Gather of the Banners (Code Geass/Nanoha crossover)

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#26
Hachiman-class Dreadnought Toyotomi Hideyoshi
Hyperspace
21 March, 2524 AD


Morihiro could almost hear the inward sigh of relief, emitted by almost entire crew of Hideyoshi, when mighty warship finally leaved the hyperspace and entered into the blackness of Stein Krone star system.

Morihiro himself betrayed his own delight at changing of the view on the main screen was a small jolt of his right arm. Hatagai’s allow a small smile to crawl on his face when he sensed how former tormenting anxiety of crewmembers was replaced by the predatory anticipation of upcoming battle. Those people’s behavior now was more fitting for the pack of wolves, but they were his wolves and Admiral Hatagai looked at bridge crew with a vague affection.

“Our position?” Requested Morihiro, addressing the navigator, who sat on the left side of the bridge. The middle-aged woman with brown hairs made a few quick strokes on her keyboard, then another few, which made the central holo-screen to flicker and change the outlook now showing their fleet (a numerous green dots) and their target: Hoshi Ichi – or Schoneherddome in the form of a blue sphere.

“The distance is two millions, two hundred forty-four kilometers to target, sir.” Hatagai smiled pleasantly at this report: the hyperspace jump successfully bring his fleet at range where his armada could perform an effective bombardment of enemy positions with their missiles. While he didn’t doubt that Belkans learnt on their mistakes and improve their anti-missiles defense significantly, still he doubt that planetary defense ring could intercept all upcoming projectiles.

And, if nothing too drastic happen, his main forces would reach the distance of the effective usage of direct ordnance weaponry after the sixty five minutes from this moment.

The effective range of direct ordnance, like mass-drivers, was a few hundred of thousands kilometers, the same as Belkans, which was bad actually, as Belkan cannons destructive power rival that of a Russian Coalition, whose direct ordnance weaponry held the title of strongest one in entire Earth Empire of United Directories.

But it doesn’t mean that Japanese weapon couldn’t obliterate the ships of Schoneherddome’s defenders, it could of so very much. And in order to use their firepower efficiently, Belkans needed to preserve the significant numbers of their ships under the relentless missile bombardments. And if his fleet would successful in either destruction or neutralization of Belkan defensive station the rocket-filled hell awaited his adversaries.

And his few hidden cards would make the life of Belkan astronauts even harder. He was sure.

“Admiral!” The urgent shout from the sensor operator post startled all present people bar Hatagai, as only deaf man couldn’t hear the anxiety in the tone of young officer. “I’m detecting numerous signals of Belkan ships from the orbit of a Hoshi Ichi! It’s a defense screen formation!”

The jubilation that once ruled the mind of all present soldiers was quickly replaced with shock at that declaration. On his part, Morihiro Hatagai just shrugged – the possibility of the Belkans seriously reinforcing one of their most vital planets and most possible target of their assault was so big that Hatagai could have been more shocked if he didn’t heard the sensor operator’s outburst.

“Magnify.” Ordered Hatagai calmly, but with a significant power in his voice, desiring to both see the full picture of the enemy defensive ring and to calm down the crew. The image on the central holo-screen blinked again and then Japan soldiers could see the mind-bogglingly huge numbers of the crimson red Belkan warships. Many Dominion-class battleships, was aided by hundreds of Sieg-class cruisers and then there was legions of the Ruhm-class frigates.

His fleet was no less numerous, but there Belkan ships could expect the help from the hordes of the satellite cannon-platforms and finally, to make the matter worse the admiral Hatagai could see the massive bulks of the Ewige Eiche-class battle stations. Those gargantuan spheres had the firepower of the small flotilla of warships and were a lynchpin of any Belkan anti-missiles defense. He really needed to get rid of them first if he wanted to his plan to success.

But again – he expected this to happen, and this gray-eyed admiral just shrugged a bit when he saw the massive frames of the inter-system teleportation nodes. Seems that Belkans would be nice enough to stay away, while Japan ships bombard them from the distance – they would send a small group of the ships to greet them personally.

The mages would be happier if they could send flotillas into teleportation jump, but it was dangerous gamble, as the even a small mistake could hurl the unfortunate vessel at the collision course with either enemy ship or random space body. And the nods simply couldn’t teleport many ship on the same time anyway.

“Seems our Belkan friends prepared a really impressive greeting committee for us.” Trailed Hatagai, straightening his back and flexing his fingers on both hands, giving a communication officer a wordless order to open channel to all ships in his fleet. “Well, gentlemen we had a battle to win there. No one promised us an easy walk and bloodless victory!” Admiral’s voice resonated through the bridge, pushing away the remaining anxiety and calling forth the pride and desire to fight.

“But I promise you, warriors of the Japan Empire – we will emerge victorious today! Despite all odds we grasped victory in all major previous battles, we pushed the Belkans back and we did it again!! Today we come there to crush one of their most important planets and claim the riches of their star for our beloved homeland and emperor! Fight, warriors of the chrysanthemum throne, fight with all you ferocity, fight with all your pride, fight with the thought about all glory we will obtain today!” Hatagai voice turned into vicious roar that shook entire fleet to its core. “NIPPON BANZAI!!!”

“Nippon banzai!” Bellowed countless voices through the broadband, now only the anticipation of upcoming battle and bloodlust ruled the minds of the Japanese soldiers, as they prepared to make their country, emperor and admiral proud today when they drown this solar system in the blood of the Belkans.

“Once the deployment complete, unleash the rocket barrage, primary targets: battle stations and teleport nodes. Then send the flotillas Kitsune, Ika and Tengu in first wave!” Ordered Hatagai, clasping his hands together and shifting in his chair to make himself more comfortable. “Flotillas Yurei, Naga and Hoshiumi should took off a ten minutes later. Flotillas Hanabi and Ryuu stay on the position and maintain the barrage!”

“Sir, yes sir!” Was the answer of his armada as countless dots on the holo-screen moved to prepare to dive into hellfire of the battle.


~***~

House Schoneherd ancestral castle Schmetternden Berg
Planet Schnoeherddome
10th day of second cycle of fifth period.


Similar to smoke, that fill the space in the burning barn, the dining room was quickly overwhelms with miasmas of anxiety, rage, hatred and… sinister joy. In her entire life Vita never could imagine her beloved father and mother’s faces twisting into such feral vicious smirks, and not only them – all present adults in the room now was busy exchanging a “smiles” that could make a pack of a hungry wolf flee with an insane speed.

Gulping nervously at the increasing bloodlust, Vita mad a few unconscious steps back. Rapidly upcoming sound of the frantic steps broke small redhead from her trance and she quickly turn around to meet the pale-faced and panic-ridden Edda and Alheid who leaved their seats to come to her side, the illumination in the room gave their faces a shade f blue with made them look even more scared. Not that Vita’s face looked any better, though.

Oswin, regardless to his daughter turmoil as he, in the first time in his life, was too consumed by vicious delight, still managed to adopt a pretty neutral expression and ask his planetary garrison commander:

“What’s our enemy disposition and can you presume their possible numbers?”

Major-General Hans Ven Lichtfanger who face moment ago wear a pretty feral expression quickly composed himself and started his report with the tone that could rival a warjack in absence of emotions.

“Currently enemy forces stay on coordinates A-047-K-68, approximately in two mega-klicks from the planet Schoneherddome low orbit. We count a six full flotillas my lord, but I can swear that there more of them. They just hiding behind that damned cloak-field.”

Oswin nodded with agreement as he had similar thoughts – Japanese never revealed all of their cards in the beginning. And there must be a drop ships and transports that carry a planetary invasion forces anyway.

“Continue to observe them and be prepared for upcoming missile attack, general.” Ordered Oswin, though his tone was more of the request than order – he know very well that Hans could more that capable and experienced to do all preparation and engage their foes on his own. But of course, not Oswin, nor al present Belkan had any intention to live their brother-in-arms to battle Japs alone.

“Hang on there, we’ll be there to assist you in fifty minutes Hans. And I’ll contact Rotenaugen to send the reinforcement once their teleportation nodes full charged.” Oswin’s eyes flared with dark intentions. “Today we make those shits pay for all they atrocities, Hans. Today we’ll show them fruits of all preparations. Hail Belka!!” The last words thundered through the air, increasing the vehemence in the eyes if the all other Belkans.

“Hail Belka!” The Hans’ answer was no less sharp and ferocity in the brown eyes of the officer of Wolkenreich army rival in intensity the eerie flames in his master’s eyes. After giving Oswin a sharp salute the Belkan general disappear from the screen, which now show the map of the sector, surrounding their planet where red dots indicated the place of the Belkan ships, stations or defense satellites and the swarm of green dots on the edge of the map reveal the position of their enemies.

Quickly inspecting the situation, Oswin turn around to gaze over the chamber and see the eyes of all present Belkan’s warriors. He wasn’t disappointed – as his blue eyes lowly moved from one corner of a massive room to other he could only see the grim determination, unyielding ferocity and burning desire to fight in every eyes of any soldier of Wolkenreich his gaze meets. Clering his throat he went on.

“My brothers and sisters, the dutiful warriors of our beloved empire, hear me here and now! Just a moment ago we celebrated the birthday of my daughter and enjoyed this bountiful feast and the company of each other. But now, as the merciless enemies invade the very heart of my domain I’m, with great regret, forced to interrupt out happy festival and request your assistance in repulsing those killers’ assault. Here and now I want to declare my intention to give the Japan Empire a deciding battle!”

Oswin outstretched his right hand forward at the end of his speech, while his left hand grasped the fabric of his shirt on chest. The silence that occurred was soul-crushing, Vita could only berate herself inwardly for daring to think that she was under pressure when she marched toward her parents to obtain Graf Eisen. The morbid atmosphere and blazing glares that now crossed on the figure on her father would sent her into mindless run, yet her father stood firm and patiently awaited the answers of the present nobles and the military officers.

The first one to respond to their grossherzog’s inquiry was herzog Lars Ven Kluge - Alheid’ father and Rotenaugen’s governor. He was a man of average height with black hairs and red eyes with a plump belly and equally plump face, though his hands pressed on his sleeves from the insides with a mounds of muscles. He coughed one time but his voice when he begun to speak held no traces of weakness or uncertainty.

“I hope I can present the opinion of each of the present Belkans, who wish only glory and prosperity to their homeland and thus I say: we’re would stand there and fight together with you mein Herr!” The voice of the nobleman started to gain the volume quickly, while resonating not only with the stones of the walls but with the hearts of all people who listened to him right now.

“We all could only watch all this time helplessly as the scoundrels who dared to call themselves a warriors continued their rampage through the soil of our nation, killing countless of our brethrens and destroyed numerous cities, while conquering the star systems in their wake.“

The scowl on the faces of all men and woman in the chamber deepened at those words as the humiliation of those loses assaulted their souls again, reminding them about the series of the painful defeats, suffered by Belkan forces. They brave warriors of Belka fought with passion, ferocity and resolve of the ancient heroes and they make Japanese pay dearly for their last victories. But those were victories nevertheless and still there was not a single major victory against the Japanese that result in the successful re-conquest of the invaded planets.

“But all that blood wasn’t spilled for nothing!” Continued Lars with great passion, his hands with clenched fists trembled from the bottled emotions and his eyes leak a few angry tears. “Our grief and rage give us new strength. We learned from our defeats: we watched and studied our adversaries’ weakness, we sharpened our blades, we improved our war engines, and we created new spells and invited new weaponry to fight the hated enemies! Our people built new factories, new laboratories and new mage institutes to trained skilled engineers, innovative scientists and ingenious warcasters and now we can rival our forefathers from the time of the united Belka in productive capacity.”

That is it, thought Oswin, as he listen to passionate speech of one of his friends. The true reason behind all setbacks and failures of Wolkenreich’s military: the Japanese forced the belkans to participate in the wars to which her economy and production capacity wasn’t prepared. Yes, the Code of Diamant Palmen made the war between “Belkans” far less bloody than the devastating conflicts of the past by creating a cage of rules and restrictions around the battlefield.

Many could say that now Belkan wars now more sportive events, rather than wars, and they was right to some extent, as every “war” now raged in the special areas, leaving which was strongly prohibition for any side of war. But blood still was shed and people die in fierce battles between smoke-belching machines, armored behemoth, legions of soldiers and, of course, skilled mages.

Despite those restriction and the state of internal affairs Belka Empire still was the one of the most powerful star nation in the sector of the galaxy, as the IAB hold no intention to challenge anyone in combat, despite its military might and was concentrated at maintaining the peace in the controlled areas, or sending their peacekeepers if some of the other star-spanning nation wanted some help.

The memory of a blood-soaked war between Empire and Concordat was a very good reminder why the status quo was the most preferable condition for any star nation that was born after the collapse of Al’Hazard.

The controllable intensity of the conflicts between Belkan’s Autonomic Provinces and the overall peacefully atmosphere in the neighborhood lulled the Belkans: many of their factories forget about the art of the creating of a war machines and now solely concentrated on forging the laborjacks and other vehicles that shine in the non-combat duties. And while the Belkan’s vehicles and automatons were widely recognized as the mark of the quality only a few production centers in each Autonomic Provinces now could produce a battle engines or warships.

No outsider ever challenged the Belkan to the combat. No Belkan ever dared to break the sacred rule of the battle and then everyone simply accepted such state of affairs as granted. They lived in the half-static state, grow wealthier from the trading, dreamed about the new power, brag about the past battles and glory, and slowly waited until the moment for the final unification of the empire would come.

Belkans slowly grow fat, thought Oswin with derision; they got accommodated to this way of life. His brother and sisters thoughts that it was enough for the galaxy their live in, they were wrong and they paid for this with countless lives after the start of the invasion.

The Japan taught Wolkenreich (other Belkan and all outside nations) that descendants of the Herman are not most ferocious warrior brood in the space. The new found long-lost branch of refuges from Al’Hazard proved themselves to be a very murderous and deadly bunch.

The ferocious and indiscriminate nature of every of their assault, combined with a numbers of the soldiers and war engines the Japanese send in, leaved Belkans in the state of shock. The losses were terrible, it was undeniable, but inability to replace the lost vehicles was the worse. The man and women of Wolkenreich was trained from their childhood (due the Code edict) and have all resolve and will to fight with invaders. But the resolve only couldn’t push Japanese back, the soldiers need a weapon and vehicles to fight as their attack magic was takes away. And there was the true problem.

While Japanese could rely on their supply lines to bring them new tanks and knightmare frames to replace the destroyed ones their adversaries could rely only on the ancient storages that was made hundreds of years ago. Though those storages was utterly massive and contained a numerous war machines and equipment in them it still wasn’t enough.

Looking in the past, Oswin now could say with all brutal honesty – we Belkans helped Japanese to fuck ourselves up with all our might. Indeed at the first stages of war, the removal of the battle spells from the battlefield was a crippling blow indeed, but if their Province had the same production capability it had on start they could counter Japanese invasion much more efficiently.

And not just that – it’s pained him to think about all technology, which research was put on hold because their nature contradicted with Code’s regalement. Those rail-guns, torpedoes and all other weaponry could give the hated enemy a bloody if only their block-headed ancestors for some reason didn’t label a long-rage fight as un-chivalry.

Well, Oswin admitted that he wasn’t entirely fair to his ancestors– if such restrictions didn’t exist during the period right after demise of Von Belka family, some of the most hot-headed and/or ruthless nobles could went so far as start bombarding the planets of their political opponents. Only the fear of being ganged up on due the violation of the codex of war prevented them from resorting to such drastic measures.

What was more important that for now citizens of Wolkenreich needed to fight with the technologies they had. And now he and his brethrens was more than prepared to show the unscrupulous fiends the result of their preparations. And then, if… NO! When, they deflect Japanese assault they could starts to slowly turn this situation around.

The neighbors Autonomic Provinces finally decided to join the war and, as the latest report states, the Japan’s supply flotillas recently suffered heavy losses from the Belkan raids, thus inflicting crippling blows at Japanese garrisons. The logistic was the field where Belka held a distinct advantage over their new adversaries: the absence of the teleportation ability and the long distance their support ships need to cross leaved them vulnerable to the quick raids and stall their advance, while the teleportation nodes allow Belkan ships to reach point of their destination with an incredible speed and allowed Belkan’s to respond to Japanese threat with a incredible efficiency.

But what truly was important, it was the sheer number of new factories that could produce the vehicles, armor, equipment and firearms for the army of the Wolkenreich, which was commissioned in the span of the recent few months. Now the battle of attrition slowly shifted toward their side as Japanese steadily lose the initiative in a war and, what was more important, as the report from the IAB intelligence service stated, the Japan Empire’s neighbors behaved more and more threateningly with each passé moths as Japan was forced to more and more of their forces toward Belkan lands. And when the other Provinces of Belka would to send the reinforcement the situation on the battlefield would suffer a complete turnaround. But the Wolkenreich need to launch a successful counterattack on their own in order to stimulate their neighbors to hasten their preparations and obtain some worth of revenge against the infidels who claim so many lives of their brothers and sisters.

And said counter-attack would finally start today!

“I couldn’t say it better, Lars!” Declared Oswin toward the auditory once the Ven kluge patriarch’ passionate speech comes to an end. “Upon this very day we only could swallow our sorrow, ire and rage, watching our planets conquered and seeing our compatriots perishing under our merciless enemy’s fire. Day after the day we could only suppress out rightful wrath and try our best to make a suitable preparations for the counterattack, while awaiting for the moment when we finally would be able to show the unscrupulous invaders the full power of our ire. And…” Oswin’s eyes flashed like a pair of flashlights, mirroring the look in the eyes of all present Belkans, whose lips twisted into savage smirks almost in perfect sync when they sensed the upcoming words. The boiling long-restrained fury which, unbeknownst to him, build-up all this time in his chest explode like supernova bursting out together with a vicious roar. “…THIS DAY FINNALY HAD COME!!!”

The powerful scream awoke something in the souls of all present people as they stood on their feet one by one until there was no one in the massive room who sat on his chair, holding their glasses, and now Vita could almost swear that they was filled with blood rather than juice. Sensing their mood, grossherzog Oswin Ven Schoneherd in a swift motion filled up his own glass and raised it in the air, matching the pose of all other nobles and officers, his wife raised her own drink just a split-second later. On a soundless order all citizen of Wolkenreich in the room swallow their drink and slammed their glasses into the table, summoning a low booming sound.

For her part Vita was quiet scared in the beginning of the entire commotion, that occurred after the emergency call. The sheer cataclysmic shift in the mood was staggering but the pure malice, hatred and bloodlust emitted by her parents and their dear guests was the quiet a frightening thing to behold and small redhead girl couldn’t help but try to find some comfort in the presence of her best friends. They too move to be closer, signaling that Edda and Alheif also didn’t taking the atmosphere in the dining hall well.

But as the trio of girl continued to listen to grown-up chatter and then the passionate speech on Lars Ven Kluge their fear and anxiety slowly but steadily was replaced with a wrath and ferociousness: Vita, Edda and Alheid had no idea that they beloved home suffered so greatly at the hands of those Jap-ai-nis, that so many brave Belkans died because of their foul enemy’s treachery.

As their ire grows while the girls listen to Herzog Lars’ patriotic lines they started to accept the soul-crushing bloodlust and bloodcurdling fury that flow in the air like a poisonous gas. In fact soon Vita, Alheid and Edda starts emit the very same miasmas of wrath and vengeance, combining with the vicious scowl that mirror of that on each face of any adult in this room.

So consumed by those dark feelings those three girl was that they utterly overlook the moment when the massive shadow block the light from the chandelled and powerful voice speak to them.

“Here you are junge Damen“ the sound of Oswin Ven Schoneherd’s voice break into their ears so suddenly that girls shrieked and almost jumped out of their shoes. Hastily restoring their “noble” look Vita Ven Schoneherd, Alheid Ven Kluge and Edda Ven Farber turned around to meet the sight of a grinning castle’s master together with his wife (who cleverly hid her smile beside her fist).

“I like to see that even younger of us have the blazing spirit of warrior maidens of the past but I already have the task for all of you, little ones.”

The trio of young nobles stiffened immediately when those words leaved grossherzog;s mouth. Yeas, Oswin was very cheerful and friendly, love his daughter dearly and he truly consider Edda and Alheid as his nephews (and those feelings was mutual); but he also was their sovereign and betraying your sovereign trust by failing him could drive some Belkan to suicide in the past, even if no one accurse them for the fail.

Their faces now were completely devoid of all emotions bar determination and obedience, when the girl bowed to him and declared in unison: “We wait for your orders, unser Herr.”

