's own expression looked much the same as she turned that way herself...
Both turned sharply back to face each other.
"I don't have any more time to spend on you." Both spoke at once. And neither looked in a mood to let the other go save their apprentice - and capture the other. The apprentices would capture each other... but whoever won this battle won it all.
At this range, the Suvota wouldn't possibly be fast enough to evade a bombardment spell. Not one of hers. Fate set off two cartridges, rune circles spinning out again. "Plasma..."
Blue raised her staff in her left hand. "Vyzhivanie, shift."
"Svobodnaya Figura," the staff intoned.
Fate slammed the charged ball of mana into the directional array, unleashing a single roiling beam of superheated air and electricity - this close in, the extra prongs of the trident wouldn't be able to arc back in to hit the target anyway, so they were just wasted power.
The beam roared in... and Fate stared as it split in two, one beam flying to the left of her target, the other to the right.
As it faded, Fate could once again see Blue - standing there calmly, palms outstretched to the sides... no staff, but a solid-looking bracer wrapped around her left arm. "Magical Conversion Affinity - Lightning. It makes attacks a great deal more powerful than raw mana, but it also opens the attacks up to manipulation via attraction fields."
Fate gritted her teeth. She didn't have time for this. "Cartridge Load." Sonic Move. Around, and behind, Bardiche switching to scythe form. Without the staff, Blue wouldn't be able to block this, even if she could track what was nearly a flash of lightning.
As she came in to slash, Blue hadn't even reacted to her disappearance yet... this was it.
But before Fate quite reached Blue... she noticed the magic woven into the space around Blue too late, by the time she saw it she'd slammed into it, and a thin, pale blue chain swirling into existence, lashing her arms together above her head.
Blue's bracer commented: "Clyuch Czep," as Blue turned to face Fate.
Fate was a little wide-eyed. A close-range trap bind... completely unavoidable if you walked into them... "How did you make it so fast?"
Blue smiled gently. "It was made before you ever charged. Before you fired, in fact." She aimed her left palm at Fate, a sphere of almost-clear blue forming in it. "Now, will you surrender? From your records, Fate Hallaoun, bind-breakers are not one of your specialties. You would succeed, but not before I finished you off. Please don't force this to end in injury."
Fate smiled herself. "Your records aren't complete, then. Bardiche, Jacket Purge - Overdrive."
"Sonic Form." Fate's barrier jacket shattered into light, blinding Blue (though probably not doing much damage), destroying most of Fate's clothing... but more importantly, disintegrating the cossack's bind.
As the light faded, Bardiche switched to Riot Zanber - two shorter blades, connected by a string of magic. She needed to finish this fast, before Aigaion's complement arrived - even she wouldn't be able to take on one hundred and eighty cossacks - though she was mostly sure they weren't all as good as Blue - and if the jamming was fading, she was running out of time. And while surrender was technically an option, she did not want to be a burden on the TSAB and her friends in it.
Blue saw Fate, and shook her head sadly. "You actually plan to fight like that? I can feel your mana level skyrocketing... but you're pulling that straight from your linker core, aren't you? It's like you're peeling it off and throwing it out at me."
Fate brought up both blades. "I'll recover."
Blue sighed, and dissolved the blue sphere of magic she'd been charging. She clasped her hands. "You're completely lacking in defences. You're liable to die if you're hit."
Fate nodded agreeably. "If." Full speed. No point going around behind, Blue clearly expected that... then again, she did have three dimensions to play with. In from above, slashing across with both blades...
... except that Blue wasn't there.
"There's no need to risk your life," the cossack's voice lectured from... behind her?!
Fate whirled around. Blue stood some distance behind her, hands still clasped. How... how had she done that?
"As long as you survive and work hard, any amount of power you want will fall into your hands. There's no rush." She raised her left hand. "Don't make me finish this."
Fate frowned. If Blue's own speed were really as safe as she made it seem, wouldn't she have used it from the start...? Fate only held Sonic back because, as they'd just discussed, it fried a number of nerve endings and left her very vulnerable to anything that stood a chance of hitting her - it was more a desperation maneuver than something in her regular arsenal. Unless she only had a few uses of it... Which would mean... she's trying to intimidate a surrender out of me before she runs out. Fate could feel a burst of magic around this area... it most definitely wasn't a normal dash spell like hers, but she couldn't quite lock it down. Bardiche's recordings would let them figure it out back on Albion, though.
Fate took a deep breath... and charged again. Straight-in, she needed to run down the Suvota's reserves before her body started slowing down.
Before she got more than just started, though, Blue's left hand flared with light and noise... painfully bright, searing at her eyes, howling into her eardrums... Fate screeched to a halt, unable to focus.
"Krepkaya Kletka," Blue's bracer commented, and as Fate finally managed to open her eyes, she saw a pale blue, barely-visible ripple of air between her and... everything. She was trapped in a pyramidal cage, and her arms were wrapped again by that thin chain...
Blue's staff was back in her hands, and the jewel at its tip pointed straight between Fate's eyes. "You pushed yourself too far, Hallaoun. Be more careful with your body, and with your attacks. You only have the one life."
Fate gritted her teeth.
The staff-tip started crackling. "You also only have the one barrier jacket, so you can't pull that purge trick again. I'll say this once more: If you attempt to break the bind, I will fire. With your defences down like that, this will probably kill you even with me holding back. Surrender."
... She didn't want to give up, but... she couldn't think of anything. Charging up any of her spells like this would take time... time that Blue could quite easily use to fire any of a dozen spells through Fate's essentially-unprotected head. Still... she could - and did - transmit all of Bardiche's recordings back to Albion. Hopefully it got through... as long as she got the information about the Suvota's new weapon back to command, they were oka... oh dear.
Fate looked up as a massive shadow dropped over them... five connected hulls, sharp angles and long curves, black and red... it was Aigaion.
... Yeah, this was over.
'Let them go, Colonel. We don't want a war.' Fate wasn't familiar with that young woman's voice... but she suspected it was Admiral Alaya.
Blue looked up. 'Our orders are to-'
'New orders. Let them go.'
Blue nodded, and lowered her staff. The cage and chain around Fate dissolved.
Fate quickly recreated her barrier jacket, switching Bardiche back to regular Assault Form. '... Thank you.'
'No need for that. This is not a favour, and need not be repaid or thanked - I am simply carrying out my duties. Call your apprentice back, and withdraw to your ship.'
Fate nodded slowly. While she didn't quite trust this turn of fortune yet... the fact remained that if Teana and she were together, they could just run, rather than fighting to get to each other. 'Teana, can you hear me?' She hoped Teana hadn't been the one to scream...
'... Eh? Fate? When'd the jamming drop?'
'Just a little while ago. Can you come up here? We seem to have come to terms with the Suvota for the moment.'
Fate could 'hear' Teana's blink. 'Um... is me carrying up the unconscious body of one of them going to cause a problem with that?' Fate had to spare a proud smile for Teana - she was admittedly more Nanoha's student than Fate's, but still... it was good to see someone you'd been involved in training succeed.
Blue turned to Fate. "No, it will not. In fact I would appreciate if you brought Planya back." Clearly, she'd been listening in. "As long as her injuries are not severe, I will also hold no grudge for having rendered her unconscious. She needed the lesson... splitting up mid-combat in a jammed zone..." Blue just shook her head, ponytail bobbing from side to side.
Fate sweatdropped slightly. 'It doesn't look like it.'
It was a bit of an uncomfortable silence for a few minutes. Fate and Blue didn't really have much to say to each other that hadn't already been said, and the ominous mass of a very large naval battlecruiser hovering overhead just added to the whole... ambiance.
But soon enough, Teana came into sight - Fate could see a rather large bandage wrapped around her stomach and trails of blood that had dripped down over her legs, but she was otherwise hale and hearty, carrying what looked like a ten-year-old girl in her arms. She was all right...
Teana continued floating upward - still wobbling a bit, but rather less than she had been before. She nodded slightly to Blue, as she passed the small Suvota off to the older cossack. "She's... very good. And... sorry about her Device, it broke when she tried to block."
Blue's expression looked a little sour - a bit irritated. "Clearly, her tactics did not keep up with her skills. Thank you for refraining from killing her. And catching her after you shot her down."