Oswin’s face also lost all previous cheerfulness and wore the solemn expression when he give them the order: “Dame Vita Ven Schoneherd, Dame Alheif Ven Kluge and Dame Edda Ven Farber, I, Oswin Ven Schoneherd, by the grace of Sankt-Kaiser and Our Kaiser Ludwig Van Wolken, the sovereign of the Stein Krone star system and governor of imperial sector Rigol hereby order you – you’ll go to Dame Vita’s private chamber and help her to prepare herself for departure. Dame Alheid and Dame Edda’s own luggage would be carried to the car which would carry all of you to the Schmetternden Berg space port once we repel Japanese’ first assault. Then, the battleship “Wille sum Zieg” would carry you all to the Rotenaugen, where you would be stationed at the Ven Kluge’s castle. Herzog Lars give the necessary orders right now.”

Only the long-term and thoughtful lessons in proper etiquette taught by her mother Martha (and enforced with a long and sturdy twig) herself prevent Vita from violent outburst here and now. What the kek her father us saying – her home planet in a grave danger and he want to simply sent her away like a ill-tempered dog to an obedience school. Vita could positively feel how her face emit a waves of heat and become as red as her hairs. She make a deep inhale, preparing to give a piece of her mind to her father but then she felt as something cold tough her bare chest.

She reached out under her shirt with her right hand to touch the metallic surface of Graf Eisen, whom she unconsciously put there after she de-packed her armor. Her Armed Device, the present from her parents and the proof of her adulthood. This simple thought utterly rid all of her ire, replacing it with a sad resignation: adult Belkan noble wouldn’t throw a temper tantrum before all those present important people - it’ll just humiliate her and her family. Adult Belkan warrior know how to control her wrath to prevent herself from turning into giant tomato-girl.

And moist important adult Belkan know the limits of her strength – without any experience on battle field she would be just a useless load for her much more battle-hardened brethrens. Her knowledge on space battles was minimal, and she knows no spells that could bolster their defense line or give a additional power to their offense. She would just make everything even more stressing for her family if she goes on battle field right now.

And thus Vita Ven Schoneherd made a graceful curtsey, which Edda and Alheid immodestly following her example, and then giving her father and grossherzog an answer: “Jawohl, under Herr” Said trio of a young nobles in unison, drawing a small smiles on Martha and Oswin’s faces.

“It was a splendid curtsey, my dear daughter.” Praised her mother, who made a few steps forward to stay right in front of a small redhead. Vita couldn’t help but sigh in relief and jot when usual gentle smile appear on her mother’s face again, pushing the stone-cold mask of indifference she wore from the moment alarm claxons start their song.

“I know about you inner turmoil and I’m very glad that you already can understand your own limitation and weakness as it’s a right way to overcoming them. Make no mistake Vita, Edda, Alheid…” Other small girls gasped when Martha switch her attention to them for a moment to give them a strong but reassuring gaze. “We send you to herzog’s Lars home not to crouch under the couch, but to train with a prominent instructors how to lead entire armies to a battlefield in the special training school. And once your tutorial are finished you’ll join the rank of our army to lead your forces to victory. You all would stand arm to arm with the beast of Wolkenreich in the battle”

They were to astonished by the weight of upcoming duties, hardness of future’s training and the direness of a entire situation to shout in joy, but Vita, Alheid and Edda spirit raised significantly. Before this year come to its end Edda and Alheid also would receive their own Devices and then all of them would go to the training camp to work on their strength and hone their skills further.

And once they would be ready their fangs would sink into the flesh of Japanese invaders.

With another sharp bow the girl raced toward the door, which was already wide open to let all the guests to come out. They all hastened toward their destination point to, each in his/her manner to participate in the battle.

Oswin stared at his daughter’s back for a while but then turn around to meet his youngest son’s passive gaze. Peter also wasn’t happy that he was for all purpose also sent away – he was “Wille sum Zieg" gunnery officer after all. His days in academy was over and he was eager to join the grand battle, but the order from his father was clear – he would go to an Rotenaugen to protect the girls.

Peter Ven Schoneherd was truly unhappy with such outcome but he was also a soldier and he never questioned his superiors’ order without truly important reason. Oswin nodded, recognizing his efforts in following the code of the soldier before declaring:

“It’s time for you to go back to your ship, my son.” Peter saluted him and marched toward the gates too, gracefully bending into the stream of the people who went toward the exit too. “Don’t forget how important you task is, Peter. Those girl’s lives under your protection from now.”

Peter turned his torso to meet his father’s eyes and pumped his fist into the air before shouting ion his own.

“Give those bastard beating of their life, father!” Oswin answer with a vicious smile.”Don’t worry Peter – those shits would deeply regret the second when they jumped in Stein Krone system without the invitation.“

Peter nod in response with a smile no less savage than his father’s own and hastened forward. Oswin feel the gentle pat on his left shoulder and when he made a 180 degrees turn around his hardened eyes meet the resolute gaze of Martha Ven Schoneherd, whose body language particularly scream that she can’t wait for battle, when she would be able to made the repugnant invaders to pay in blood in fire for all sufferings they bring onto their land, to start.

“We need to hurry up an go to the control room, dear.” Despite her boiling wrath and anticipation for the upcoming bout his wife’s vice was even and somehow soothing. Oswin straightened up and answer with a sharp nod. Not willing to disrupt their guests leave and give additional problem to already crowded castle’s transport system, married pair dashed toward the door on the opposite side of the dining hall – they still have their trained legs so they would reach their point of destination on their own. It wouldn’t take more than ten minutes for such trained runners to made all way through the maze of the corridors and halls.

The smell of battle filled the air not only in the gargantuan castle and capital city, but cover entire star system as well. The alarm claxons roared in the warning, the threads of a battle tanks, APCs and other land vehicles gnashed into the lands as their engines roared to live. The boots of millions of soldiers rumbled over the floor as legions of legions prepared to battle. Even more deafening howl shook the air as the massive warships lift from their ports all over the planet to join their brothers in the space.

Entire system was preparing for the deciding battle.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#27
~***~​

Hachiman-class Dreadnought Toyotomi Hideyoshi
21 March, 2524 AD



Forty minutes, that was the time that was required for missiles to reach Belkan defensive formation, that was the hardest time for the soldiers of Wolkenreich, the awaiting for the start of the battle, the doubts and anxiety tormented them almost physically. The memories of all previous lost battle and perished brethrens both motivated the defenders of the planet and clouded their mind on the same time.

But then the thousands of projectiles reached the range where phalanx cannons could fire at them effectively and then Janak’s Pits break loose. The previously black void of space was now illuminated by bright, though short-lived, flashes of explosions as the offensive might of Japan Empire collided with iron-clad defense of Belkan Empire.

The Japanese forces didn’t betray their usual doctrine of anti-mage warfare and the first offensive wave was filled with either high-explosive warheads or simply filled with sakurahydrogen. The Belkans had learned on from their mistakes and modified their warships and defense satellites with new phalanx weaponry oriented on anti-missile warfare, and now arrays of wide-bore automated cannons sent entire streams of metallic projectiles toward the waves of torpedoes. Each projectile was nothing more but arrow-shaped piece of metal, but being propelled up to a speed of Mach 4 all of which had an explosive spell engraved onto them, give them enough power to rip the missiles apart.

As testament of the Belkan’s efforts, thus far not even a single missile couldn’t penetrate the defensive barrier of the planet. The problem was that the Japanese didn’t expect this either: while the very first collisions between two fleets was absolutely in Japanese favor, as their adversaries didn’t have any weaponry or magic that was oriented on the destruction of the upcoming waves of the missiles, the most recent battle displayed that time of easy victories for Japan had come to an end.

The objective of the first wave was to test the waters and create a protective screen on their own. The destroyed missiles, thus who had the sakurahydrogen in them, left the space between two fleets filled with the pink shimmering clouds which blocked the sight of the magic-based sensors of the Belkan space armada.

Each torpedo in the next, much bigger wave, carried a Kaiten-class tactical nuclear warhead, and even few direct hits of those missiles could rip even a battleship apart. The sheer numbers of the launched torpedoes, combined with the young and untested abilities of the Belkan anti-missile weaponry, made the interception a very back- breaking feat. The flashes on the main screen and the images of various Belkan ships disappearing in the storm of plasma signalized of the first lose and the first blood belonged to them. But Japan commanders know that the Belkans was resourceful and ingenious inventors when the defense of their home was concerned and expected to see a few new tricks today.

The movements of the Belkan’ warships didn’t fall outside their defense doctrine so much as their red vessels filled the space with a numerous metal shards, trying to destroy the torpedoes before they reach their formation and thus no one among the Japanese personnel on Hideyoshi’s bridge noticed few abnormalities until the frantic shout from the sensor station drawn their attention.

“Sir, the long-range sensors are picking up the rapid building of a few energy bodies at the edges of the Belkan’s formation!” Cried the officer, quickly taping on his keyboard, sending the data from his console on the main screen. Once he finishes the input the four golden dots appeared on the screen, when the image turned for a bit Hatagai and his subordinated could see that those dots was surrounded by the small groups or red dots, and moved toward the upcoming nuclear missiles.

Another screen, created by holo-projector, showed that it behind those dots were Belkan teleportation nodes (though, almost three times larger than usual ones), surrounded by small group of cruisers and frigates, lead by sole Dominion-class battleship. Said nodes weren’t dormant, as both their energy reading and the soft glow around their egg-shaped frames told them.

Hatagai, both literally and figuratively, connected the dots in his mind and the smirked, realizing the Belkan’s intention. As he thought – the Belkans indeed learned on their past mistakes and now prepared a few unpleasant tricks for their adversaries. As if agreeing with him, all four nodes flashed brightly, engulfed in the crimson light, as the tendrils of the blood-red energy pierced the void of space. In a span of seconds the energy lines connected all nodes together, creating a shimmering rectangle a few millions kilometers in square.

The sensors went mad, bellowing like a wounded rhino, as the light around the nodes grows brighter and the part of space, framed by the energy lines started to shimmer. A few long seconds after the purple-colored wave flow burst from the “edges” of a figure in order to full the area in the crimson cage, another few moments after the stormy purple field, marred with jagged lightings, was present to the shocked soldiers of Japanese Empire. Only one minute was passed since the Japanese noticed those groups but now between two armadas stood a new obstacle for the invading army – a dimensional rift.

Morihiro could almost hear the snarl of impotent rage emitted by the many astronauts in his fleet when they saw as the thousands of missiles, all of which should have struck the position of their foes, simply disappeared when they flew into the maw of the newly created distortion of space. On his part, Admiral Hatagai could only give his adversaries a smile respectful smile – well done my Belkan friends.

Despite this incident, the gunnery officers, on the ships which launched their rockets later, were swift enough to change the course of the torpedoes, sending them away from the dangerous patch. Some missiles were sent toward the devices that created and sustained the rift but were intercepted by the nodes’ escort ships.

But there were still enough torpedoes to carry the objective – while Belkan defense formation was able to intercept the missiles that moved toward the four giant nodes, they became too concentrated on their task and thus overlooked the another rocket barrage that flow over the both scar in the space and the groups of the warships of the Wolkenreich and struck the array of the teleportation nodes that float above and behind the brewing storm of the battlefield.

The destruction of nodes was meet with a chorus of an exited shouts on the Hideyoshi’s bridge, the happy crewmembers cheered seeing that their weapon still can and will crush the enemies of Japan. Hatagai also smiled coldly, seeing the demise of the crucial part of teleportation system – now the reinforcement from the Rotenaugen would be forced to use the standard engines to reach the Schoneherddome, which would take at last five hours of the inter-system maneuvers, since the both planets were on the diametrically opposite locations against each other.

The Intelligence Service claimed that mages wasn’t very skilled in the short-range hyper-jumps as they had the teleportation and, due the fear of accidentally hurl all of their valuable ships into the sun, they now had no other choices to sent their engines into absolutely full burn and hope they would able to help their brothers and sisters in time.

But it was too early to enjoy this achievement: the Schoneherddome defense formation was powerful and those weird devices, that created dimensional rift, theoretically could be used as substitutes for the destroyed nodes and who could say what trick they could pull off in the future.

“Give the order to the all captains to destroy those Belkan space-distortion mechanisms at the first opportunity!” Ordered Hatagai to the communication officer, the black haired man immodestly started to work on his consol, sending the data through the hyper-impulse communicators.

Hatagai nodded, confirming the execution of his order and then he turned back to the main screen, where he could see that his forces had almost reached the Belkan’s formation. Leaning back on his chair the Japanese admiral clasping his hands together, made a few long breathes and narrowed his eyes, preparing for the beginning of the brutal close-combat.

He could only grimace when the sensor station started to beep in warning again. Seems that Belkans stored up a lot of frustration and malice toward the Japan and were now more than happy to pull out another unpleasant surprise from their behinds. A single command from the sensor console and another screen appear before the occupants of the dreadnought’s bridge, revealing the image of the three-damned dimensional rift. Hatagai open his mouth to ask what exactly drew sensors’ attention when he saw numerous black dots in the maw of the rift with rapidly grew in numbers.

Admiral and all other soldiers of Japan who could see the current events could only gasps when thousands and thousands of the nuclear torpedoes – the very same torpedoes that disappear in the violet haze – now flew out and right toward the warships of the Japan’s armada which was already prepared to engage their adversaries.

“Input the emergency missiles self-destruct code! But don’t detonate all of our launched torpedoes!” Hollered Hatagai, as his skin blanched as the nuclear missiles barrel right into the vanguard groups of Japanese ships.

Caught by surprise the very first ships were struck head-on by the missiles and disappear in storm of plasma. The following ships tried to defend themselves by the phalanx fire but they have very short time and there was so many torpedoes. Frigates, cruisers and even battleships disappear in the blinding flashes, some ships tried to perform evasive maneuver but pretty often ship that managed to avoid dark-green torpedo ended up slamming into his sister-ship who also tried to avoid direct hit, which result in mutual destruction or crippling damage.

Then the signal reached the breach in reality from where new and new missiles comes flying and then uncountable flashes marred the void of space as the torpedoes exploded, obeying to their last order.

Japanese astronauts could barely catch a breath when they formation come under fire of the advancing Belkan forces who didn’t hesitate to use the opportunity and attack the distracted enemy forces.

Hatagai gritted his teethes seeing such development – he know that Belkan army would learn on their mistakes, but he couldn’t imagine that they would learn THAT well.

Japanese admiral made a few deep inhales, calming himself down and concentrated on the battle. As he could see his forces finally started get over their initial shock and retaliated with their own fire, splitting their formation and flanking the spike-shaped advancing flotillas of the Belkan ships in order to use their deadly broadsides to their maximum efficiency.

Now the holo-projector sustained not just one big screen but also created many smaller screens that show a various battles which occurred right now.

Legions of the Uwatsu-class frigates fearlessly charged into the lines of their Belkan counterparts – Ruhms trying to use their advantage in the rate of fire and avoid the deadly discharges of the Belkan frigates’ twin-barrel main cannon.

The swift Nakatsu-class cruisers, which speed and maneuverability was second to no one in all EEUD circled around their hulking and slow adversaries – Sieg-class Belkan cruisers, whose firepower in their call also was peerless among all known cruisers. Nakatsu was faster and had additional weaponry – the missiles carrying the various, though non-nuclear, warheads. The trick was to get behind the Belkan brute and fire into his more vulnerable rear sector before Sieg’s own broadsides and turrets would rip the Japanese warship apart.

The window, where two battleships were engaged in the duel only made Mirhiro Hatagai to cringe. Brave Sokotsu-class battleship tried his best to outmaneuver his monstrous Dominion-class “brother”, while his two three-barrel main turrets, broadsides and missiles tried to chew through behemoth’s, armor and shields. But all his efforts was fruitless as the 700 meter long monster simply charge at Japanese warship firing his 6 two-barrel cannons at battleship while using his broadside cannon to blast one unfortunate Nakatsu apart. Each volley of the Belkan vessel tore off massive parts of the Sokotsu’s armor, layout and even weaponry.

Another volley result in a crippling explosion that leave Japanese battleship’s with a hole that revealed his Naga-reactor stark naked before the enemy’s firepower. Sokotsu tried to slip underneath the enemy ship, using their closeness to his advantage, but Dominion turned around his axis, aimed and fired his broadside cannons. Energy shields tried to hold off, but they were powerless in the face of such firepower and moment after the mighty ship of the Japan Empire fleet explodes.

The Japanese may like it or not, but only Pobeda-class battleships of Russian Coalition or their Ruler-class Britannia counterparts could stand up to Dominions in straight duel.

But the battle was far from over, thought Hatagai. Despite the initial loses Japanese fleet still held the edge in numbers and long-range firepower. He still could turn this situation around. More and more Japan ships entered the fray, hammering already engaged Wolkenreich ships, pulling some weight from their already damaged brothers.

One screen show how group of Siegs was caught in the fire cauldron between two units of Nakatsus and succumb to the enemy onslaught one by one. The Ruhms, who previously pushed upcoming groups of the Uwatsu, now was forced to retreat, while taking casualties as pair of the Sokotsu battleships come to aid their little brothers.

Even the mighty Dominions wasn’t invulnerable, as the sight of the behemoth disappearing into flash of the nuclear explosion when four nuclear torpedoes struck him at once prove.

Admiral Hatagai glanced at the tactical map again, observing as the group of the green dots flanking the entire battlefield, aiming to get as close as they could. The special flotilla Yurei, lead by the Raijin-class battleship Maeda Toshiie prepared to play their role in the battle.

Hatagai grinned – twenty minutes from this moment Rikia and his subordinates would deliver… their guest to its stage. If his dear Belkan friends think they was the only side who prepared a hidden aces they are dead wrong.


~***~​

The battle continued to rage on, as the space near the planet Schoneherddome was a spectacular show of destruction. The void was filled with explosions.

Colonel Maiko Hasagawa cursed violently as her ship – battleship Kuzonoha Shuuhei – shook violently after being struck by a volley of fire coming from the quartet of the Sieg-class cruisers. She and her crew had the bad luck being caught in a battle with an entire unit of undamaged cruisers right after her ship finished the bloody battle with a few squadron of Ruhm-class frigates supported by the squadron of the brothers of her current assailants.

To be honest she entered the battle, supported by another battleship – Soichiro Yagi – and one squad of frigates and in the end her side claimed the victory. It was a Pyrrhic victory though, as only her vessel survived the brutal clash. And now her ship had a very good chance to share the destroyed Yagi’s unpleasant fate, his battered and broken hull float nearby to remind Maiko about the possible outcome if she screwed up.

All other nearby Japanese vessels were engaged in fierce melee as well and couldn’t help her, and Maiko was more than sure that many of those ships also wouldn’t mind if someone would come to help them. In the end she had no other choice but dive in the battle and hope to hold up long enough for reinforcements to come.

That being said, for now Shuuhei not only managed to stay afloat but also successfully returned fire, hammering the nearest Sieg in the enemy squadron with both of his main turrets, while bombarding another cruiser with his broadside guns and rockets.

The next strike from the Belkan cannons was even more powerful, the entire ship rocked when energy shields failed to soften upcoming enemy’s barrage and as a result, the entire array of a broadside cannons was annihilated. The power from the explosion rocked the entire ship, whose emergency systems immediately snapped into work to maintain his workability. The airlock doors immediately blocked the rooms that were exposed to the vacuum while emergency claxons went mad; though the crew, who was sent flying due the spasm of the vessel, sustain a damage of a various degree, already knew how grim the situation is.

The bridge’s crew had the advantage of the restrainers, built into their chairs but still Maiko received her dose of unpleasant feelings when the impact tried to toss her out from her chair when the entire bridge jolted; the forty five years old woman teeth’s rattled when her head slammed into the back of her seat and she even saw stars for a moment.

The Japanese colonel shook her head, trying to fight with upcoming wave of nausea; she didn’t have luxury to doze off in the middle of a death match. Hissing from the pain, she still couldn’t resist reaching out with her left hand and carefully touching the aching area under her long brown hair. Her damaged flesh responded with sharp bite of pain and Maiko grimaced, but she felt a small relief when she glanced down and didn’t saw any trace of blood on the fingers of her left hand.

“Load tubes 2, 5, 7, 8 and 10 with nuclear missiles; load tubes 1 and 3 with mana-disruption missiles! Shoot the disruptors first, aim for the gap between the first and second cruiser in squadron! Once the missiles are detonated and the dispersion of the sakurahydrogen confirmed shoot the nuclear torpedoes, aim for the furthest enemy vessel! Maintain combat speed and increase the barrage, target the leading Sieg in the unit!” Commanded Maiko, observing the main screen, where the four enemy ships quickly charged toward her vessel, hoping to utilize the damages to the battleship’s broadside canons and slip behind it in order to unleash a devastating barrage into the most vulnerable rear arc of the ship.