Teana shook her head, raising her hands. "No, no... don't worry about it." She looked to Fate. 'Sorry. I was trying to get back to you or get in contact with you, but she was too good...'
Fate shook her head. 'Don't worry about it. I had much the same problem.'
Blue nodded. "I'll leave you to this, then." She rose towards the huge battlecruiser.
Fate turned, and started heading back towards Albion, Teana settling in at her side.
The telepathic voice she presumed was Alaya came through once again: 'By the by. You may want to get decontaminated before you drop your barrier jackets or walk into unshielded areas. The bomb has highly toxic aftereffects aside from the jamming, and one of you seems to have been flying through clouds of reactor and engine fuel to boot.'
Fate sent back an acknowledgement, and factored that into the little they presently knew about the Suvota's new weapon.
"You know..." Teana began.
Fate turned to her. "Hm?"
"I really hope those were the best they had."
Fate cocked her head. "Why?"
"One tangled with you and didn't go down for several minutes on end... If they were average..."
"Well... at the very least, they're well above average. The average Suvota cossack will usually lose against an average TSA mage, and... well, I don't know about yours, but mine did not hold out against me. She defeated me."
"... Shit."
---N====================>V---
Sunday, June 11, New Calendar Year 0076 (2017 CE)
Interdimensional Space
Suvota Compact Naval Service, Strigon Battlecruiser SX-005 Aigaion
The Sakhalin-class battlecruiser possessed a raised section with a very large window that looked down over the ship's body.
That was not, however, the bridge. It was too exposed - that entire raised section was actually a guest area and observation deck. The actual bridge was buried deep within the Sakhalin's hull, very nearly at the center.
Colonel Svetlaya strode in that direction, a little irritated. The inner halls of the Sakhalin - plain white bulkheads, largely undecorated, lacking even signs and arrows and you-are-here maps (a defensive measure against boarding, people who belonged there could access the computer to navigate if lost and the memories of the old Velkan tactics still struck terror into academy students, even after generations) - passed by smoothly, uneventfully. The whole ship was quite aesthetically boring right now, most of the personal touches had been taken down for this test. And Svetlaya had heard that Strigon's ships had quite a few personal touches normally, artwork created by the crew and the like - Alaya was very much a follower of the 'Navy is my family' school of thought, apparently. A few crewmen passed by her, saluting - she acknowledged them with nods and continued on.
And then she was at a red door. Svetlaya raised a hand to tap her crystalline pendant, and it opened for her. She stepped through.
The bridge was unlike TSA two-tier designs - Suvota bridges were simply a long downwards slope, the Captain's chair was at the highest point at the rear, and then crew stations and information displays spread downward and outward until reaching the primary viewscreen at the far ends.
Svetlaya nodded to the tall blonde Suvota man at the chair - Captain Sipij, the nominal commander of Aigaion, though since it was an Admiral's flagship, Alaya had overall command.
Speaking of which, Svetlaya saw her down towards the bottom of the ship, peering at one of the information displays - it looked like a graph of some sort. Svetlaya started towards her.
Alaya wasn't a very tall young woman, and was very young to hold the position she did - only fifty years old, though due to Suvota longevity her body was that of a human twenty-year-old. Not very tall, but a little taller than Svetlaya - Svetlaya was actually a great deal older, but aged unusually slowly even for a Suvota - and thin, in good shape despite not being any more qualified for combat duties than the basic minimum. Long dark hair, dark purple eyes, and of course the Suvota pointed ears. Her clothing wasn't that unusual - laced-up boots, white stockings, dark green coat with white trim and a white ruffled jabot worn at the collar, and a short white skirt, plus a short dark green cape hung at the back. Standard-issue naval duty uniform, though she omitted all rank insignia other than the flag officer's cape (and Svetlaya had heard she had a habit of taking it off as well), and the coat was not actually fastened at her waist, leaving her midriff bare. Probably for comfort, the midline fastener tended to be a bit tight.
Alaya looked back over her shoulder. 'Ah, Svetlaya. I've been expecting you.' Telepathy... well, it was a good choice, Svetlaya had a few things to say that would somewhat break discipline if she mentioned them in front of Alaya's subordinates.