The ship rumbled again when its two main three-barrel turrets shoot massive shells toward their target, supported by the remaining broadside cannons. She could order the helmsman to perform the “belly-up” maneuver and turn the ship around its axis in order to face the enemy with undamaged board, but decided against that pretty quick – the battle was too intense to lose even a few seconds where the main turrets wouldn’t be able to fire.

Shuuhei rocket again, but this time because of the synchronous firing of all of its weapon systems. The massive shells shot out at incredible speeds, followed by the wave of the smaller ammo from the broadside cannons, and then four long cigar-shaped missiles shot out from the tubes.

As Maiko expected, the enemy ships responded with an intensifying phalanx armament’s fire, trying to shoot down the rapidly upcoming torpedoes, but on the same time still leaving a spacious gap between each ship – explosion of an even single missile that struck its target would engulf entire area around the ship in the wave of plasma. Even the fleet of other Directories of Earth Empire would never dare to think that their AA-guns would be good enough to intercept all upcoming missiles with a nuclear warheads, the newly-born Belkan phalanx weaponry wasn’t even a contender to torpedo ordnance of the Japan fleet.

Once she finished those thoughts the sensor station started to demand attention with a distinct beeping, signaling, as Maiko could tell from the previous experience, that something went wrong.

“Colonel!” Cried the officer, frantically inputting commands on his console. “Sensors detected the rapid buildup or a magic energy around the enemy ships cruisers! And more of that – we’re detecting the establishing link of the mana-transfer between the ships in the enemy group!”

Maiko snarled in frustration – what the heck were those creeps up to? Why couldn’t they just lie down and die?! Under normal circumstances she wouldn’t have worry about any magical shit those Belkan creeps could pull out – the upcoming waves of missiles filled with sakurahydrogen would screw up any attempt to use the mage-craft. But now – with that fucked dimensional rift in the way – all combat doctrine was flushed into toilet.

The battle plan already was messed up when the first missile barrage failed to inflict the damage on the enemy formation, but the Japanese still hoped to use their superior numbers to quickly overwhelm the defenders of the space-disruptors and then obliterate the infernal devices and thus open the patch for the upcoming barrage. But the Belkans not only withstood the initial assault of the assault groups of the fleet but counterattacked with such intensity and furor that it disrupted the fleet’s advance, this opportunity wasn’t missed by the Belkans.

The rockets, filled with the gas, almost reached their point of detonation when all four enemy cruisers suddenly illuminated with a crimson light and the lines of the distinct Belkan magical triangles appear on their hulls. And then, to the shock of all Japanese soldiers, the swarm of the red projectiles shoots out from the each warship.

“Magnify!” Commanded Maiko, narrowing her gaze and tightening her grip on her chair. The main screen revealed a new window where the bridge crew could see that those projectiles were in fact a massive metallic spheres, engulfed in flickering red light. The work of the magic was obvious as those spheres danced around the ships that launched all of them with a speed of aero-space shuttles without colliding with the hulls of the cruisers or with each other.

Several seconds later, the first launched missiles detonated, releasing the stored sakurahydrogen, which should have blinded the sensors of the defiant Belkan ships. Their adversaries reacted just like Maiko expected - four warships broke their linear formation, as the leading cruiser started to slow down, seeing that he already flew from the contaminated area, while the following ships dove under the expanding cloud, still firing their AA-cannons at the upcoming torpedoes with a nuclear warheads. But since they were forced to break their formation the covering fire began to lose its efficiency.

Before Maiko could let the satisfied smile grace her features, the chaotically moving crimson orbs suddenly darted forward, toward the dangerous nuclear-armed guests. Leading by the unseeing puppeteer and closing the distance with fifty-two meters long metallic cigars in a less than one minute, the glowing projectiles attacked each missile like a swarm of a bees attacking an intruder.

The power of the collision, considering the speed the objects moved toward each other, was more than enough to obliterate the torpedoes, but to add the insult to injury, the magical projectiles simply drilled through the metal of the rocket and not one of them was destroyed, while not even a single missile managed to slip through the attack.

“Continue to fire! Transfer the energy from the cannons of the right board to the shield! And continue to bombard the leading cruiser, we need to weaken their formation!” Roared Maiko, trying in a futile attempt to prevent frustration and anger from leaking into her voice. The stubborn resistance of the enemy group already exceeded all of her expectations; if she didn’t lower the enemy numbers ASAP the situation could escalate to the point where her ship would sustain very grievous damage. To be honest, the newly-promoted colonel had a hard time struggling with fear right now.

It wasn’t supposed to be like that – the Empire should have obtained another glorious triumph by entering this system and annihilating the imbeciles who dared to oppose the Japan’s right to rule over those planets. But then those bastards pulled this damned rift out of their arses and now entire battle plan was torn apart, the first lines were smashed apart against the defensive fire of the Belkans and now the entire assault flotilla was caught into fierce death match, in desperate attempt to destroy those damned nodes.

The main turrets fired again, aiming at the already heavily battered warship. The damaged vessel had no chances to avoid the hit and could only hope that the shields softened the strike enough for the ship to hold up. Amaterasu seemed to finally hear the pleas of her children as the bright flash signaled the death of the stubborn cruiser.

The bridge responded to this event with the cries of triumph, and even Maiko couldn’t suppress a cheerful outcry when she saw that not only she lowered the pressure the enemy group put on her ship, but also the number and the speed of the crimson spheres around the ships decreased as well. She was right – the ships maintained the mana-transfer link between each other, the less ships that remained on the battlefield, the less impressive magical feats the Belkans could achieve. She just need to continue to work in this direction.

The vengeful strike struck her ship with enough power that almost ripped her chair from the floor. The lights flickered for the moment bur sirens didn’t shut up as the window with the schematic image of their battleship appeared on the new window on the main screen.

“The main targeting system is disabled!!” Hollered the gunnery officer in obvious panic, which rapidly spread among the bridge crew almost instantly. The effective range of fire of each cannon on the every ship depended on the distance at which the complex of the computers and sensors could predict the possible trajectory and various way of the evasion of the target. In the vacuum of space there was always a chance that a stray particle or dust clouds could disperse the energy of the shoot from the energy cannons, still the discharge could easily travel for many millions of kilometers without losing its destructive potential, and shells from the cannons could fly for years until they collided with any obstacle, retaining their deadliness.

What truly mattered in a battle in the void was how good your marksmanship was and the ability to predict you opponent’s movements. And if something bad happened to your ship’s targeting system then your fate took a turn in a very grim direction. Maiko bit her lower lip, drawing blood – until the engineering team could either reactivate the main or put the reserve targeting system on-line, her only effective remaining weapons were missiles, as they had their own targeting system and needed only the signal from the video cameras to take aim. But their efficiency has been put into question when those damned red spheres obliterated the five nuclear missiles with ease, striking them with incredible precision.

Maiko stared at the trio of the Belkan ships that go back into linear formation and circled around her ship, preparing to unleash next destructive salvo. In such state of her ship the chances of their survival disappear as quickly at the cloud of sakurahydrogen… wait! Maybe this could work?!

“Siphon all available energy from the cannons to shield!” Roared Maiko, without giving herself time to think and then berate herself for such insane plan. The crew around her snapped into the frantic work. “Load tubes 1 to 6 with nuclear missiles and tubes 7 to 10 with a sakuragydrogen loaded missiles! All ahead full, set our ship on a collision course with the Belkan cruisers! Aim the disruptor-missiles at the leading ship, tubes 1 to 3 aim at the second and 4 to 6 at the third cruiser! Fire on my command!”

Shuuhei’s entire frame rumbled when the main engines propelled the 700 meters long behemoth toward the trio of the fire-spitting Belkan warships. The nervousness grew with each passing moment as the damaged battleship shortened the gap between itself and charging Belkan ships, which not only hammered them with the fire of their cannons but also the dance of the crimson spheres around the cruisers became more and more threatening.

The shield, which now received all the energy that would usually flow toward various cannons, still held out but everyone knew that under such intense attack it wouldn’t last for too long time. The Belkan ship changed their formation and now flew side by side, hammering the damaged battleship with a furor, obviously intended to blast it apart.

“Shields already down to 35% of their overall power!! Colonel!” Cried the chief engineer, major Toha Hibisu, over the comm-line, whose terror-filled face already skipped the pale phase and now was straight blue.

“Fire the disruptors! And prepare for the Crash Discharge of the shield!!” Commanded Maiko, squeezing her chair with the force that threatened to break the plastic surface of her seat. The major went bug-eyed for a moment, hearing her command, but, remembering about situation, he started to quickly input the commands on his console as the ship rumbled again due the enemy bombardment and the launch of the torpedoes. It didn’t take a mind-reader to hear how he almost screamed, “Is she insane?”

She couldn’t blame him for such a reaction. Crash Discharge was an emergency measure, used to deal with a missile barrages. The mechanism behind it was pretty simple – the shield generator would build up a massive amount of energy poured into it from the ship’s batteries, but then deflector nodes on the ship’s hull wouldn’t allow this energy to stabilize around the vessel, creating a protective bubble but it would let the all accumulated energy to go berserk, releasing a massive shock wave, which could destroy any oncoming waves of missiles.

That being said, such an action was used very rarely. First and foremost it left the ship completely unprotected, as the shield generator would need some time to reboot itself; secondly it needed the rockets to move in a tight formation to be destroyed in one swoop, with also happened pretty rarely. Maiko understood that her order to pretty much leave the ship without any shields before the Belkan’s fierce attack must have looked like an act of utmost idiocy. Even more jarring was the fact that the Wolkenreich’s fleet didn’t use rocket weaponry at all. But she had another goal in her mind entirely.

“Detonate the disruption missiles!” Declared Colonel Hasagawa, observing the main screen, especially the indicator of the shield’s status. The massive cloud of gas blocked the line of sight for both parties, which gave the battleships the time to close the distance and enter the rapidly expanding cloud of gas.

”Discharge!!” Roared brown haired woman, desperately praying for her idea to succeed. The observing screens flared with an emerald-green light as the generator released a massive wave of energy into surrounding space, leaving only the metal of the hull to stand between the Shuuhei’s crew and the enemy’s upcoming fire.

“Incoming enemy fire!” The sensor operator’s voice was utterly calm and almost emotionless as the officer seemed to surrender to his fate, just like the other soldiers, who were on the bridge right now. The bright red pulses of energy flew through the void toward the battleship, which still didn’t leave the cloud of the infamous pink gas. Many young man and woman couldn’t help but close the eyes as the deadly projectiles were just seconds apart from the colliding with the ship.

Their hearts skipped a beat, then other one and the one another, but the devastating strike didn’t come. The sensor operator couldn’t believe his own eyes and readings of his computer – the upcoming energy attacks changed their trajectory when they was a meters away from the ship’s hull.

Maiko could almost hover over her own chair out of relief – her plan worked. The insane idea of the some ashigaru (his family name was Nakajima, was it?) was right – the energized sakurahydrogen could change the trajectory of energy flows. Her gambit paid off – the ship lost its shields but the cloud of the gas worked as an even better substitute. The Belkan crews seemed to be as shocked as the Shuuhei’s crew as the barrage even stopped for a moment. Maiko had no intention of letting this opportunity slip by.

“Hard to starboard! Put all available energy to shields!” This time Maiko roar at almost absolute top of her lung, the crew around her worked with an insane fervor, clearly understanding that it was their last chance to snatch a victory. The wounded ship, despite all the damage done to it still managed to perform the maneuver with speed and grace, lunging forward the upcoming cruisers. “Prepare to fire on my command!”

The Belkan cruisers’ crew, seeing the maneuvers of the Japanese battleship, snapped out of their daze and resumed their attack, but now they supported their cannons with the swarm of the crimson spheres that charged toward Shuuhei with a ferocity of an enraged bees.

The reactivated shields withstood the first volley, but the swarm of the magically charged metallic projectiles pierced the protective cocoon and slammed into the Japanese warship’s hull. The battleship shook under the barrage like the boat on the riffle, but still held out – it seemed that the destructive power of the orbs decreased with the death of one of the cruisers.

“Come one, Shuuhei, come on. Hold on, just hold for another few moments…” Maiko pleaded internally, feeling the plastic surface of her chair start to crack under her grip, each jolt of the ship invoked a cold outburst of terror in her guts. The constrained prayers were echoed by the other soldiers present on the bridge, their pale faces and wide-open eyes showed that not only her nerves reached had their limits.

In the center of the main screen the group of three red dots and single green dot rapidly closed the distance between each other, and the image of the three Belkan cruisers became more and more oppressive, as if death itself came to meet them. And the green dot barreled into the enemy formation.

“Fire! Fire!! FIRE!!!” Bellowed Colonel Maiko Hasagawa at as lout as she could, foam appeared on the corner of her mouth and her eyes bulge out of their socket. The gunnery officer almost smashed his console with his fist when he “pushed” the button. The ship jolted sharply when the six deadly projectiles left their nest and flew toward their targets, the hearts of all of the crew members jolted in time with the lurching of the ship.

Belkans, to their credit, reacted immediately, trying to shoot down the nuclear torpedoes with phalanx armament’s fire. But the distance was too small and the undeveloped state of the Belkan AA-cannons was more apparent now more than ever as the six products of the Japan’s military industry flew through the vacuum of space and struck their respective targets.

The three flashes of the nuclear explosions illuminated the void. The torpedoes were equipped with a plasma cutter that automatically activated five seconds before the impact, each was powerful enough to melt through the armor of the cruiser-class ships, which allowed missiles to pierce the hulls of the cruisers and explode inside of the Belkan vessels, destroying them outright. But the Shuuhei’s crew still couldn’t celebrate their win as the storm of plasma, generated by the explosion of the nuclear warhead in the space, engulfed their ship too.

While Sokotsu-class battleship was larger and was further from the epicenter of the explosion its hull already took a heavy battering and many crucial systems were exposed due the damage to the battleship’s armor. Who knew what could happen next – the damage could turn off the life-support systems and then they were done for.

The howl of alarm claxon had become so routine that crew barely paid any attention to the noise, concentrating instead on their consoles. Maiko, for her part, didn’t even bother to give the command to strengthen the shield, knowing that the engineers were already working on this problem, together with the reanimation of the targeting system.

When the fury of the explosion finally faded away, the crew of the wounded battleship managed to breathe a sigh of relief. They had survived! Not all of them, as they could see on the status reports, but still their ship managed to live through this fierce bout. Though, Maiko was sure that the state in which their battleship emerged from the battle left many things to be desired.

“Damage and casualty report.” Ordered battleship’s captain, nervously observing the course of the battle, which raged around them, but for now their ship was left alone as all nearby Belkan’s vessels were too busy fighting with their Japanese counterparts to death.

“116 crew members dead and 76 injured.” Usui Kaburagi, her deputy commander, reported as he checked the data on his console. “Enemy fire breached the hull on the deck 4, 6, 7, 8, 10, 13, sections 11, 15, 23…”

When the black haired man finished his report Maiko could only sigh in resignation – her ship was barely alive, as it was, if Kuzonoha Shuuhei were to meet even a single squadron of frigates its demise was all but assured. The hull was breached in multiple places, the broadside cannons on the left board was pretty much non-existent right now and to make the matter worse, the frontal main turret was so heavily damaged that it had melted into a giant pile of slag. In short, they won this fight but they were done for the rest of this battle.

“We’re being hailed ma’am! It’s Akira Kurase!” The joyful shout of the communication officer sounded almost alien after all previous events. The weary crew was too scared to believe that it wasn't some trick of the Belkan army. But the new window, that appear on the main screen, revealed a broad face with a meaty nose and small green eyes that belonged to vice-admiral Ibawa Araki – the commander of the assault flotilla Tengu - proved that Amaterasu didn’t forget about them.

“I can see that you took quiet the beating, Hasagawa-kun.” Rumbled bald vice-admiral, observing her and her crew, through the video-link.

“Indeed, sir.” Replied Maiko, barely restraining her face from twisting into goofy smile as she watched how the massive swarm of grin dots forced the red dots back – their reinforcements finally arrived. “We lost Soichiro Yagi and many of our comrades and our fate could have been very grim if you didn’t appear, sir.”

“You’re done a good job pressing those bastards here, Hasagawa-kun.” Complimented her the older man with a curt smile. “I can see how much it cost you but now our offense has gained momentum as reinforcements continue to come.” His expression quickly changed and adopted a more morose expression before he continued. “Still the bastards fight with an insane ferocity. Our losses exceed our initial expectation by a wide margin.”

Maiko could only nod with the equal grimness – she also was aware of the tense situation at home – the absence of the result could be catastrophic for all of Japan. On the main screen Maiko could see that while Belkan was pushed back, it wasn’t a retreat either. The defenders of the planet were simply adopting a new strategy to fight them.

The sudden flicker and disappearance of the rectangular torn in the fabric of the space made her flinch for a moment. Then she got the implication and her smile grew a bit. Vice-admiral Araki noticed that and nodded in confirmation.

“Finally some good news, colonel. Our compatriots overwhelmed the defenders and destroyed one of the nodes and are currently in the process of the decimation of the second. Now we'll get our long-range fire support back and then it's time to settle the score with those bastards!” The green eyes of the bulky admiral flared as the more savage smile took a place on his face.

“I see that you not in position to continue the battle, Colonel. So, I give you permission to leave the battle. Araki out!”

“Thank you sir.” Replied Maiko Hasagawa, standing up from her chair and bowing in gratitude. The older man nodded and then terminated the connection. Leaving the battlefield without the permission of the commanding officer and/or serious circumstances considered treason in the fleets of EEUD and the sole penance during the wartime was execution. Well, she had the black box of the battleship as the evidence of dire situation and that she had no other choice, but now she could go away from this hellish whirlpool without problems from military prosecution.

“Helm.” Commanded Maiko with a smile, slumping into her chair powerlessly. This day already drained almost all of her life force. “Turn the ship around and begin the charge of the hyper-drive. Destination – system Okitsu.”

The raising howl in the depth of the ship’s maw sound like an angelic song to her ears as her damaged vessel initiated the hyper-jump preparation sequence. She and her crew survived this battle and from now she could only silently pray for the victory of the Japanese Empire.


~***~​

Whew, finally I reached "the battle between two fleets" part. The squadron of cruisers pulling Vita's spell was funny to write I admit.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#28
It was a long delay. But I needed a beta-reader, since my own english is not very good. Many thanks to Nanya for his help.

But now i'm happy to present a proof-readed part of my story. I also made a tweaks in the previous post.

~***~​

The fire erupted from all breaches on the hull of the Japanese battleship as the warship gave in to its wounds. A few moments later, another star of explosion flared in the middle of the fierce battle.

Oberst Bruno Vin Ardenau flashed a satisfied smile, seeing how the Japanese forces in the area were visibly rattled, even if only for one moment, by the death of one of their “big boys”. Good, one by one he and his compatriots would purge those treacherous invaders.

Amber eyed Oberst’s high spirit was spoiled when a few rockets, launched from the unit of the Japanese cruisers managed to get through his ship’s AA-screen and smash into the battleship’s hull. The damage were minimal but this incident reminded the violet haired Oberst about the fact that neither he nor his mighty battleship – Nethergarde – was an invincible being and one mistake would cost him his life.

Concentrating on the tacscreen Bruno quickly found the attackers – the two full units of Nakatsu-class cruisers, which meant eight cruisers, escorted by an equal numbers of the Uwatsu-class frigates. The trajectory of their flight, their perfect formation and the purely untouched state of their hulls clued him in that it was the Japanese reinforcement, which had come to increase the pressure on the Belkan forces in this area.

Those ships wasn’t the last hostiles that entered this battlezone – as Oberst Vin Ardenau could see on the tacscreen as more and more green warships came in at the full speed in order to join the battle. The Japansese ships were surrounded by the bright flashes of the activated engines of the rockets, which shot out from their nests and towards their targets. The Japanese ships didn’t stop on just long-range bombardment of course; as they managed to dive right into the center of the battle so they could use their broadside cannons to the maximum potency, hammering all nearby Belkan warships in the vicinity.

The chatter on the comm line revealed that another swarm of missiles, launched from the Japanese long-range ships, had breached the Belkan formation, but now, since the vanguard ships were locked into melee the efficiency of the AA-screen of the defenders of the Schoneherddome was depleted. The violet haired commander gritted his teeth as he saw how the ships of his brothers and sisters started to succumb to the Japanese fire, they had already lost too many battles to those perfidious scoundrels and he’d be damned if he wouldn’t give those bastards piece of his mind.