Svetlaya leaned on one of the far walls, looking back at Alaya. 'I checked the communication logs. We received no messages from Estovakia since hours before the test began. Or anywhere else, for that matter.'
Alaya nodded agreeably. 'You're right, we didn't. There were no new orders, that was my own initiative. What do you think of Hallaoun?'
'She has definite potential, but she's a bit careless with herself. If she survives that carelessness, though, she'll be very, very impressive in the next decade. Her apprentice, though... now that one is interesting. Anyone can be a force to be reckoned with if they have a surplus of power, but that one... from Planya's logs, she was actually less powerful than Planya.'
'Sounds like that one will be even more problematic in a few years. And last longer, since most high-power human mages burn out by thirty. I rather hope that if we have to fight them, it's after those two have passed away from old age.'
'Also, though you clearly know my interests, I am not deflected that easily. They saw the test, Admiral. We need to keep it from leaking.'
Alaya raised a finger. 'Do we? They saw the test, yes. But. They don't know whether that was our initial test, our final test, or just a demonstration after testing was complete. All they know is that we are at some point in the development of a weapon that can destroy an entire naval squadron in one shot. Or a city.' She started pacing. 'They don't know its operating parameters - they don't know that it takes mere seconds to fire, unlike their existing superheavy Arc-en-Ciel cannon. They don't know that the range far exceeds any other weapon. They don't know it can be entirely automated, and make up for our lack of personnel. Because they do not know, they must assume the worst.'
Svetlaya raised an eyebrow. 'That we have it, it is the perfect weapon, and we are going to fire it at their cities if they look at us wrong? Please.'
'Exactly. And that they cannot do anything about it, because they do not know what it is. Which means they fear us. And that fear... that is what will keep them from attacking us. They know we can do a bit more, but they don't know how much more. They're now paranoid. Why do you think we were to perform the test so close to TSA space? I'd call this a complete success.'
'The test was a failure. The Pluto system cannot be effectively fired from a Sakhalin's hangar bay, it takes too much time.'
'But they don't know that, and by the time they find out, the Kievan-class will be rolling out. The idea that it would be cheaper to fire from an existing ship's hangar bay was the last argument against it. The test was a failure, but the operation... that was a success.'
Svetlaya nodded shortly. 'Well, it is a little too late to do anything more than hope that you are right. So I do. But I will still include this in my report to the Prime Minister.'
Alaya bowed her head. 'Of course. And if I am wrong, I will be reprimanded most thoroughly.'
---N====================>V---
Sunday, June 11, New Calendar Year 0076 (2017 CE)
L2 Orbit, Earth's Moon
Silver Ghost Flagship Sraionte
From Earth, nobody would see them - they were stationed in a geosynchronous orbit, what was known as the Number 2 Lagrange Point of Earth and its moon. In common parlance, they were on the dark side of the moon - its shadow hid them from any observers.
The halls of Sraionte were empty. Dark.
The only life within them was a tall, white-haired woman in a long grey duster, striding purposefully through the darkness. She could not see either wall in the darkness, or much else, but she knew where she was going.
Ahead, there were a few lights from a handful of consoles. In the center of those consoles, there was a high-backed chair, turned away from the room's door.
She stepped in, snapped to attention, and delivered a crisp salute. "The repairs are as complete as they can be made, and our supplies are stocked up once more."
"Oh? That's good to hear. At ease."
The woman spread her legs to shoulder-width, clasping her hands behind her back. "Yes ma'am."
"So what's our status?"
"The ships were positively decrepit. It took me five years to fix up and reactivate enough repair drones to be as well-off as we are now."
"Mm, it's understandable, we've been sealed away for quite some time. Are the personnel manufacturing facilities in working order?"
She winced. "I'm afraid not. The existing biomass degraded, and they're highly toxic right now. I've tried a few test builds, but they don't have the neural matter to hold a consciousness."
One of the consoles dimmed. A slim hand reached out from behind the chair to stroke it softly, and it lit back up. "That's okay. I know that wasn't your specialty. We'll just have to find another solution. How's the rest?"
"The rest of our functions are in solid condition - guns, engines, main cannon, shields. Our crew lack bodies and are mostly asleep, but they are still capable of operating. We will have to provide tactical direction, though."