The particular group, consisted from two units of cruisers and two units of frigates, that launched a surprise attack on his vessel as if sensing his thoughts, increased their barrage and destroyed pair of the already damaged Belkan cruisers. Kek, thought Bruno – he needed to lock those ships in the battle before they could put even more strain on his side.

Fighting all those ships was tantamount to suicide. In theory, Belkan battleship could take one squadron of Japanese cruisers head on, but he definitely couldn’t win against eight cruisers, especially when said cruisers was supported by the two squadrons of frigates – but he wasn’t the only Belkan commanding officer who noticed the woe of the Balkan fleet in this area, as Bruno could see the fresh ships belonging to his side moving from the within of the Belkan formation to engage the enemy.

Bruno made a few quick finger snaps on his left hand – his habitual gesture when he was prepared to make a dire choice – before scanning through the tacscreen, looking for the ships that could aid him in the battle that would soon occur. He had just about given up on finding help when he was alerted by one of the communication officers about an oncoming trio of friendlies. Looking at the trio as they were put up on the view-screen, his heart practically sung with joy.

The three ships were easily recognized by Bruno thanks to their identification numbers, they were the Sletzer, Nottenhauzer and Urem; named after three large cities on the Schoneherddome those cruisers were under command of the Bruno’s three good friends. Quickly ordering to establish the link with the cruisers, Bruno concentrated on the image of the Japanese vessels – while most of the newcomer hostile ships were already engaged by their equally fresh Belkan counterparts, the already infamous (for Bruno at least) group of sixteen ships were still rampaging through the Belkan ranks.

The main screen gave him a small bit of good news in the form of three windows, each of whom was occupied by the face of the Belkan Hauptmann. Kai Vin Neiderhauz - the big nosed, broad-faced dwarf with emerald green eyes and short curly blond hair and strangely enough, a long beard; Manfred Vin Bergmann – the thin man with a dull blue eyes and ash-gray hair and his younger brother – Meinhard Vin Bergmann – the man with the similar stature and eye color, but his hair was black. All of them stared at Bruno with professional interest and small hint of joy at seeing familiar face in the middle of bloody battle. Oberst made a curt nod toward all of the Hauptmanns, wearing a small smile of appreciation, for he, too, was glad to see the faces of reliable comrades, considering the situation, their support was very important.

“We have no time to spare, herren! We need to kill one big nasty ratte and I need you assistance!” Declared Bruno, narrowing his gaze into his counterparts’ ones. The ship commanders nodded in agreement, seeing the damage that this group of the Japanese cruisers and frigates had inflicted on their forces in area. Bruno returned the gesture and ordered the communication officer to terminate the connection. He knew that Kai, Manfred and Meinhard would follow him.

Nethergarde charged forward, diving deeper in the chaos of the mutual slug-fest between the two fleets, with Sletzer, Nottenhauzer and Urem on his trial. Around them the frigates, cruisers and battleships continued their deadly dance in the void.

The battle between the Belkans and the Japanese was similar to a herd of buffalo repulsing the attack of a pack of hyenas. The tight-knit formation of the bulky Belkan warships steadily rumbled forward, sending barrage after barrage toward the smaller but more mobile and faster groups of Japanese ships, who circled around their Belkan counterparts, hammering them with missiles and mass-drivers.

Due the collapse of the dimensional rift the Japanese got their long-range support back and for an entire hour, much to his growing ire, Bruno could see the flashes of nuclear explosions on the panoramic view of the battlefield on the main monitor. Tight formations had many more chances to get caught in the storm of plasma, generated by such explosions and thus, the Belkans were forced either to split to smaller formation, or get closer to a massive Ewige Eiche station, under the protection of their powerful AA-armament. Hower, such a thing would allow the Japanese to gain temporal vantage until the battle escalated even further and now Japanese commanders were too afraid to hit their own ships with nuclear ordnance to use them.

The same could not be said about the three-damned sakurahydrogen missiles, since a collision with the object, that could move at speeds of thousands of kilometers per hour would be devastating. Usually the Japanese used their rockets to cover as much of the space of the battlefield as they could before their ships arrived and start the brawl, but today, due to unorthodox move of the Belkan army, their battle plan was screwed.

Now the Japanese used their Disruptor-missiles in response to the usage of the spells, not to prevent them, which gave the Belkans an entire array of new possibilities.

Noticing the determined approach of the Belkan battleships and trio of cruisers, the Japanese group of ships started to turn around, aiming their broadside cannons on the Nethergarde – the biggest target. Bruno smiled coldly, seeing the maneuvers of his adversaries – he had the feeling they would behave like that and so he prepared a small surprise for them.

With a few clicks on the panel under his right hand he established the connection between his own Armed Device and ship’s computer, another click made the entire set of twenty cartridges explode, pouring raw mana into Bruno’s Device through the ship’s energy network. Brunio hissed when he felt an incredible amount of magical energy connected with his Linker Core, the ship system made a good work giving him enough extra capacity to control this energy but the strain was still there.

Oberst snarled at his own momentary weakness inwardly and concentrated on the spell, he had no right for weakness. Bruno Vin Ardenau didn’t forget to order the gunnery officer to prepare the cannons to fire-contact with the enemy and target the two nearest cruisers.

“Panzerhindernis” – Uttered Nethergarde’s computer in unison with Argarlf - Bruno’s Device as the red barrier appeared right before the battleship’s bow. A few seconds later the magical shield was forced to endure the wrath of the entire array and power of the Japanese weaponry.

The metal bars, propelled to monstrous speed, slammed into the shimmering crimson field one after another carving out a shower of sparks from its surface. Bruno hissed from increased strain with each passing moment. The barrage would fade away soon, until those slit-eyed bastards recharged their cannons, but it would be up to him to be able to hold the shields until that moment.

Then the storm of fury faded away, giving Bruno time to catch his breath and cancel the spell. Once the crimson triangle disappeared the space was pierced by the streams of the red energy that burst from all six main turrets and the fore canons.

Japanese captains also weren’t too dumb to think that enemy wouldn’t retaliate and broke into evasive maneuvers the moment the barrage came to an end. Yet, the Belkans were able to predict, partly at least, the trajectory of the enemy vessels during their escape. The bright crimson energy drilled through the green metal of the cruiser’s hull and exploded a moment later, sending the metal parts and remains of the ship’s systems in all directions.

The damage was grievous, but the cruisers were alive and still fearlessly fired their cannons at their assailant, but Bruno was satisfied with this result as he didn’t expect to destroy those ships with just an initial barrage. He had three cruisers to finish the job.

The enemy clearly understood that Nethergarde needed time to recharge its cannons and finish off their comrades and tried to concentrate their fire on the cruisers, which moved right behind their bigger cousin, but their barrage was intercepted by the second Panzerhindernis, casted by Bruno. The pressure was a bit lighter this time, partly because Bruno started to remember his old skills, which were useless in the usual battle against the Japanese, but mostly because the cruisers, that supported him, established the link which not only give him additional mana but also, more importantly, shared the burden of supporting the spell between four mages.

Sieg-class cruisers had two twin barreled turret cannons on their bow, and hauptmanns of the Sletzer, Nottenhauzer and Urem made a good usage of the armament by splitting the fire – three upper turret aimed at the right cruiser and three lower ones at the left. Damaged cruisers tried their best to avoid the shots, but the damage to the thrusters decreased their mobility by too much for them to successfully pull evasive maneuvers off, and considering the time the cruisers had to gain a perfect aim, it would have been an incredibly great feat to perform even if they had been at perfect shape.

The familiar streams of energy raced across space in order to pierce the battered hulls of the green torpedo-shaped cruisers. Twin bright flares punctured the black void right before Belkan crews eyes as the Japanese ships came apart in a shower of flame. Cruisers that hadn’t used their fore cannons, saving the charge before-hand, now fired on the Japanese frigates, but the elusive ships managed to avoid the blow.

Bruno, Manfred, Meinhard, Kai and their subordinates had a very short time to cheer before the Japanese answer came with fiery hatred. Nethergarde’s entire hull shook violently when a barrage, generated by the synchronized volley of the broadside cannons of four cruisers, slammed into the crimson outer armor.

Sparks flew everywhere as one of the monitors exploded, light on the entire ship blacked out for a moment, there was no corner on the ship that didn’t jolt like a horse that had its tooth suddenly plucked out. Bruno snarled in pain as alarm claxons hollered at the top of their non-existent lungs, yet lavender haired man only smirked when he saw the damage report on the display that appeared right in front of him – the ablative armor of the battleship took the majority of the barrage's destructive might on itself and now the squibs blasted the remnants of the armored plates off.

This armor was the newest addition to Belkan armed forces, and only just recently shipyards started to equip Belkan capital ships with it and thus not all cruisers and battleships that guarded Schoneherddome were protected by the additional layer of defense. The idea was simple; the combination of the metal and the ceramic plates, connected between each other by the sets of fasteners, was put over the usual armor, connected to it through the array of the locks and shock absorbers. Thus enemy was forced to pierce the hull of the ship twice if they wanted to inflict serious damage on the ship.

This armor was too heavy for frigates and significantly increased the fuel consumption together with a significant decrease in speed. But the Belkans always more relied on the thickness of their armor, rather than on speed and agility, so the trade-off was fair in the eyes of the Belkan military. The recent clash was good verification of this.

The obvious shock of the Japanese captains gave Bruno’s ship the time to line the arc of fire of the cruiser’s broadsides. He was worried that remaining cruisers from the other squadron would attack him after they blasted the ablative armor off and inflict some actual damage this time, but it seemed that unit commander was on one of the perished ships and the remaining pair of ships were still in a state of shock.

Unfortunately, the cruisers weren’t so lucky – to be specific, Nottenhauzer was currently on the receiving end of a vicious bombardment from two groups of Japanese frigates. The first group’s volley could only strip the ablative armor from the cruiser, but what was miniscule damage for the battleship was significant damage for the cruiser’s hull. But what was truly devastating that it was a second volley that burrowed through now that Nottenhauzer’s armor off, and caused grievous damage to the ship’s internal systems. Bruno cringed when he saw that one of the cruiser’s turrets fall apart due the damage.

Both groups of the ships flew in opposite directions, recharging their cannons and preparing for the second engagement. Bruno frowned – his side scored the actual kills first, but now enemy knew about their cards more and would be more prepared, needless to say, the Japanese still retained their numerical supremacy over them. This would be a tough battle.
Nethergarde turned to port, starting a maneuver which should bring her bow armament to full usage when the Japanese charged at them again.

Sletzer, Nottenhauzer and Urem followed behind, but Nottenhauzer visibly fell behind, the damage was even more severe than he had first thought. It was a bad sight, the Nakatsus held the distinct advantage in the agility and if Japanese started to dance around them it would take even more sacrifices to destroy that group.

The situation around them remained unpredictable but Bruno found some small solace, seeing that the Japanese definitely lost the momentum and in a battle of endurance, it was always the Belkans who held the advantage.

The sudden bright flash that appeared on the monitor interrupted his line of thoughts – this flash was larger and brighter than all he had seen previously. Oberst Vin Ardenau gritted his teeth with a force that threatened to break some of them – he had the idea which vessel had just met its end right now.

“Oberst Konig Feizer has been lost!!” Cried the locator officer in horror, declaring the death of one of the prized guardian stations of the Belkan Empire. So, one of the mighty Ewige Eiche-class space fortresses succumbed to the Japanese onslaught which meant that Belkan AA-shield now had a glaring breach in it. Despite the ferocity of the battle, if the situation would call for it, the Japanese would break off from the melee using their superior speed and mobility, regardless of their losses and then the Belkan ships would stand naked before the fierce bombardment from hundreds of thousands kilometers away.

“Incoming missiles!” Come the warning cry of the locator officer together with the distinct beeping of his console. All soldiers of the Belkan army hissed in unison when the saw the small swarm of missiles coming at them their adversaries deciding to go full swing.

“Defensive fire!!” Ordered Bruno, preparing the spell and bracing for the upcoming surge of nausea. “Synchronize the with Urem and Sletzer, and order Nottenhauzer to stay right behind our ship!”

The phalanx cannons, as crude they were, did a good job shooting the missiles down. Well there was not too many missiles after all, as Japanese still was afraid to accidentally strick their own ships. Yet, as the clouds of sakurahydrogen continue to multiply, the situation became more and more dire for the Belkans.

“Kek I can’t even use the Panzerhindernis in the situation like that.” Snarled Bruno inwardly, as Nethergarde plowed through the barrage. ”On other hand, those slit-eyes still didn’t do anything more than bind us for a moment… Wait!! Binding?!! Oh kek..!!”

Realization came too late as the mighty battleship rocketed under the barrage. The Uwatsu flew over the ship, bombarding its hull with their broadside cannons and turrets. Now the alarm claxons bellowed even louder as now ship received heavier damage than before.

“Our thrusters took serious damage, the mobility has decreased by 30 percent!” Cried the helmsman, wrestling with the helm as ship struggled under fire. Trained gunnery officer didn’t need the order to return the favor. The broadsides opened fire immediately and Bruno smirked when he saw how one of the Japanese frigates was torn apart be the volley, the bastards didn’t get away with their stunt.

But there was still too many enemies left and the second unit of Uwatsu had another target in mind and flew straight toward the damaged Nottenhauzer, the cruiser tried to fight back but the damage and the bad timing did their dark job. One volley after the cruiser fell apart.

Bruno, Kai and Meinhard didn’t have the time to grieve about the demise of their comrades and brothers as the Japanese cruisers came to the sight with their guns ablaze, full units formed the left and the remaining cruisers from the right.

Enraged Bruno almost slammed the panel on his chair while slamming his fingers into her sensor-filled surface. He charged twenty cartridges, pouring a colossal amount of mana into his Device. The strain was colossal but rage and bloodlust was a good anesthetic and doping in the situation like that.

“Aim our fore guns on the Fuchs-3 and 4! Fire once I complete the spell!!” Snarled Bruno, ordering to target the cruisers from the decreased unit, feeling such anger that the veins in his eyes started to rupture. The Nakatsu-class cruisers concentrated on the more vulnerable targets, the cruisers, as the damaged battleships had trouble with maneuvers now and thus couldn’t bring his devastation weaponry that was located on its bow to use. The ablative armor softened the strike and the retaliation was fierce, but the situation didn’t looks good. And then, finally the spell was completed.

“Donnerfaust!!!” Roared Bruno, releasing the fully constructed spell into the ship’s inner energy network. A second later the Belkan magical triangle appeared before each cannon on the ship. The dutiful gunnery officer didn’t disappoint either, once the crimson aura appear around the Nethergarde’s hull, all turret cannons erupted with fire. Now it was a storm of fire that no one of the crew had ever seen in the entire time of servitude, the all-destructive storm of the crimson energy, as the spell tripled the already terrible destructive power of the battleship’s cannon, slammed into the pair of the cruisers right over the reactor’s bay, melted through the layers of the thick metal in the span of milliseconds to struck the very core of each Nakatsu. Both ships disappeared in the whirlwind of flame a moment after.

The Japanese were no less shocked than Nethergarde’s crew. But unlike them, they felt additional horror instead of elation. Their confusion gave the Urem and Sletzer the opportunity to take aim and destroy not one but two frigates in one coordinated volley. The remaining Japanese ships sent their thrusters into full burn and took off at top speed.

“Damage report.” Demanded Bruno, whose gaze was glued to the group of the ten green dots that moved in a wide circle, obviously trying to flank his small battle order and attack from their vulnerable rear guard.

“Sir, multiple breaches detected on the decks 3, 6, 9, 11, 13, 16 and 18.” Started his report Carsten Odernaul, his XO, as he wiped blood from his wounded forehead while working on his console. ”Damaged energy lines from the reactor to the broadside cannons on the right board but the reserve line should make up for it. Damage to our weapon systems is minimal – just a few damaged cannons on the broadside cannons on the left board. But our thrusters took severe damage and now we can barely perform any maneuvers.”

Bruno could only snarl at the last sentence – the damaged thrusters meant that his ship was basically a sitting duck, which meant that the Japanese could simply circle in his rear guard, bombarding his battleship with little worry. Yes, turret-based cannons wouldn’t be too hindered by the damage, but the enemy could now simply out-run the arc of fire quickly if the situation would call for it. He was almost certain that if he wanted pull the victory from the jaws of the defeat he'd have to pull some sort of crazy stunt.

Well, one couldn't be in the Belkan Empire and go far without pulling a few crazy stunts every so often after all.

“Connect me to Urem and Sletzer quickly! Warm up the engines and order all crew members to gather in the central compartments of the ship, order the gunners of the broadside cannons to move to the support fire control center. Once the other areas are empty, close all airlocks and order the personnel to brace for the impact.” Ordered the amber eyed man, working on his panel frantically, the crew around him worked with the same fervor when the communication windows appeared on the main screen. To said it looked bad was to put it mildly.

Kai’s face and hair was drenched in sweat, his lower lip was cut while his nose was clearly broken, the upper half of his chair was missing, it seemed that his command chair wasn't able withstand the ferocity of the battle. Meinhard’s chair was sturdier, which couldn’t be said about his teeth and right eye, which was cut by shards of glass when one of the monitors exploded under the bombardment.

The worn out faces of the cruisers hauptmanns was a clear indication of their own fatigue and Bruno knew that he would put even more strain on them in an already dire situation, but he had no other choice. He’d bear the same burden at least.

“Herren.” Started Bruno as he curtly gazed at his comrades and subordinates with grim resolution. The oppressive pressure grew stronger with each passing second and the violet hared officer couldn’t help but make a few snaps with fingers again as the crew members worked with insane speed, as if they were trying to shelter themselves with an air of determination against the increasing fear. “It’s a do or die situation and I need your help for pulling out the former instead of succumbing to later.”

The pair of Belkan commanders on the screen nodded with the same determination in their eyes, preparing to hear the plan of the Oberst. “We need to gain the advantage of the first strike against our adversaries. They hold the edge in the speed and mobility so I need your help to get closer to them ASAP before those bastards start to fire their missiles on us again and in order to grasp this advantage I need you to create the link between our ships again, but this time I need you two to take the formation of the spell on yourself, since I need to concentrate on the another.”

Kai and Meinhard nodded again, without even asking what the spell it would be. They had come too far to back off now, as that would mean they'd betray their comrades who fought a bitter battle right now and would turn Manfred's death into a sham. The looks in Meinhard eyes pretty much screamed victory or death. Bruno just hoped it wouldn't turn into obsession for the black haired man as Meinhard’s subordinates relied on him.

“Ja wohl!” Come the answer from both hauptmanns at the same time and Bruno went to the most important part, he could see that one green dot, the sole surviving frigate from his group, leave the formation and now fled from the battlefield. Other ships continued their maneuver with frigates first followed by the cruisers. “I’ll need you to cast the Schwalbefliegen and turn the battleship toward the enemy cruiser group, while I’m busy with upholding the integrity of the ship’s hull and superstructure.”

The crew around him gasped once they heard the plan of their commander. The plan was insane and Bruno knew this. the Schwalbefliegen was shooting a spell that would propel the metal projectiles and control their trajectory during the flight. Technically, the spell could move a battleship, if an absurdly large amount of mana was poured into the spell, but the power of the inertia would surely, if not outright rip the battleship apart, then inflict severe damage to the warship’s structure. Bruno knew it all, but he also knew that he had very little time left to create a better plan and thus he continued.

“Once the maneuver is complete, the Nethergarde will charge toward the remaining Japanese vessels, and I need you ships to move forward to intercept the frigates. Kai, Meinhard and I know that it's an insane feat to achieve but I need you to toss my ship away from the internal barrage and turn it around. I’ll have to put all my strength in preventing it from falling apart so I can only help you with navigation during the jolt. I’m sorry.”

“We’ll do that, herr Oberst.” Declared Kai and Meinhard nodded in agreement. “Open the channel and we’ll made a good cozy road so that you can go and rip those bastards apart.” Bruno answered with a sharp salute on those words and, with a few taps on the console, opened the mana-channel to both cruisers. Meinhard and Kai answered with salutes on their own and terminated the connection, preparing for the spell-casting and the battle.

“The surge of energy was painful, Bruno had really overused his magic and while he was A rank mage it was still too much for him. Cursing himself for faling out of shape, Bruno continued on, Argarlf already stored the Donnerfaust and now the constructed spell would tie all areas of ship together with a network of the invisible threads, which should help the structure of the ship hold during the insane maneuvers her captain had in his head.

The casting triangle flashed around both cruisers, and the bridge occupants could see from one of the observation windows as the well-known crimson aura engulfed the battleship. Tremendous groans reverberated through the entire ship when the completed spell forced the entire hull to jolt viciously forward, before the battleship quickly turned around. The crew was prepared and the quake wasn’t as powerful as the ones ship suffered during each enemy barrage, still the muffled curses could be heard on bridge.

The Nethergarde rocked when the engines went into full burn propelling the ship forward. The cruisers didn’t hesitate to follow their leads, but soon their dagger-shapes hulls, releasing massive torches of fire from the nozzles, overtook the battleship and Urem and Sletzer moved to meet the upcoming enemy frigates head-on. Still the link between the vessels held.

Despite the lingering pain, Bruno Vin Ardenau could tell that he really started to remember his old skill in mage craft, and if he managed to survived this, he would be able to use his spells much more freely and without all this suffering in the next battle, however, that was a big if. But damn, it was really humiliating that he allowed himself to fall so out of shape with his magic. He already had the device to help him greatly with process of casting and hundreds of the cartridges with stored mana but he really need to train his body and Linker Core again.

The icon, which showed his ship’s location quickly, shortened the gap between herself and four green icons, the Nakatsus. Oberst smirked as he saw that the enemy cruisers didn’t reacted at all at his charge, no matter what the slit-eyes said their locators were only superior to Belkan's counterparts when the latter was blinded by that damned gas. Of course they saw that it was enemy who moved toward them as his IFF didn’t match theirs but he was sure that the Japanese would think it was just a suicidal charge of a frigate, since the normal capital ships in the Belkan fleet couldn’t turn around with such speed.

The amber eyed mage’s glee didn't hold for too long, until the moment when cruisers’ crew didn’t get the visual confirmation and reacted accordingly, releasing that red dot hides a much more potent danger behind itself. With a grace that was impossible for their Belkan counterparts, all four Nakatsus dived downright and to portside, preparing to meet Nethergardewith the barrage.

“Sir,Urem and Sletzer engaged the enemy frigates; they won’t be able to support the spell for too long!” Cried the Carsten checking the readings on his console, as the tacscreen show the death match between cruisers and frigates. Bruno quickly made a few inputs in his console, preparing for the endgame of his gambit. The air was pierced by the sounds of two quick snaps again.

“Fire contact in the thirty seconds!” Cried gunnery officer, preparing to perform his duty with dedication. “Aim at the engine blocks of the last two cruisers, split the turrets between them equally! But don’t fire with the fore gun, we’ll need them later!” Ordered Bruno, preparing to use the spell in order for his insane maneuver to work. A moment later, they unleash the power of the stored spells in the canon of the Nethergarde. He wanted to said “we all count on you, son” but decided to spare poor young man from additional pressure in already dire situation.

The green hulls of the enemy cruisers grew bigger on the main screen and the anxiety grew with it, still Bruno couldn’t help but reveal a shark-like grin again, those slit-eyed bastards responded in the way he expected them to do, they went full speed, forcing their engines to work for eight seconds at full power before cutting them off, now their speed was far too high for them to perform a sharp turn, as inertia would smash the crew over the bulkheads if they tried it.

The broadside cannons of Nakatsu flared when EM-accelerators send the deadly projectiles toward the advancing battleship and it was this very moment Bruno Vin Ardenau had waited for. He gave a short telepathic order. Flash of red light filled the main screen for a moment when the spell, boosted by a forty cartridges, tossed the mighty ship like a piece of driftwood in a storm.

No one among the thousands of crew members could tell what was louder; the hysterical scream of the alarm claxons or the groaning, rumbling and crunching of the overstrained frame. But the worst of all was the thunderous crushing sound, which punctured this hellish cacophony, resonating with suffocating terror in the souls of the astronauts, when, despite all finesse of the Belkan work and the struggles of the reliable spell some structures of the ship gave in and collapsed under the strain.

Bruno snarled, he felt that he could endure the upkeep of the spell but now he wasn’t so sure about his ship, reports of the damage appeared every second. The greenish field appeared around every single member of the bridge crew; the ship tried its best to protect the crew with an anti-inertia field, but the power of the G-force was tremendous. Bruno didn’t dare to think what happened to any unlucky soldier whose field failed to appear.

The ship shook violently, when rockets, launched from the Nakatsus succeed in hitting his ship, where the broadside cannons failed to finish their task. The already weakened hull cracked in some places, revealing the interior to the hostile environment of space. The lavender haired man desperately prayed that all those areas were free from human presence. Though he knew very well how childish those thoughts were.

The activation of the remaining thrusters reverberated throughout the entire frame as the savvy helmsman activated the engines without his order to try and lower the strain that his commander and his ship were forced to endure. Bruno dreaded to think how much damaged ship had taken from this crazy stunt alone, he was sure that it was much more than from the fire from the Japanese ships.

Oberst Vin Ardenau found the solace in the fact that his plan to avoid the barrage was a success. All the suffering the ship and his crew was forced to endure finally paid off. The shocked Japanese lost the ability to fire on him due their speed and the limited arc of fire of their ordnance weaponry and now the most reliable arcs of the cruisers appeared right before the battleship’s deadly array of turrets and fore guns. The obvious panic, in which the cruisers tried to maneuver, while burning the thrusters on the bow, trying to slow down, was also quiet satisfying.

“Fire!!” Roared Bruno, as he activated the Donnerfaust and the familiar casting triangles appeared again. Then all started to move in slow motion for him: Bruno saw turrets flash like six small suns releasing their deadly charge toward the cruisers, which were already moving frantically trying to shake off the clear aim.

The shots, which carried all the hatred of the Belkans, darted through the black soundless void, hungry for the death of the Japanese invaders. The crimson streams pierced the nozzles of the two rear cruisers, burrowing into the ship’s hulls. Bruno continued to gaze blankly as both cruisers continued to move forward, even with massive holes in their hulls. The signal lights continued their work and some could say that they failed to land a mortal blow, but Bruno saw flames quickly raise up in the depth of those newly made dips.

And then stream fire burst out from those breaches on both cruisers as the fuel tanks combusted. The green metal bent outward from the power of the initial explosion and then both ships were torn in half when the engines and fuel tanks exploded. The remaining parts darted forward uncontrollably as the crew obviously couldn’t survive such catastrophe.

The remaining ships, who managed to slow down and was in the middle of turning maneuver, tried to return the fire, but their aim was disrupted when the battleship’s fore guns erupted with a similar burst of blood-red energy. Unfortunately for the Belkans, the helmsman on both Japanese ships was able to avoid the shot and then to make it worse both Nakatsu quickly left the arc of fire of all turrets, without forgetting to hammer the ship with one synchronized volley of their broadsides.

The Japanese cruisers particularly oozed with hatred and bloodlust. And unfortunately, they now had the advantage as they moved towards the rear arc of the battleship, but now Nethergarde had no way to turn around in time to meet them. Bruno, despite the direness of the situation didn’t give up and prepared to issue a new order when the communication officer shouted in delight. “Sir, Urem and Sletzer are coming to aid us in the battle! And they’re not alone!!”

Battleship’s commander could only gasp in surprise and relief when the new window on the main screen show the pair of battered but still very spirited Sieg-class cruisers, followed by the full unit of very fresh but no less spirited Ruhm-class frigates. The cannons on all ships blazed sending unstoppable storm of energy toward the, now outnumbered, cruisers.

The reinforcement seemed to come in time to help the Urem and Sletzer to demolish the Japanese non-capital ships quickly and then dashed to support his battleship. The Japanese captains were quick to figure out how bleak their future would be if they tried to stay and so they took off at maximum speed without even trying to fire back.

Chorus of joyful cries filled the enclosed space of Nethergarde’s bridge at the sight of their victory. Yes, after all of those struggles, loses and suffering they emerged triumphant and no one could stop them from vocally expressing their delight. Bruno knew, with a rising guilt and self-hatred, from the reports that still continued to come on his monitor that many brave soldiers died, some from the Japanese attacks and some perished when the ship was tormented by the G-force. Other victims of the Japanese bloodlust and greed for new conquests.

“Oberst! We’re being hailed.” Declared the communication officer, as his console started to beep. One nod from Bruno and the communication window appeared on the main monitor, revealing the face of the Kai Vin Neiderhauz, whose face wore the mixed expression of relief and exhaustion.

“Glory to Sankt-Kaiser, Bruno, we're here in time!” The shorter man flashed a more cheerful smile now, after he confirmed the survival of his friend. “You know, I swear that once I get some free time I’ll go to the temple to flare a new candle. Once we started to trade a first blows with those kekers, our comrades suddenly barged onto battlefield and hammered them from the behind.”

Bruno could only imagine the feral grins on the crew members of those frigates when they understood that they have the chance to get the alpha-strike on the usually more fast and agile Japanese counterparts. Well, and once the formation of the Uwatsu frigates was broken after the very first loss their fate was sealed.

“Seems that today was our lucky day, mein Freund.” Bruno gave a tired smile as the strain from the battle started to affect him. “Reinforcement came to help us in time. But now we need to help our brothers and sisters who are still fighting right now.”

Kai’s smile grow even more wider and lively as he continued. “Mein Freund, look at the tacscreen more carefully, we weren’t the only ones who got help. Right now the balance of the battle has shifted in our favor. We need to hurry up and get some new kills for us.”

Bruno immediately switch his attention to the tacscreen and after a few seconds of careful observation he saw the truth of Kai’s words. On the right side of the visible tactical map the group of the red dots moved through the various clashes, helping the engaged Belkan ships to overpower the enemy and then move forward.

The freed ships either moved outside the battlefield, if they were too damaged, or helped with the reinforcement to aid their comrades in battle. The other ships strode toward the particular point, to meet the repair ships, who used the combination of, nano-machines and spells from the golem meiseters lore to perform the quick’s field repair.

The Belkans gained momentum in the battle, which was lost by the Japanese, when they engaged the defenders of the Schoneherddome in melee. And now they couldn’t take the Belkan’s counter-offense head-on as the red dots moved faster and faster, rolling over their adversaries.

Now it was apparent that the victory in this area belonged to the Belkan fleet. The Japanese seemed to get this as well as many green ships, who were lucky enough to be on the edge of the battlefield, shamelessly broke the engagement and moved outside the battle on top speed, which was something that the Belkans had no intentions to let them go. Unlucky brothers of the fled ships, who were caught in the middle of the field of the battle, could only fight bitterly, awaiting for their end to come. Bruno smirked darkly inwardly, it served those bastards right.

He turned his attention back to Kai and answered. “My ship needs to have some quick patches to its hull done before we can join you guys. Good hunting, Urem! Just leave some pray for us, okay? Nethergarde out!”

Kai nodded with a broad smile and then terminated the connection. On the observation window, both cruisers and the frigates that support them, ignited their engines and took off in unison. The battle still wasn’t over and the Belkans still need to work in order to snatch the victory not only in this area, but also to break the spine of the entire invasion fleet.

“Set the course to the nearest repair vehicle.” Ordered Bruno, shifting up in his chair to adopt a more collected appearance, he needed to endure it, just like his subordinates. “Once we get rid of the most glaring breaches in the hull and restore the integrity of the frame we’ll go back into the battle and wipe those infidels from the face of our cosmos!” His eyes flared before he intoned the list lines, there was no traces of fatigue in his form anymore. “GLORY TO THE BELKA!!”

“GLORY TO THE BELKA!” Come the thunderous answer as the crew went back to their work. They still had the battle to win.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#29
Another quick update.

Wow, I never thought I could produce such wall of text on my own.

House Schoneherd ancestral castle Schmetternden Berg. Battle Control Center.
Planet Schnoeherddome
10th day of second cycle of fifth period.


Oswin tapped his left cheek a few time, observing the movements of the numerous icons on the 3d image of the space, surrounding his planetary domain, showing the ongoing struggle between two fleets for dominance. To his grim satisfaction, Grossherzog Ven Schoneherd could see that Japanese armada already lost the initiative and now could only desperately hope to win the melee, with the help of their long-range support. Well, he would be more than happy to crush their hopes.

“Reinforce the Herzog Ven Weisshahn battle group with the forces of the 5th rear flotilla, slit-eyes press them hard!” Commanded Oswin, noticing the point where Japanese started to slowly gain the advantage and even drown the Belkan defenders back. Despite all the commotion in the castle’s TCC he knows that his command would be heard and executed.

Taking a small break he diverted his gaze from the large panoramic 3d view of the battlefield that float in the middle f the room, and glanced around. The large hall, from where he and his stuff controlled the flow of the battle was located in the lower levels of the Brullen turm – the oldest and most spacious tower of the castle.

Oswin couldn’t help but wonder why the Alois Ven Schoneherd build the brain-center of any battle in their system in such manner? Honestly, if not for the all sophisticated equipment and arrays of computers the clueless person could think he accidentally entered the ballroom.

Utterly non-Belkan ballroom, to be specific. Martha revealed that grossherzog Alois was tired of overuse of the standeart patterns and colors in the castle so he decided he wanted something special for the hall from where he would control his forces.

The marble tiles, which covered the cellar, walls and floor had the gentle mocha color, the same color as the six massive supporting columns. The source of the light in the room was two large bronze chandeliers that shone as bright as all illumination of the dining hall where he, his family and guests feted Vita. The only traces of the traditional Belkan architecture in the room were the three massive crimson mosaic circles on the floor, one of whom lay nearby from his boots.

Yet, it was, without a doubt, a battle control centre. The latest and most advanced Belkan hardware, that filled majority of the room’s space, granted a steady control on his forces to any Wolkenrecih commander and his stuff. Right now numerous military personnel used the abilities granted by this hall to lead their fleet to victory, working behind their station, reading the reports and shouting the orders. Yes, for all its frilly approach, this hall was a truly brain center of their victory.

Though, the attentive climate-control, which was achieved by the combination of carefully installed fans, ventilation lines and engraves spells that made sure that air in the room always was friendly to the occupants; and the small well-crafted fountains attached to each columns that was a containers for the powerful water-based spell that prevent the officers from the mental breakdown and reinforce their fortitude also helped Oswin to start really liking this room.

Martha, who stood on his right side, flashed a smile feral grin of satisfaction as she noticed something in the rapidly changing panorama of battle, something bad for the Japanese of course. Grossherzog Ven Schoneherd, silently praising his beloved sharp eye for battle, concentrated on the tacscreen, trying to see what pleased his wife, after few seconds he noticed a large group of Japanese ships, caught in the crossfire and separated from the bulk of their forces.

To the credit of the invaders, even in such hopeless situation they’re refused to give up and continued to fire on the Belkan ships, some of whom even disappear from the screen, indicating the death of the vessel. Still, the speed with which the green dots ceased to exist was much greater, and continued to increase, signaling of their rapidly decreasing battle-strength.

The situation in other areas also didn’t favored the slit-eyed gentleman, as even if they wasn’t push back there at moment, they also wasn’t able to bush Belkans back either. And when the Belkan battleships, cruisers and frigates that already gained victory on their turf come to the help, Japanese immediately loses all their previous achievements.

As he stated early, Japanese loses the initiative, while fleet of Wolkenreich gain it and now started to slowly but steadily beat the invaders back. To make the matter worse for the Japan fleet, the another screen, which show the panorama of the entire Stein Krone system, show the large red icon, with a lettering that stated “10th and 13th assault fleets” that swiftly strode through the black void, closing the gap between itself and Schoneherddome. Approximately, seventy-six minutes later the massive reinforcement would come to their aid.

Which mean that already heavy battered Japanese fleet have only seventy six minutes of life.

Still, Oswin couldn’t join the chorus of the exited whispers that could be here that and there in the room, as the jubilation filled the air. There was something that still bothers him, preventing the patriarch of Schoneherd family from cheering up.

“Dear…” His inner turmoil didn’t escape Martha’s attention, her hand squeezed his right shoulder and sounds of her voice filled with concern were an ironclad proof of this fact. “We both know what on the stake so you should tell me what plague you.” It was amusing, in some case, how her voice managed to be both reassuring and demanding on the same time. Yet Oswin know very well that his sweetheart was right, in the battle any piece of information could be very important and, cursing himself for not starting the conversation on his own, blue eyed Belkan noble started his confession.

“Martha, you know pretty well that Japanese had enough time to figure out all of our tricks, we use to hack their communication lines. Yet, we managed to obtain almost perfectly correct date of their attack and made preparations. Doesn’t it bother you, my dearest wife? What are they hoped to achieve by such actions?”

Martha’s expression darkened at his words, as amber eyed woman pursed her lips before answering, her face now loses all previous jubilation and now was twisted into worried and confused expression. “I agree, that’s something fishy there, my love. Just like you I have very little doubt that our enemies purposively give this information t us. I more than sure, that Japanese HQ let us know that they’re coming. But…”

She paused before continuing, her voice quickly started to gain back all lost confidence. “But look at them now! Their fleet now in a tight position: the initiative lost, their flotillas took more and more loses with each passed minute, their offensive formation slowly falling apart!” As if in confirmation of her words, entire line of green dots disappeared from a panoramic image of the battlefield, heralding about the entire group of the Japanese ships succumbing to the Belkan’s bombardment.

“Even if they have the reinforcement come from hyper-space this instant, they still couldn’t bring them out too close to the battlefield because our ECM network made the FTL navigation inside of the system too unpredictable to the Japanese. The approximated save distance, they need to but between point of exit from hyper-space and our planet would give us at least forty minutes of leg-up to pressure Japanese fleet further!”

Martha smile morphed from the smug into cuter - energetic version when she added. “And, outside the upcoming reinforcement, we also have some reserves on the Shoneherdome after all. It’s not like we used all of our hidden cards after all.”

Martha’s words were not a baseless bragging of a greenhorn officer, though she didn’t even try hiding her vicious delight either, the current picture of the battlefield, where forced of the Japan Empire continue to succumb to an onslaught, prove her words. Still, Oswin know very well that field of war love to give you unpleasant surprises: you can create sophisticated multi-layered plans, but all of your work can come to naught due the events you didn’t managed to foresee.

Thus being said, Oswin also didn’t miss the opportunity to sneer at the desperate, and overall futile, struggle of their adversaries: after all pain, deaths and bloodshed caused by their unprovoked invasion Japanese of so very much had it coming. And again, they still have some tricks to play if situation called for it.

Few months ago Wolkenreich’s government made a secret deal with the Russian Coalition, whose ambassadors managed to get attention of one of their border fleets without provoking a fire, no matter how hard it was for a Belkan commander no to fire on the ships, bearing one of the two cursed logos – the blue sphere of a winged planet with a red pyramid turned upward in the center, encircled by golden rhomb.

The emissary of the Russia promised a help in their war, calming that the defeat of a Japan would be extremely profitable for Coalition and their closest ally – Britannia Empire. Of course, they also wanted to get a firm holding on some of the Wolkenreich’s planet and other prvilegies in exchange for their help. Kaiser Wilhelm Van Wolken was reluctant to believe in their words initially, and even more agree on their conditions, but the direness of situation worked him to make a deal.

Eventually, this worked our perfectly for their Autonomic Province as not only they gain a new technology to repel the invaders, but also finally reminded other parts of the old empire of their blood bonds between each other and now old rivals of the Wolkenreich, putting aside all ancient grudges, prepared to enter into the war together and push the invaders back to their very nest.

Russians also hold their part of a bargain and continued not only supporting Wolkenrecih with equipment and information on the Japanese weaknesses, but also ravage the support lines and attacking the rear bases of the servants if chrysanthemum throne, driving them into corner. Oswin knew that Japan was in the dire situation itself as her economic started to give in under such gargantuan pressure

Continuing to enjoy the thoughts of his enemies woes, Oswin couldn’t overlook the fact that triumphant thoughts wasn’t exclusive for him and Martha only – all around the hall, among the sharp roaring orders and swift reports, the air was punctuated by the cheerful outcries and praises. It wasn’t most regal behavior but no one among present citizens of Wolkenreich cared – it was the first time from the start of the war where their side definitely winning and just for today the Belkan officers decided to took some lenience on military protocol.

Oswin could swear that streams of water in the fountains, reflecting the light from the chandeliers, sparkling much brighter today, as if even the equipment cheered for the sond and daughter of Belka in this battle. Grossherzog stared on the cheerful and playful dance of the water a bit more… and then something clicked in the depth of his brain.

Like an explosion, the nauseous feeling burst from the small spot in the very back of his head, overwhelming his entire senses, as he stagger, losing the balance. His sight went dim, the surrounding sounds transformed into incoherent cacophony, the only thing he still could recognize was his beloved wife’s face, twisted into expression of horror. A few moments after the sight of his sweetheart faded away too, leaving him in the velvet darkness.

The darkness remained unchanging for a few moments but then entire panorama quivered like surface of the sea, the disturbance grow in the magnitude, creating a panorama of a ocean, tormented by a vicious storm. Then, with a tremendous moan, the black “sea” exploded and a ghostly aquamarine arm shoot upward. Shoneherd’s family head could only stare in shock as he saw how said arm bolted through the void toward.