"I suppose that's as good as can be expected. I have some news as well. Unfortunately, yours is the good news."
"Ma'am?"
"There hasn't been a war in almost a hundred years. There isn't a single experienced soldier in service any more. They're cattle for the slaughter."
"... What about the Silver Light?"
A hand waved from behind the chair, and nine diamond-shaped blue jewels rose in a halo above it. "Just nine. We won't be able to set off the true Silver Light with just nine keys."
"... There are going to be a lot of deaths, then."
---N====================>V---
00:11 Monday, June 12, 2017 CE
Tokyo, Japan, Earth - Non-Administrated World #97
"Buena Tarde, Anunciar."
Kanata's eyes opened with a blink, staring up into the night sky. It wasn't really as pretty as it should be... the sky never looked that great from cities. "Huh?" Voice... was odd. Too soft...
Kanata looked down.
"... She wasn't kidding about giving up my body..." It wasn't familiar in the slightest. Oh, it was human, but... given that there was no clothing on, Kanata could tell pretty easily that 'he' was now 'she'. Slender arms and legs... gently-swelling hips... and of course breasts, which Kanata was pretty sure were on the large side, though she didn't really have much experience with them.
Blushing, she levered herself up, and blinked. The first thing she noticed was that her body moved easily... her body hadn't looked too toned in the cursory inspection she'd managed (she probably should check more, but... it was embarrassing, even if it was supposed to be... her... body), and she hadn't spotted any of the little nicks, scrapes, and scars 'he' had picked up over sixteen years of workouts and alley fights, so she had been expecting to be weaker than before, not stronger.
The second thing she noticed was that sizeable breasts moved very distractingly when unsupported. Blushing redder, she brought an arm up to hold them in place.
"Buena Tarde, Anunciar." The voice - a softish masculine voice - sounded a little irritated as it spoke again.
Kanata blinked, looking around. She didn't know the language, but for some reason she could still understand - 'Good Evening, Anunciar'... "Um... my name's not Anunciar, it's Kanata." She couldn't see who was speaking.
"Kanata es Anunciar. La Anunciar es Kanata." 'Kanata is Anunciar. The Anunciar is Kanata.'
Kanata sighed. "All right... where are you...? I can't see you."
"Su Cuello."
"You're on my-?!" Kanata blinked, and slapped a hand to her throat. Sure enough... on the left side, there was some kind of... growth. It felt a little... soft... and warm. Three rounded bumps of... felt a bit like cartilage, she supposed, soft and a little yielding, but strong. Her eyes widened. "What... what are you?"
"Soy Reconquista."
"Reconquista...? No, not who are you, what are you?"
"Soy su Referencia, Anunciar."
Kanata blinked. "That... is just another word I don't get."
"Le Ensenare, Segun lo Prometido." 'I will teach you, as promised.'
"Okay... so... are you the companion she talked about?"
"Si."
Kanata smiled weakly. "All right then... Reconquista. Let's go."
"A Donde?"
Kanata's smile faded. "I have a double murderer to find and stop, and I don't think the police can handle something like... that. She said power came with this - show me how to use it."
"Siga mi Plomo." 'Follow my lead.'
"I'll do just that." Kanata started walking. She didn't know where to, but away from 'his' corpse and that of that girl were her focus right now.
---N====================>V---
Next: Chapter Two.
Another incident has begun. The Suvota Compact's preparation for war continues as the Silver Ghosts begin to awaken from their sleep. The TSAB strives to discern the truth before matters become dangerous, but... for Kanata Shirahime, at least, they already are.
---N====================>V---
Author's Notes: Thanks go out to Sunshine Temple, who did a grand job of making me trim my work down, Akuma-Sama, and Belgarion213, my prereaders.
As a note, you may notice a few names that you recognize from other sources, other magical girl shows, or video games. This is not a crossover with anything, I'm just really bad at coming up with names and... borrowed. (Especially names in a foreign language that are also supposed to be gender-neutral - ie, Kanata. This isn't a crossover with Oto x Maho, for those who recognize the name, it's more of a homage with a very different character... and now that I think about it, that might just get a tad confusing if I ever write an actual crossover with it...)