As shimmering hands continue to stretch out the myriads of a shining dots of various color starts to appear all around. Soon the aquamarine-colored arm reached its goal and, with a snake-like lash grabbed one of the red dots that circled around a bigger green colored sphere.

Inhuman arm started to squeeze said sphere with its fingers, quickly becoming less and less transparent, as its attempt to crush the small circle that quivered like a heart. Disgusted, yet intrigued Oswin concentrated his gaze on the suffering dot. Then, this instant, he saw one of the Ewige Eiche battle station, being crushed by the inhuman force. Oswin tried to scream in rage and terror but no sounds come out and the grossherzog of Wolkenreich could only watch helplessly as the demonic fingers finally overwhelm the resistance of the structure and crush space bastion like a paper.

The intense grief and wrath roared into his mind as he tried to muster his magic and attack the three-damned hand. Finally, sensing a response from his Linker Core, Oswin charged forward with a great bellow… And collapsed face-first, tripping on one of the thick cables.

“Dear! Oswin! Mein Herr!” The screams of his wife, friends and subordinates resonated in his ears as seizure-attacked nobleman slowly regained control of his body after the weird vision. His head throbbed both from the sudden nausea – NO! Now he recognized the feeling of an awakening of his innate ability of providence - and the sharp contact of his jaw with marble of the floor. KEK! It’s really hurt, thanks Saint-Kaiser even in such state he managed to raise his right hand and use it as amortization, or pain would be worse. His hands took some damage too, but considering his sparring matches with Martha and other warrior of Belka, this was nothing more but annoyance.

Multiple hands grabbed his body, pulling him back on his feet. Martha's face again appeared before him, as his beloved wife supported him from the front, trying to get what happen to her husband. Even such little time in this Janakian void made him almost fall in love with a normal human voices, but now he had much more important task, even to said a few words to calm his panicking compatriots.

He gazed on the tacscreen, trying to figure out, what his special sense trying to tell him, ignoring all shouts and jolts his subjects give him. Oswin’s oblivious behavior infuriated already terrified out of her mind Martha and amber eyed woman show this by viciously slapping him on face. Power of the impact sent him staggering back a few steps before he regained his balance; blue haired man shook his head trying to get rid of the ringing in his ears.

Once he cleaned his mind Oswin quickly realized how unpleasant he behaved right now – he collapsed all of sudden, then charged forward bellowing like a buffalo and after all people who worry about him tried to about his well-being he flat-out ignored them; and he didn’t put the sheer discouraging effect his behavior could inflict on his own stuff in the middle of such important battle. The worried and concerned gazes the surrounding people threw on him only fanned the fire of shame in his heart.

Filled with guilt Oswin open his mouth to start begging for forgiveness but them, when his siode gaze fall on the map of the battlefield he finally get his answer when he saw the upcoming wave of the another rocket barrage.

As they continued to push Japanese fleet back, Belkan ships moved in the direction where the artillery and support ships of the invaders were stationed. And thus they moved in the area, where the AA-screen was much weaker due the destruction of one of the battle stations. If the enemy would be able to take out another station in a surprise attack then the Belkan ships would be exposed to the rocket fury of the Empire of Japan.

Even in the perfect shape Belkan fleet would have huge problems intercepting all those missiles and now, after such vicious battle, he had no doubts that many warships in his fleet had barely operating phalanx armament. This means his forces would sustain a pretty crippling damage once those rockets starts hammer them down with impunity.

He underestimates Japanese commander – he still had a plans of a counterattack, and now Oswin know why he saw the transparent arm in his vision. The ghost ships – a Raijin-class battleships, as Russian Coalition intel told him, together with all their specifications – special vessels that had the ability to create a camouflage field and thus sneak a small but well-armed battle group to mount a devastating attack n their station.

Now what was left is to try to prevent the worst from occurring. There was almost no time left as the rockets would get into the effective range of the station AA-screen approximately in twenty minutes that means Japanese would need to start their attack soon.

“Give order to all warships stationed on the planet, minus special group Lian, to launch!!” Roared Oswin almost on top of his lung, pushing all authority and power he had into this order. All present Belkan froze on their places by the power of his voice, forgetting all their thoughts about their liege condition. “NOW!!” Oswin’s roar shook entire room and finally the military training kick in, as staff members snaps into the action, roaring the orders through the comm. lines.

“Dear?” Started Martha, still in shock by his behavior. Oswin quickly started to clarify the situation to her and other, obviously dumbfounded officers. “ Japanese would start the surprise attack on the Graf Dannwig in the upcoming minutes! They’re using the geisterschiff to get there unnoticed as our sensor net already took too much damage to notice.“ Frantically explained himself Oswin, pointing on the screen for emphasis, Martha, together with all other present officers, paled when she heard his declaration. The Belkans know first handedly what Japanese torpedo barrage do if you don’t have a proper AA-screen.

The shout grow in volume as the panic threatened to overwhelm the soldiers of Belka, the officers who didn’t sat behind their consoles widely run around, truing to avoid the collision and get on their places ASAP, numerous fingers viciously bombard the keyboards, imputing new orders at the top speed trying to make the flywheel of the war machine to spin faster.

“Oswin…” Martha bitted her lower lip, biting her pleas back as it would sound too selfish in situation like that. Buy her husband still get what she tried to said as he too was too worried of what could happen. And this his gave another set of instructions.

“Give continental-wide order to move into the shelters and turn the phalanx anti-rocket emplacements into stand-by mode! Also, give order to special group Lian to start launch up sequence. They instructed to take off once our reserves flotillas reach the battlefield and then proceed to to perform a short teleportation jump to the transshipment base Hilldorn! Once they get there they have my order to move toward Rotenaugen!”

“Ja wohl“ Thundered the hundred voices in unison as the officers of Belkan armed forces continued to carry out their mission. All present people know that they could be late to save the station but arrival of the many undamaged ships, including the new support cruisers, specially armed for AA warfare, would help them to overcome the enemy barrage. Otherwise they’re doomed to perish.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#30
We need to bring some lufe back in this thread. ;)

Raijin-class Battleship Maeda Toshiie
21 March, 2524 AD


Colonel Rikia never could understand why journalists liked to claim that soldiers of the Japan Empire are the best because they don’t feel the fear. First, the human being who doesn’t feel fear are not normal be default; second, the soldiers who potentially lack a fear response are naturally reckless. Impulsive and tend not only get themselves quickly but also expose their comrades to lethal danger as well. Battle-hardened veterans simple know how kept a leash on the terrors and nothing more. Sometimes, using special emotional stabilizers to make sure that they don’t succumb to panic in a crucial moment. .

But right now, as his vessel and entire flotilla under his command slowly, drifted toward the battle stations that could eat even a dreadnought pretty fast in a combat, he wished that his imagination just stopped prodding his fear response by presenting more and more colorful images of his ships demise once Belkans notice the energy readings, which betray the arrival of a Raijin.

The image of the colossal fire-breathing sphere grew larger and larger on the main monitor, putting a significant pressure on all bridge crew members, as even the nervous jokes died away already, leaving the pale astronauts alone with their growing terror. Gritting his already aching from pressure teethes Riku tried to strengthen his own grip on fear by cursing Admiral Hatagai – the pompous glory-obsessed bastard never hesitated to put the lives of a fellow comrades on line if it could win him a new medal and time to pose before the Empire as hero. Lord Riku already lost the count of his friends he loses because of Morihiro Hatagai insatiable appetite for fame.

Still, short colonel couldn’t argue with the fact that admiral did a very good job, creating an opportunity not only for his flotilla to reach the point of their destination, but as Maeda Toshiie’s captain could see, despite their tight situation their fleet was in, Japanese forces still could grasp the victory due the Hatagai’s timing and calculation. If Riku succeeds in his task, then Belkan armada, that currently pursuits their retreating ships, would be caught in the upcoming bombardment and thus opportunity for Japanese to turn situation around would arise. Hatagai was a screw-up bastard, but he was very smart bastard.

Thus being said, the plan was still extremely risqué – as the success still demanded total absence of luck on the Belkan side, so their wouldn’t notice their approach – no matter how damaged sensor net of the Wolkenreich’s soldiers was, one more careful scanning and his flotilla would stay naked before wrath of the mages. The second absolutely crucial part was the perfect work of their triumph card, as even if their flotilla reached the needed range unscratched, Ewige Eiche station had more than enough firepower to chew through their entire flotilla.

That worried Riku the most, rely on absolutely new equipment, which never saw the actual battlefield wasn’t a gamble he would took usually. But this time it was Hatagai’s direct order and he couldn’t say no without sending himself and people dear to him on the gallows. Seems that they admiral had a great pride in his new toy as he couldn’t stop bragging about “undefeatable triumph card that would bring glorious victory to the Japan no matter how hard arrogant mages would struggle”. But of course Morihiro Hatagai wouldn’t risk his butt delivering this thing under the enemy fire; he had ashigaru to take all the beating. Just like always he and his kin do.

This thought infuriated Riku even more remembering all lovely acts of abuse he and people from other world was forced to endure, even before he was conscripted into army. And those bastards have the galls to shun them for being friendlier to the citizens of other star nations and refusing to accept the ideals of Empire. Should he and his comrades accept the ideals of the nation who treat them like a shit and not even bothering to hide this, eh?! No wonder the last years before the start of “righteous war”, and following closure of the borders, was marked by massive wave of migration when millions of Japanese decided that don’t won’t to have anything in common with Empire of Japan and moved away, without forgetting to say “fuck you Kururgi Genbu” on their leave.

“Colonel, we’ll reach the given coordinates in fifty five seconds.” The voice of the helmsman pierced the electrified atmosphere of the bridge like a gunshot, Riku even jolted so slightly in his chair. Seems his little fit of loathing helped him to kill the time, thought brown haired man with a grim smile, concentration on the upcoming death match. He, and all other present officers could almost hear the words “if we didn’t get shoot down” helmsman didn’t said.

“Start the deceleration and prepare for deactivation of a LDSS!” Ordered Colonel Rikia, clapping a few times, his usual gesture when he tried to calm his men down. It worked for a bit as he could see that his officers’ faces became less milky white when they start to concentrate on their panels more than on the image of enemy station’s cannons. “Starts to transfer the energy from the stealth system to weapon systems and load the tubes with missiles! Give orders to cruisers to prepare their cannons and flank this station, once field fade away they ordered to initiate the bombardment! Frigates are ordered to defend our ship and the “Object 1”, the drop-ships remain in the rear and wait for the further orders!”

Maeda Toshiie rocked slightly as his fore-mounted thrusters flared to love, reducing the speed he keeps all this time. Inertia tried pushed the humans inside the hull forward, but the restrainers did their job well and no one of the bridge crew break their noses on their own consoles. The gunnery officer tapped frantically, preparing all ship’s cannons to the battle, the slight turn of the Raijin’s main three-barrel canons, as crew could see on the status report window, proved his devotion to his job. A communication officers’ inputs showed their work when Riku saw on one of the windows how the groups of Nakatsus started to leave their formations and fly by wide arc around the station.

Cruisers in his flotilla was specially reequipped and remodeled to fit the hit-and-run tactic of Yurei flotilla. Unlike their brothers they had a thinner armor and while their main engines wasn’t different from the rest of the fleet. They boast increased number of thrusters to improve their agility. Also, instead of long-range rocket ordnance they support their broadside cannons with a turret on their bow.

The captains of the cruisers know what they should do, even without any help; Riku could tell the cruisers would leave the area, covered by the field right on the moment when said field would fade away. He knows many of those cruisers’ captains, many were his friends, and he could only moan inwardly, knowing that some of them wouldn’t get back from this battle.

Agile frigates also break the formation but instead of moving away, started to prepare for interception of incoming enemy ships. The non-capital ships split in almost identical parts: one protected the sole battleship – his Raijin - in their flotilla and other one swarmed around the ship that would decide the outcome of this operation. The Arizuka-class drone-controlling ship.

This one ship really stick out like a sore thumb among the ships of a Japan Empire, and Riku wasn’t the only one who think like that once they saw this weird vessel. Unlike the streamlined ships of the Imperial Star Fleet drone-controller was a blocky vehicle, though he retained the trademark green color of the Japan Empire, together with a pair of well-known external engines in nacelles. This weird ship rivaled even a mighty Sokotsus in a sheer size, but while battleship boasted a vast amount of various weaponry Arizuka was armed only with an phalanx weaponry to defend from the enemy rocket-fire.

No, his main offensive capability lay in a massive hangar bays, filled with hundreds and hundreds of deadly robots, which entered the battle through seven EM-catapults and controlled by supercomputer in the center of the vessel.

Receiving an order from the Toshiie’s bridge, drone controller’s hull rocket when his also started the procedure of deceleration; once ship reached the necessary speed for launching the gates, which shielded the catapults started to move away, leaving the passage for drones open.

The cloak fades away completely when the first wave of robot-ships takes off. The mushroom-shaped Kame-class, defense robots blasted off first, followed by arrowhead-like Same-class assault robots; and then the most massive among them, a crab-like Zarigani siege drones darted toward their target – the Ewige Eiche class station. And then Arizuka released another wave of silent killers and then another one, the swarm of metallic termites prepared to chew the mighty oak apart.

The darkened figures of the Hakugei drop-ships could have seen in the distance, those behemoths were useless in the direct battle and now could only wait for his order to dive into planet’s atmosphere in order to deliver entire armored corps, which would rampage through the enemy rear-lines, until the main land forces would come. A Riku know, the entire 6th assault army now wait for Hatagai order in the nearby system to take off and half-of-day later join the battle for the Shoneherddome.

“Colonel!” Brown haired colonel knows too well, from his experience that it was naïve, and borderline idiotic, to expect the plan to went perfectly smoothly, still he couldn’t help but release an frustrated hiss, hearing the shocked outcry of his sensor officer – damn, seems that all recent build-up stress really made a work on him. “Sensors are picking up the multiple signals in the planet’s stratosphere – a large group of Belkan ships move at the top speed in our directions! Fire contact in the upcoming ten minutes!”

Bearded commander snarled out of loud this time, he never thought that his ship’s weakness would be used against them in the battle so important. Yes, Raijin’s LDSS were powerful stealth devise, but unfortunately it went both way – the battleships put too many energy and processor power into field’s maintains and thus blinding his own sensor systems, while cruisers outside Arashi simply didn’t have sensors powerful enough to pierce the working LDSS.

Usually it wasn’t an issue, as they had another battleships to support them, but in current situation other Japanese ships in the vicinity was more busy trying to stay alive rather than performing an active long-range scan. And now they had a massive wave of reinforcement coming at them.

The image on the main monitor wasn’t pleasant either: the cruisers of his flotilla hammered the station with an coordinated volleys, leaving deeper and deeper gashes on her armor, threatening to blast it apart in the near future. Unfortunately, the station’s cannon continue to outright rip entire cruiser group apart when they returned the fire. The massive wave of the Japanese ships tried to help, trying to add their own firepower in the battle, but the pursuing horde of Belkan vessels didn’t miss the chance to bombard their adversaries either.

Riku greeted his teethes – now their lives depended on Hatagai’s new toy. And if it fails - there would be no future for them.


~***~

Dominion-class battleship Wille sum Zieg
Military spaceport near the capital city Schmetternden Berg
Planet Schoneherddome


The narrow and poorly decorated living quarters used on any large engine of war, used by Belkan armies, was pretty common sight for the nobles, who were forced to undergo military training from the childhood. A pair of bunk beds, with attached closets, one personal console with a single chair, bolted to the floor – that was an expected view Vita, Edda and Alheid meet when they enter the room time ago.

They spent their time in this plain quarter perched on the chair, watching the flow of the battle on the screen that hovered in the air, sustained by Vita’s Graf Eisen. The trio whined and cried in aguish when they saw the destruction of the Belkan ships and then Belkan girls cheered and pumped their fists in the air once their gaze fall on the demise of the Japanese vessels. The girls, despite their young age, know very well that it wasn’t an entertainment show and that people died up above them in the fire-ridden void of the space. But as any living people they needed an outlet for the all feelings that brewed in their hearts.

And now, as the hauptmann of the ship ordered all personnel to prepare for the launch, they could only lay on the bad, nearest to the terminal, chained to the surface with a chain-binds, preparing for the lift off. Now redhead, bluenette and black haired noblegirls could only lay in the silence of the room, separated from the other people by the thick walls. Due the military regulation, there were no portholes in the ship’s hull. Only from the observation bay the personnel and guests of the ship could stare in the void of space without using video screen.

Remaining in the complete silence the girls could only try their best to suppress their fears and anxiety. They wanted to start a conversation to break this suffocating pressure but no one of them could find a way to start a chat. There was an incoherent mumbling, a gasps even a muffled cries, but not a single intelligible word was said among them. Only when entire room starts to vibrate, due to activation of the main engines, Edda Ven Farber managed to state her thoughts firmly.

“So, it’s begun.” Her dark blue hairs contrasted sharply with her ghostly white face with an wide open eyes. “We’re leaving Vita’s home.”

“Yes.” Alheid, who looked as downtrodden as her friends, couldn’t even shake her head. “But, uncle Oswin said that we would lift off once the mighty warriors of our fatherland beat the evildoers back, thus mean – we’re winning, right?”

Vita nodded, feeling how cold sweat continued to flow down her face and neck, marring her hairs. She and Alheid always were energetic girls, competing with each other and other kids relentlessly. Their energy pretty often get them into troubles, which didn’t have a positive impact on the health of the bottoms. But once they could sit straight again, the pair of lively noblegirls starts to ran amok again.

Their mother never gets bored with saying that they really were a spirits of fire in disguise as their energy knows no end. But right now Vita felt as powerless as she never did in her entire life. Scarred and exhausted from all this brooding, she could barley operate her rigid body, at this moment Schoneherd family heiress was no different from the golem, whose control spell was almost extinguished.

They should win. Her mama, papa uncle, brother and all other good people of Belka should win this battle. They were the righteous ones, they fought to protect their lands and beloved ones! All laws of space should favor them, not those evils invaders! She kept telling those words again and again.

But those were words of a young girl, the grossherzogine in her kept telling her that successful conquerors could thrive even when the justice wasn’t on their side.

The entire room shook violently when the mighty battleship’s anti-gravity engines propelled him upward. Then the main engines released a stream of fire and Wille sum Zieg started his voyage to the stars. With specified intervals, the other vessels of their group followed the leadership.

Not it was nothing left to trio of girls, and by extension to all crew of each ship in their group, to pray for their side’s victory, as the remaining teleportation podes on the planet’s orbit started their charging sequences. Once their miniature flotilla leaves the stratosphere the sophisticated devices would sent the ships through the warped space to reach the station, placed in the middle of their system. Now it was up to the warriors who stay here to grasp the victory.

They didn’t want to think about what would happen if the opposite side wins.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#31
Fhew, almost done. It's a penultimate part of Interlude 2.


The flow of battle was akin to a fire, which receive more and more fuel as time had flow. Once it’s a tranquil warm flame that shone tranquilly with a calm light, but since you continue to feed the fuel to it, the flames grow in strength and ferocity and eventually the controlled flame transforms into rampaging inferno of destruction.

The skirmishes is a fast, tightly controlled rides where small amount of troops force both sides to care about their troops and try to minimize the time of a fire contact. The battle was more intense where the spells, shells and energy bullets fly more vigorously and there was a reserve to replenish a dwindling forces,

And the showdowns between mighty armadas, like the current ones, would have present more than one cataclysmic collision between forces where the fire and still would decide the victory, as the flames in the hearts of warriors grew larger and larger with the intensity of the battle. The fear, the anxiety, the insane thrill of a clash, the whims of fate – they all was a food to the lord of chaos that lurks in the midst of the battlefield. Well, Lady of Luck also was a judge in the contest too.

Though the good commanders always could use the control on their recourses and strategies to lead even the fiercest tempest into the direction he need. Ferocious combatants could devour enemy in the fierce showdown, only to be gunned down by a long-range bombardment, since they actually fought with a spare troops all this time.

The drones, launched by the Arizuka had no emotions, no worries and cared not about their life and death and thus, even as the inferno continued to rage around them, the legion of a unmanned droned calmly proceed to follow their instructions. People always fear or at least unsettled, something different from them and the legion of unnamed droned indeed wasn’t a pleasant show for the eyes of a Belkans. Even some sailors in the Japanese fleet couldn’t help find the presence of the droned unpleasant.

After all, you can say it many times to yourself that robot-ships simply couldn’t be afraid of death or be confused that was the very reason behind their creation and then fielding, but actually seeing all those soulless combatants, moving through the void in an alien-ish pattern, due to the fact they used maneuvers and speed that would be lethal for the humans if they inside, indifferent to their loses and moving through the void like a giant tendrils of a unimaginable monster was still pretty unpleasant panorama.

Arizuka used its numerous sensors and powerful supercomputers to constantly scanning the surrounding area and calculating the most effective evasive maneuvers, trajectory of attack and the interactions between the drones he launched.

The kame-class drones, which lead the assault, used the shield generators, installed in the “cap” to shield themselves and their brethrens from the enemy fire. The mushroom-shaped vessels’ shield was powerful enough to deflect the attacks of AA-weaponry and in groups those drones could deflect even the shot of the ordnance that could cripple the small ships, like frigates. And even when the heavy ordnance blasted some drones apart, when the lucky shot actually hit the elusive drones, the new unmanned vessels took their place.

Same-class drones had the very different purpose – in their frames were hidden many sakurahydrogen filled missiles, which were used to either create the “smoke-screen” to blind enemy, or like as the small-class ordnance against Ruhm-class frigates. Also, when the drones was out of missiles they wait until enemy cruisers was nearby and then darted toward them, sending their thrusters into absolutely full burn. Even without any warheads, the sheer kinetic energy of the impact inflicted a serious damage on the medium ships of the Belkan fleet.

The zariganis, unlike their comrades didn’t do anything right now and simply follow their working brothers, aiming to reach the stations. But there was not a single soldier on a battlefield that thought that crab-shaped robots are harmless. Once their reach the station something very bad would happen to the bastion of a Belkan fleet.

And thus the defenders of Schoneherddome do their best in destroying the unknown menace until it would be too late. The drones was too numerous to shoot them down in time, but there was the obvious target – Arizuka! Even without a good data of the Japanese technology there was no mistake, that the destruction of their controlling ship would render the swarm of robot useless, even if they had the autonomic A.I. it simply couldn’t even dream to perform the same calculations as the drone-carrier’s supercomputers.

Japanese know about this too and mount a desperate defense around the massive ship, hoping to hold the Belkanc back enough for drones to complete their mission whatever it was. Unfortunately, the odds were in the favor of Belkans now; as Japan fleet’s defensive doctrine was build around the usage of long-range bombardment and the flank-attacks, using their mobility.

But now Japanese were forced to engage in a close-quarter combat where Belkans hel the distinct advantage. Moreover, the drone-carrier was pretty slow ship and green colored ships simply couldn’t move away from him as his shield wouldn’t last long under the destructive volleys of Belkans cannons and might of their spells. The last part was very bad new too, as the lags between the barrages, launched by Hideyoshi and his retune, grow in time the Japanese were forced to rely on their own stock of rockets, which already was spent. And thus not only torpedo-shapes warships were robbed of one of their most potent weaponry, they also were left defenseless before the might of a magic.



~***~

Raijin-class Battleship Maeda Toshiie
21 March, 2524 AD


“Munakata and Shinano are down!” Cried radar operator as the two more green dots vanished from the interactive map. Riku, wiping the blood from his damaged forehead could only snarl in mix of rage, frustration and despair, as he could see on a main monitor as two of the brave cruisers that lunge themselves between his ship and three groups of a Belkan frigates got torn apart by a storm of crimson energy. There was almost nothing left from Shinano outside the massive cloud of debris, while Munakata “get away” with having his entire starboard side reduced to a molten slag, the ship slowly drifted away now, silent and dead.

The fact that Toshiie managed to get some revenge by vaporizing entire squad of a frigates, who carelessly got too close to each other, with a well-aimed nuclear missile didn’t give him much satisfaction. Maybe because he could see how the Dominion-class battleship and two Sieg-class cruisers suddenly flared when the crimson areolas engulfed them for a moment in order to shoot outward in a tendrils of the same colors. Those tendrils entangled in one spot, to grew into the massive flaming wheel few hundred meters in diameter, said blazing disc didn’t hesitate to ram into the nearby Sokotsu. Even though the “buzzsaw” extinguished itself halfway through the ship’s hull, the crippled and barely operating battleship didn’t survived for too long either.

And it wasn’t a single incident – all around Raijin, the magical creations and attacks of a Belkan army continue to help their cannons to demolish the ranks of their enemies. Just like this Sieg, which created a shimmering energy “cord” with numerous pieces of a dead ships attached to it and then used this “whip” to hack a nearby squad of Uwatsu frigates apart.

The plan and the entire battle went down in smoke as he could see. The arrival of the three-damned unexpected reinforcement from the planet killed all chances for victory his side had. Under the Hatagai’s order, fleet ceased his retreat and forced to get back into a slug-fest with a vengeful Belkans, which was a very stupid decision if someone asked for his opinion.

The fact they were forced into retreat was already dead giveaway how bad the situation was and even though his brothers and sisters fought with a berserker abandon, for all vessels they rip apart with their broadsides and turrets they had even more green ships disappear in a storm of flame and steel. Riku guessed with a gritted teethes and vile curse, was there any possibility that Hatagi didn’t know about pyrrhic victory? As the situation goes, even if his beloved robots somehow would neutralize the station, how many of the Japanese ships would remain operational when time will come?

“Sir! Our landing ships come under the fire! The escort ships held the enemy back for now, but they outnumbered and wouldn’t last long!” Come another panicked shriek from the radar station. Usually Riku would softly reprimand his operator for such misbehave, but the satiation already reaches the point where Riku Rikia himself barely cared about protocol.

Sending all available ships to cover the emergency landing on the planet was barely an option, as there were simply no reserves left. And, assuming that some ships will successfully land and disembark the troops, how long those troops would last without any support at the highly-populate and well-armed planet where entire population very hostile to them?

Riku grimaced, as he observed how Hakugei-class transports helplessly got engulfed by raging fires of a battlefield. Though what he expected – the Hakugeis wasn’t build to be elusive and maneuverable. Those sturdy but ponderous vessels weren’t built for cover missions in first place anyway, and the situation went awry they could only hope that they thick armor would last long enough for them to unleash the horde of a drop ships.

They definitely didn’t need to be there – in the middle of the already lost battlefield. They didn’t have the time to brake, turn around and run. They massive hulls and heavy cargo produce an insane inertia, which needed time to get rid of. Time they didn’t have.

“We have no other choices!” Roared green eyed officer, rising to his full height and giving a sharp gesture with his right hand, finding some solace in the fact that Umiboshi – the transport where Genya and his subordinates was stationed - was in the middle of formation and thus untouched for now. “As a commander of a Yurei special flotilla I hereby give the order to the landing forces to initiate an emergency hyper-jump! Aim to the edge of the system! Once they enter the normal space they have my instruction to make a full charge and then jump to the system Okitsu! We will provide the covering fire for our comrades!”

The chorus of acknowledgments was interrupted by the violent jolt of the ship when the energy shot grazed Raijin’s portside. Riku, grabbing the armrests for the balance, allowed himself to find dome relief in the fact he was fast enough to finish his instruction before this attack could leave him with bitted tongue. He also took a smile pride in the fact that his order, for major part, was dictated by a concern for his comrades life, though he was forced to admit that he REALLY wanted to put some distance between his ship and advancing Belkan armada.

Meda Toshiie still didn’t receive a significant damage, thankfully, and his maneuver was as smooth as ever. Since their group was late to join the battle, battleship’s magazines were still filled with rockets and now rocket tubes shot the ordnance one by one, aiming to create a sakurahydrogen screen.

Once their ship, angled itself in the space properly, main three-barreled turret breathed fire, aiming at the one of the Sieg cruisers, which already was threateningly close to the transports. The shot hit landed on target’s center, but ablative armor and cruiser’s own hull managed to ”eat” the attack, even though Belkan capital ship didn’t get away unscratched. Still the belkan ships were forced to abandon their initial targets (which was good) and concentrate on the charging battleship (which were not good), but thankfully Raijin was a tough cookie to crack and, which was even better, few cruisers and group of frigates come to his aid.

The exchange of barrages wrecked two Belkan cruisers and crippled two more, but claimed the lives of single Nakatsu, three frigates and leaved four Japanese cruisers with damages of various degree of heaviness. The second volley finished damaged crimson vessels, but not before red warships managed to drag two another of their Japanese counterparts down with them. It wasn’t a most successful outcome of a showdown, considering that their side had a battleship on their side, but they moved too hastily for their own sake and despite the price, Maeda Toshiie and his new retune barreled right into the flank of a Belkan battle group.

Massive hulls of the nearest transports were marred in the burn marks and craters, confirming the fact that transports were in grave danger. Hakugeis were incredibly sturdy for non-combat ship but they still definitely weren’t invincible, actually, right now, their massive size and weight was a huge drawback as their reactors needed a significant amount of time to charge the hyper-drive. In normal circumstances the charging sequence could be hastened by deactivation of a shield, but in such situation it was out of the question.

“Sir! Look! The station…!” The voice of the radar operator trembled from the awe, shock and fear, which startled entire bridge, including the bearded colonel. And the Japanese nobleman could only gasp, observing the scene on the window on the main screen.

The massive sphere of a Belkan battle station was swarmed by a zariganis. AA-defense fire destroys crab-shaped robots in mass with each volley, but just as stubbornly mages continue to shoot them down, the relentless robots continued their attack. Moving to a point-blank range, those robots latched on the station hull, using powerful electro-magnets and then activate the powerful plasma-cutters in their “claws” and started to drill through the thick plates. The defenders unleashed a truly gargantuan cloud of a magic-powered metal spheres, which then mercilessly dived into the already “stuck” robots’ hulls.

But there was too many zariganis to destroy, well, if the drones was the single problem than the Belkan could destroy them in time, to be honest. But remaining Japanese vessels, either due the Hatagai’s instructions or through simple desire of revenge, attacked the station recklessly, forgetting about their own survival, dividing the attention of the point-defense systems.

When robot-crab finish his job, he pulled himself up, to cover the tunnel with his body. A few moments later crippling explosion rocket entire section of a station, destroying the outer hull and the victorious robot.

Riku whistled in awe – that little bugger right now just shot a tactical nuclear bomb right into the station’s interiors! Nuclear explosion were devastating, it was a well-known fact, but the level of destruction destruction between the explosion that occurred in airless void of space, outside thick plates and the detonation of a nuclear device in the inner sections, separated by thinner metal plates, where air was contained by spells, inside the armor, couldn’t be compared.

The inner explosion continues to ravage the station as more and more zariganis completed their task. Despite Belkans desperate measures, which included the fire of a broadside cannons on the station’s hull, Ewige Eiche-class space bastion continue to fall apart, the Hatagi’s toy managed to destroy the Belkan’s goliath.

Which didn’t help the Japanese too much, as their forces pair a good price in the lives of their ships and crews to stall the advance of the Belkan armada and give Arizuka enough time to complete his mission. The pair of Dominion-class battleships took a position, charged their main cannons, invoked a powerful spell an unleash a hellish barrage that struck drone-controller in the bow. The power behind the attack were so terrible that stream of energy managed to drill through entire hull’s length and struck the engines.

Arizuka didn’t explode it became a cataclysmic explosion itself. And once their shepherd died, the swarm of robots, which already moved to dive into the ranks of Belkans, immediately transformed from all-killing horde into the bunch of drunken jellyfishes. Though considering the state of the remaining Japanese vessels, which continued to retreat in crescent-moon shaped defensive formation, those drones wasn’t too much of a help anyway, as the Belkan prepared to launch the last attack.

To make the matter worse, the sensors almost went med from all hostile reading as the massive wave of a Belkan ships appeared from the eastern side of a planet, pretty much trapping all remaining green colored ships. The massive Belkan reinforcement finally comes to join the fray. Join the slaughter of Japanese force was more correct term, though!

Riku slumped into his chair powerlessly, his face now gray and his lip red from the blood that appeared when bearded man bites them in frustration and despair. It was over! Even if they would escape from this bloodbath somehow, the Emperor would demand their heads for the failure of such vital mission. And no one had any doubt that ruler of the Japan Empire would get his wish.

The single bright spot in this situation was the fact that Hakugeis finally charged their hyper drives and now proceed to get out of the battle ASAP.


~***~


Hachiman-class Dreadnought Toyotomi Hideyoshi
21 March, 2524 AD


Outside the various sounds, emitted by the all machinery, the bridge were silent. The elation, which lorded over the space of mighty dreadnought brain center, now completely surrendered to a soul-crushing despair.

All man and woman who wore the form of a Japanese armed forces could only stare lifelessly at the scene, where only destruction awaited their main forces. It was the end, while Belkans were too far away to mount a pursuit of the Hideyoshi and all ships that accompany him; there was no salvation from the grim reality of a defeat. And HQ really didn’t like to show mercy to any traitor that bring a disaster on his homeland by failing the tasks of utmost importance as today’s mission.

The sound of a clap pierced the oppressive silence, forcing some out of the most emotional crew members to jump in their seats. All present Japanese instantly focused their attention on the source of the sound – Admiral Morihiro Hatagai himself.

Silver eyed flag-officer gave his shocked subordinates a relaxed smile, which, combined with his almost bored expression made it look like the supreme commander of the fleet forced himself to see an utterly unworthy film. Then he stood up from his chair, which made silence even more oppressive as Japanese soldiers prepared themselves to a stern lecture for their pitiful behavior.

“Gentlemen, please conduct yourself. We’re soldiers of Japan and we always need to present our great homeland’s unshaken spirit and tranquility, especially on the middle of a battle.” The phrase like that was expected, but the soothing notes and unwavering smile on admiral’s face were unexpected to put it mildly. His next two phrases was even more unexpected. “You, my dear subordinates, need to come to your sense, if you didn’t want to face a grave consequences. We’re have a battle to win after all.”

Win? Win this already doomed battle, as their forces continue to being blasted apart? Well, they had the reserve forces, which were await them on the edge of the system, the flotilla of ships that leaved hyperspace a ten minutes later after the main forces entered the normal space – but this contingent simply not large enough to turn the odds in their favor.

Yet, Morihiro Hatagi show no traces of panic, fear, anger or despair, He simply stood in the center of his bridge, calmly observing the panorama of a battle, where red dots already enveloped the formation of a green dots, closing the trap. Still flag-officer addressed the radar officer, using the same fatherly voice.

“Lieutenant Ritoku, I need the detailed report about the disposition of our and enemy forces, that current engaged in the battle against the planet.”

Redhead officer at radar station, just like his compatriots, was quiet shocked by his superior officer’s question. How could this information help them in such dire situation? But his commander demanded a report and soldiers of a Japan Empire was well-known for their loyalty and obedience.

“Sir, the enemy reinforcement continues to push our flotillas toward the planet’s stratosphere, while the Belkan garrison armada plays the role of an “anvil” as they continue their descent. Our forces have no other options to retreat and I’m afraid soon they will be dragged down into gravity well”

The last line fall like a coffin lid – unlike the Japanese, even the largest Belkan vessels could perform the atmospheric entry and re-entry using their anti-gravity engines, as no Earth Directory could match in this field for now. But for torpedo-shaped Japanese warships, being caught in an embrace of gravity meant a certain death. Though, as their sensors show them, the Japanese vessels would be destroyed by enemy cannons faster than they will be crushed by the deadly grip of their planet.

“Aha!” Many officers, present on bridge when admiral, in response, give the radar officer a small nod and with a small, and which was much more astonishing, satisfied smile he turn around to input a few commands on his chair’s command panel.

Under the gazes of a many flabbergasted soldiers he finished his work and then turned around, now wearing more appropriate solemn expression. And then his voice suddenly thundered out.

“DON’T BE SHAKEN MY FELLOW JAPANESE!!!” All present people were immediately paralyzed by combination of oppressive power in their superior’s voice and the blaze in his eyes. “A OUR DEAR COMRADES PREPARED TO SCARIFACE THEIR LIVES FOR OUR BELOVED HOMELAND I SHALL PRESONALLY BRING THE HAMMER OF OUR RIGHTEFUL FURY ON THE HEADS OF OUR VILE ENEMIES!!!”

Hatagai’s voice thundered across the spacious bridge, resonating both in the audience eardrums and souls. The gravity of the situation was blown away by the astonishing power of their admiral’s presence. “THIS CHOISE WAS HARD TO ME TO DO, AS SO MANY DAUGHTERS AND SONS OF OUR BELOVED JAPAN WILL PERISH! BUT WE HAVE NO RIGHT TO SHAME OUR FOREFATHERS’S DREAMS WITH OUR WEAKNESS! FOR ALL THEIR THREACHERY, FOR ALL THEIR TWISTED MAGIC, FOR ALL THEIR WICKED TECHNOLOGY! BELKANS STILL COMMITTED A GREAT MISTAKE BY UNDERSTIMATING OUR RESOLVE AND POWER OF OUR WEAPONRY!”

Hatagai’s vocal cords seems starts to give in under the pressure of his speech, since his next words were uttered in much quiet voice, but there was no one on the bridge who didn’t heard a word of their commander.

“Our brothers and sisters fought valiantly and with iron resolve of true warriors of Japan and continue to do so, but as we can seem the jaws of our adversaries prepare to gnash into their necks! It’s unacceptable!! We absolutely cannot let our beloved comrades to be humiliated like that! I Morihoro Hatgai, with a great sorrow here and now will give our steadfast comrades an end, they truly deserve! Professor Kihara…!”


Hatagai push another button on his console and the shocked gasp reverberate through the bridge. All of sudden, the main screen blinked to reveal a small group of eleven green dotes a few thousands kilometers away from their position.

Their IFF gives out their disposition as two Raijin-class battleships, eight Nakatsu-class cruisers and another object, whom the computer couldn’t identify. But before any of the Japanese officers could say any questions, the new window appears on the monitor, revealing a smiling face of an infamous professor Kihara Gensei who worked directly under Admiral Hatagai.

Even considering life-prolong technology the patriarch of a Kihara family was old, celebrating his second hundred birthday few months ago: his bald head now were marred with repulsive red spots, his meaty nose, which was broken many times during the disasters in his labs now looked like hawk’s beak, though his mouth still was filled with rows of a bright white teethed. His light blue eyes didn’t show any traces of fatigue, despite his age, burning with energy, they stared right onto Admiral Hatagai’s silver orbs.

“Status report!” Commanded admiral, addressing elder man before him. Even though flag-officer didn’t specify which status he want to know, everybody get the rightful idea, that the last unknown object was the center of admiral interest. Professor Kihara get this too as his smile grew even wider and glints of almost patently pride flashed in his eyes.

“We’ll reach critical mass one hundred and forty seconds later, Hatagi-kun.” Reported old scientist nodding again and again like a bird. “As I thought, starting charging sequence only after your boys started to “caress” our Belkan friends was right. It was nice to see that you managed to destroy Belkan sensors on “our” side of planet first enough so they would catch traces of energy build up.”

Hatgai in return flashed the cheerful smile, despite scientist’s not very respectful manners. “Indeed, once their satellites were shot down and “disruption” missiles filled the space with sakurahydrogen planet defenders became too concentrated on the enemy at range, forgetting about us. Now I hope, with your help professor, to show them what a big mistake they commit by doing so.”

Gensei’s smile grew darker as his eyes flashed with a malicious glee “Just give me order, Hatagai-kun and I give your little soldiers a helping hand.”

Hatagai could sense the how young officers of the bridge tried to hide their confuse at the current situation, distaste toward Gensei’s behavior and lingering offense about the fact that admiral hide the presence of a few ships from them.

“Forgive me for this little stunt my friends.” Admiral Hatagai break his conversation with two-hundred years old scientist to give a quick but deep bow toward his crew, before slumping into his chair, inwardly savoring all those look of admiration – oh, kami those younglings were so easy to please. “I was forced to use special code to confuse our own sensors, but I did it because since Belkans already managed to break our long-range transmissions, I feared that their vile technology and/or magic could do the trick with our sensors. And the hidden status of this unit was vital for our victory, should things go awry.”

The magic of those words were astonishing – all previous brooding was gone, replacing with almost love and worship in the eyes of young officers, who will deliver the tale about his ingenuity in the deepest corner of a Japan Empire once this war is over. It was a good idea to gather such youngsters around him – they were so easily to influence, so easy to control.

He didn’t lie when he said that he used special codes that were given only to highest ranked members of a Japan Empire’s military (those programs allowed the closest military advisors of a Emperor Genbu Kururugi to gain a full control over the any computer and sensor, that were manufactured in the factories of a Japan) to insure that his hidden triumph card were hidden long enough. After all, even if no Earth Directory had any successes in cracking each other computers, the true capabilities of the mages wasn’t known.

But now all those officers, not only habitants of the bridge, but also entire dreadnought and all remaining fleet would see that it was him – Morihiro Hatagai – who dear the winning ticket for entire Japan in this battle.

Admiral Hatagai returned his attention to a Gensei, who still waited for his orders with a unhealthy broad smile. Japanese flag-officers voice was so calm and casual that extramundane officer could miss the fact that he gave out an ultimate order.

“Prepare the Dimensional Driver to fire.”


~***~

House Schoneherd ancestral castle Schmetternden Berg. Battle Control Center.
Planet Schnoeherddome
10th day of second cycle of fifth period.


Shouting out of loud was utterly inappropriate behavior for officer of Belkan army, but right now even, Oswin Ven Schoneherd, couldn’t help but grin like an idiot, looking at the tacscreen where the forces of the Belka continued to overwhelm the remnants of the Japanese main forces. And thus he continued to overlook loud shout of glee or cheers, which erupted each time group of green dots disappear from the screen. Like a children seasoned soldiers giggled clapped their palm together, jolted and squirmed like in some weird dance.

They were winning! Now it was obvious – the Wolkenreich finally managed to stop Japanese Empire previously unbreakable advance! They finally found the strength to beat the invaders back! This will be a turning point in this war – the moment where sons and daughters of Belka remind the arrogant scoundrels who master of those realms.

“You know Oswin…” Amused voice from his right side startled the head of the Schoneherd’s family. Quickly turning around Oswin saw the source of voice and his goofy smile crawled back when on his lips his gaze fall on his father’s smiling face. Paul Vin Toppenau couldn’t be more similar to his than now – his broad smile could easily rival Oswin’s expression in sheer childishness. Just like other Belkans older nobleman wait for too long to achieve a crushing victory over their hated enemies. “I think that only two members of our family is not happy right now – it’s Vita and Peter, who, as I can presume, right now fume in indignation as they forced to sit and wait for their chariot to jump from the relay station to the Rotenaugen.”

Oswin make a pause before answering to his father’s inquire, enjoying the view on the numerous windows where Belkan fleet continue to hammer the Japanese into oblivion. Green ships, to their credit, continued to fight, even in such hopeless situation, but after all atrocities, committed by Japanese Oswin find it hard to sympathize with doomed soldiers.

“Yup, I agree – Peter must try his best to hold back all his curses, while Vita roar in frustration that she can’t leave the room and force the hauptmann to turn ship around. Well, I think Vita need to have a good vacation and strongly against waste of resources, so I wouldn’t recall my order.”

Paul simply laugh at that, Oswin joined in with vigor, just like Martha, who choose this moment to move from the crowd of cheering HQ officers.

Their laughter, together with obviousness of all other Shoneherddome’s soldiers died immediately as alarm claxons roared to life.

“What the…” Before Oswin finished his answer the belkanian, who sat behind radar station cried in shock. “Mein Herr, the video-telescopes caught the de-cloaking sequence in the middle of the Japanese formation, where their flagship stationed. We see two of their battleships, two cruisers group and… something BIG!!!”

The last words were a huge understatement as all present officers watched in growing horror as the cloaking field disappeared, revealing what their enemies hid behind it.

The radical difference of this object from the rest of Japanese vessels was glaring. While their space craft were shaped like torpedoes, and their stations were more cube-like, this newbie was built in a shape of a massive flower – six petal-shaped structures connected by a central pistil-like construction. Even as far as it was the telescopes couldn’t find any welds, or fasteners – whenever it was, it’s really looked like it was grown like a flower.

Not only design put it aside from the rest of the invaders. Just like radar officer said – it was a gargantuan object, which eclipsed not only the dreadnoughts or battleships, but even mighty Ewige Eiche stations were only quarter of the size of this behemoth.

Kek, even a quick glance could tell that this thing were on utterly different technology level from all equipment entire Belkan Empire had in its storages. But still, all present denizens of Schoneherddome had the feeling they saw something like that before?

The instincts of all present warriors screamed in unison when the massive “pistil” started to glow from the inside. The energy sensors were still blinded by the battle and enemy interference, but the mages of Belka could fell the unimaginable energy build-up in the very core of the monstrous creation.

“Sankt-Kaiser, save us…!!” Panic-filled hoarse voice of his wife struck Oswin like a battle hammer – he never heard his wife using such terror-consumed tone. Looking around he saw that not only her voice dripped with fear, her entire face were twisted by it. Her amber eyes now were dull from panic, fear and despair, her usually bright skin now had sickeningly bluish shades.
Before, now very scared Oswin could ask what scared her; Martha went on like in trance.

“It’s a Dimensional Driver – the ancient planet-killing weapon from the times of Al’Hazard! I studied their technology after the tragedy that claimed father’s life. But... but why those scoundrels have it?!!!”

Oswin also wanted to know this, but even more he just wanted to see the Sankt-Kaiser to appear out of nowhere and smash the doomsday device, that aimed at his planet, apart. He didn’t even have the strength to talk, as he could feel with every cell in his body that hellish cannon will fire very soon. Too soon for him to order the ships on the orbit to forget about anything and run, to start the evacuation of the planet – there was no time left to him to save anything dear to him.

Tears started to flow from his eyes uncontrollably, as he could only stare blankly as the enemy super weapon prepares to destroy everything. The soul-crushing despair consumed everyone, as man and woman in uniform of Belkan army (or in expensive suits of nobles) cried uncontrollably before the sheer unfairness of this universe.

They tried their best today - they studied, learned, and improved themselves and their equipment, dreaming to give their enemy a beating in the battle. The Wolkenreich finally managed to create a stead pact and create a strong bond with their neighbor Autonomic Provinces, which could be a powerful push toward the unification of Belka. They could finally achieve the revenge for all people who were killed or enslaved by treacherous and cruel Japanese Empire and drive the invaders back.

They could have future, but now only death waited for them.

“At least Vita and Peter would live.” Declared Oswin softly through tears, pulling his sobbing wife into embrace. Taking a last long gaze around, he addressed the downtrodden communication officer, who still worked on his console, despite the agonizing despair he felt right now.

“Please, send this message over entire system. LIVE!” This last shout come out with unexpected force for Oswin, but the warmth of his sweetheart’s body gave him strength even at the verge of death, just like always. “And carry our legacy, my dear subo… NO! My dear comrades! It’s still not an end for us! Right now I just want to say two additional things! Thank you for being such loyal and dutiful subordinates! And last thing – I’m sorry…”

Those words were met with applauds, as weak as they were. The people in the room couldn’t say anything in the face of death, but at least they wanted to show their gratitude for their grossherzog’s words, to show that they hold their bonds dear.

At this very moment Dimensional Driver reached full capacity. The sophisticated mechanisms in each “petal” had the similar pattern of work as the teleportation nodes, but not only they open the breach in the fabric of space, they also collected the unimaginably colossal energy that flew between the dimensions and then let the central capacitor-like devices to compress it into one gargantuan burst of energy.

The astonishing flash of light drowned the space around the cannon as the sphere of a light-purple energy which was almost hundred kilometers in diameter burst toward the doomed planet. Seconds after the discharge, the cataclysmic amount of energy vaporized the ships that were caught in its wake and slammed into the planet.

The explosion was true a terrifying sight to behold. Once its container was destroyed, a monstrous amount of energy was released, obliterating all objects that drifted on the side of planet, where the shot landed. But the lion share of energy went on to destroy the good chunk of planet itself. All water on surface and even inside of the planet curst was evaporated, as the entire surface were scorched, millions of tons of rock were blasted apart, creating an astonishing swarm of boulders which now flied chaotically into the void as the dead planet were sent from its orbit.

The mountains melted the steel and even admantum flow like water before turning into the gas under the insane temperature. The living life didn’t die – it was atomized and even fortified underground bunkers were able to save the people in them due to sheer magnitude of destruction.

At twenty first day of March of year 2524 planet Schoneherddome cease to exist.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#32
Hachiman-class Dreadnought Toyotomi Hideyoshi
21 March, 2524 AD

It was very hard to suppress the moan of delight yet Morihiro Hatagaistill held his true feelings back, as he relished hearing all praises and cheers, while the bridge crew continued to exalt his persona while shouting, cheering and reveling in their victory, while jumping and hollering in their seats like a bunch of kids.

To be honest, the Japanese also shouted insults toward remnants of the Belkan planet, while almost pushing their middle fingers into the monitor; praised the bravery and self-sacrifice of their comrades as much as power and reliance of their ships. But most of all, all present man and women just couldn’t stop praising their admiral’s ingenuity and precision. All of the people, who wore the uniform of the Japanese armed forces continued to yell that it’s only because of Admiral Hatagai’s cunning planning the Japan’s fleet emerged victorious today.

Just like a pack of a puppies those young soldiers stared with admiration on the silver eyed man, greedily memorizing all his little nods, alight movements of eyebrows and barely noticeable twitch of the edges of his lips – he was center of their universe now, a miracle worker, who bring out a super-weapon that gave that turned the tide of almost lost battle in their favor. For them, he was a person closest to God, a glorious warrior, who gave them future.

Oh kami, Hatagai felt that he could melt in pure bliss this instant, as the surrounding people continued to confirm their almost devotion and gratitude to him. Finally, all his hard work, plans and trials paid off. Once he got back to the main HQ he’ll get his long and well-deserved ultimate recognition as the Japan’s foremost commander, together with all glory, fame and wealth Emperor would give him after he achieved a victory that was so desperately needed.

Yes, the price for victory was pretty high – after all he was forced to threat his main forces as nothing more but bait for the Belkan’s fleet. The pace of the invasion starts to drop in the past few months already and it was only matter of time before armies of Wolkenreich would finally create an impregnable wall for the forces of the Empire, whose supply lines already was ravaged by the raids of “unknown pirates” and economic show the obvious sight of upcoming catastrophe.

And thus he proposed the usage of the most potent weapon Japan Empire had in its storage to break the possible stalemate before it will cause Japan a crippling lose. It was unavoidable for them to sacrifice the huge part of their invasion fleet to achieve the success in this daring mission.

Hundreds of ships, which carried thousands of the dutiful warriors, charged into the battle without a knowledge that they single role was a distraction for the long-range bombardment to take out Belkan sensors, which let professor Kihara to prepare the Dimensional Driver to fire without being noticed and destroy teleportation nodes and thus not let even a small group of Belkan ships to escape the attack of the super weapon. Belkans even couldn’t use the emergency teleportation spells as the energy discharge during the explosion not only made any attempt to travel through sub-space a very dangerous event but also jammed all magic in the radius of hundreds thousands of kilometers due to inter-dimensional energy discharge.

Amai Fuudo was against this plan, proposing the retreat to the edge of the conquering territory and agreeing on Chinese federation terms for their help and thus preserving “a valuable resource of their manpower and equipment”. Good lord Genbu-sama agreed with him, Morihiro Hatgai, in the end, declaring that Japan need a solid ground in the negotiation with Chinese and thus they will use the Dimensional Driver. Morihiro was glad that their Emperor is man of bravery and precision and refused to resort to cowardly methods of the Genral Fuudo.

And of course, he was happy that Genbu Kururgi-sama didn’t let the Fuddo to steal any grains of his - Morihiro Hatgai’s – well-deserved glory.

The only one drawback in this situation was a usage of the priceless capacitors, which were, just like the marvelous cannon, a fruits of the ancient civilization long gone. This weaponry was found by the expedition of the Imperial Main Research Institute, under the patronage of the emperor himself. The sheer gargantuan amount of energy, that went into capacitor during the shot leave it no chance to survive the discharge.

The reading on the status window of the Dimensional Driver confirmed this fact by coloring the “pistil” in the dark gray color. They had a spare capacitor back in the metropolis, but only one. Which mean Dimensional Driver would be used one more time only in the direst of situations and only by emperor’s order.

“Sir.” The voice of the radar operator held the small amount of anxiety, which was pretty shocking. When Hatagai give him a small nod of acknowledgment his reported, while imputing command on his console. “The latest reports from our hyper-space sensors reveal that our troop carriers were in the middle of a emergency hyper-jump when… Dimensional Driver shot and I’m afraid for the worst.”

The delightful shouts grew quieted on the bridge as the crew get the implication. Such cataclysmic outburst of energy, combining with the very nature of their cannon, meant that ships that weren’t in normal space at the moment of the discharge were either destroyed outright or, in a lucky case, was catapulted into uncontrollable jump, which mean they would enter the normal space in the location FAR from the original point of destination.

Morihiro just shrugged in the face of such information, as he expected this to happen. In the middle of such whirlwind of destruction, the self-preservation instincts tend to kick in and force the ship’s captains to initiate the emergency hyper-jump to save the lives of their crews and ships and thus were caught in sub-dimensional cataclysm. Well, those ships were on the list of “allowable losses” from the very beginning anyway.

After all – the true purpose of the troop ships was to be a ultimate bait, that will convince Belkan defensive fleet that Japan need to invade Shoneherddome, and thus when the reinforcement come Belkans were forced to move close to the planet, determined to intercept any landing craft, while pushing retreating Japanese forces away. Which put them all into the kill zone of the Dimensional Driver’s shot.

Well, if some of those troop-carrier ships come back alive he wouldn’t mind to give them an award for their stubbornness and determination to come back. After all, the trajectory of their jump leaves them no other possible point of escape from hyper-space but the middle of the mage-controlled territory.

Which mean, that chances of the return of the Japanese landing forces were almost non-existent.


~***~

Dominion-class battleship Wille sum Zieg
10th day of second cycle of fifth period.


She just sat there, in the plain military-style chair and stared at the screen unmoving. She didn’t scream, she didn’t cry, actually she didn’t emit even a tiniest sound in the deathly silent room. Vita Ven Schoneherd couldn’t muster her strength to do anything – all 10 years old redhead could do its sit and just stare blankly at the screen before her. Once shining azure eyes now were dull blue lifeless orbs, which was glued to the scene where the scorched melted remnants of her beloved home drifted in the void of space.

It was almost surreal – just a few minutes ago she Edda and Alheid cheered when the fleets of Belka surrounded leftovers of enemies, bombarding them and pushing them toward the Shoneherddome in order to hasten their termination. But then there was a blindingly bright flash of a purple light and everything was gone. The brave Belkan ships, the vessel of their enemies and her beloved homeland – they all disappeared from the face of universe, leaving only a barren scorched husk of what was once a beautiful planet.

Her mind went numb, losing all ability to proceed with any lines of thoughts. She forgot who she was, what were those things that surround her, what those weird symbols and images on this shimmering square meant. Yet there was a dull pain in the depth of her very existence that quickly grew in strength, bloating out and consuming her soul. Her guts clenched so hard it’s felt as she was stabbed in her belly, her head threatened to explode under the throbbing pain and her eyes were particularly on fire. But even in such paralyzed state her consciousness continued to show her images that invoked a response in her soul.

Mama. A beautiful amber eyed woman with long hairs of the same color as flame, who hold her in hands with such love and care. Who could sooth any pain with her gentle care and never failed to be near her in the time of need, whose wisdom helped her to live through hardships.

Papa. A strong yet caring man with the very similar eyes and blue hairs, whose strong arms always were there to support her in life. Who always could give her a word of courage or helpful advice in her studies and who used his craftsmanship to give her precious treasures.

They continue to come – the images of people and places she loved and cherished the most. They appeared before her eyes, but only to disappear quickly into nothingness as if mocking distressed girl. She could understand why she so quickly lose the grasp on her precious memories. But slowly and steadily the answer come with the power of a thunderclap.

Because now all those lovely images became nothing but history. Every image the saw – was the last flashes of the things that ceased to exist. Almost everything she held dear disappeared in the storm of fire unleashed by the inhuman monsters that invaded her home.

And then something broke in her being. Vita Ven Schoneherd’s entire existence was overflow with agonizing grief and despair. Universe around her spun violently slowly as her vision got clouded with tears. In vain order to dull the inner pain she started to torment her body – chewing her own lips, ripping ski with nails, plucking her hairs out.

The lump of pain in her body grew with each second of her sufferings. Grief, sorrow, despair and even small part of insanity bubbled and expanded, pushing away all other senses. And then this poisonous stew explodes in a eruption of shrill, loud, inhuman howl that reverberated through the room.

Like the water through broken dam, the ultimate understanding that she lost everything flew into Vita’s mind. Her planet was gone, her home was gone, even large part of her family was gone, including most important persons to her. Her final present on her own birthday was a destruction of all she hold dear.

On this point madness, born out of pain, overwhelmed Vita Ven Schoneherd completely.

She didn’t remember how image-filled attempt to remove the cursed image of her dead planet she started to bash her head on the projector to the point her head starts to bleed, and only the combined efforts of equally grief-ridden Edda and Alheid sops her until it goes too far. She couldn’t do anything but cry and sob in the embrace of her closes friends when her brother, with face wet out of the tears come on unsteady legs to check on her, just to join the cry of a trio of broken girl in the shred despair.

She didn’t have enough strength to protest when the devoted soldiers of the house Schoneherd hid her from the eyes of the three-damned yellow-faced monsters and then put her into cold sleep for eleven years.

When she wake up she, to her sinister delight, learned that damned Japan Empire was obliterated and now conquered by the most powerful nation of Earth Empire of United Directories – Holy Empire of Britannia, who now take a hold on the majority of the Japanese old territories – including the subjugated Wolkenreich.

And now she was part of the force that wages a guerrilla warfare against the Britannia in hope to finally get the tools to liberate her homeland, thankfully her dearest friends – Edda and Alheid – was here to help her to serve their sovereign – Signum Van Wolken, a true Kaiser of the Wolkenreich.

They managed to find, with a help of IAB scientist Precia Testarossa, an old Transport Line, constructed by ancient Al`Hazardian Empire, that guided them on Earth itself, which give them an rarest opportunity to strike the heart of their enemies itself! Unfortunately, unstable work of the Hazardian artificial tunnel allows them to transport only a small amount of forces during the windows when the ancient technology worked properly. Which made a full scale invasion impossible – the defenders would localize the enter points pretty easily. These fallen attempts not only would lead earthlings to the ancient Hazardian relics, but also give them access to the priceless teleportation network!

And thus they were reduced to quick hit-and-run raids on the former lands of Japan, but now they all had a clear target – the Jewel Seeds. With their might and help from the various fractions of the non-conquered Autonomic Provinces of the Belka Empire they would liberate their homeland.

Or die in attempt.


~***~


Author Notes. Whew, finally I finished the Interlude 2 and overall closed the introduction part of the story. It was pretty dark but I needed to show what make Vita so fierce and spiteful in this verse, when she wasn’t a slave of a Book of Darkness. And I think the Complete Monster Glory Hound of an Insane Admiral was a good substitute for an ancient tome of mass destruction.

I know that these two chapters didn’t have too many flashy spells in them, but just like in Nanoha Force, when evil dudes render magic useless; our heroes bring out good old kinetic weaponry. Don’t worry we go back to Nanoha and Yuuno and our befriending magic in the next stage. After all Belkans had the twenty years to figure out how to make it work again.

Many thanks to all readers!
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#33
Stage 3. A Land of Serpent and Lion.​

It was already two hours past midnight but viceroy of a Special Administrative Area “Japan” crown prince Odysseus U Britannia continued to work. Even on a usual day he often went to sleep only when the clock flashed a 0.00 on a screen, and now, when he received a message of a violation of Earth space and then few wide-scale act of terrorism with a use of magic rove him from a usual schedule.

For almost entire six hours, with a pause for a official announcement, he was pinned on his chair, listen to a reports, reading the messages and giving an orders, what was worse almost always he was need to pay attention to more than one communication windows. His eyes, neck and back ached but he keep himself together - his land and subject needed him and he had no right to fail them.

Twilight War taught him a hard lesson about the horrendous cost of failures and thus he doesn’t have a luxury to be a Mediocre Prince anymore.

Making a small pause, blue eyed prince reached out for a small flask filled with his favorite energetic drink to have few deep sips. Putting back the small jar on the plastic surface of a table, Odysseus took a small glance around so he could let his eyes to see something else but the screen of his computer.

The room itself had a semicircular shape akin to a birthday’s cake sliced in half. Floor was covered by a vast blue carpet with a massive golden signs of zodiac embroidered on it. The “flat” wall’s most prominent feature was a large airlock, which was build in a shape of a old wooden doors from middle ages, also there were a numerous holo-pictures, which displayed various animated scenes from the history of the Earth (courtesy of his brother Clovis) – a entire wall covered in a living pictures.

Pair of long, this time truly wooden, couches, covered in a purple fabric, stood on each sides of door, so the visitors could wait until he could talk to him directly from the pair of the massive chairs, which were from the same set of furniture as the couches. He sat on the third chair of the set, which was shielded by a truly spacious table. Said table was crafted in a form of a seahorse from a titanium alloys and covered in a oak-three plating. This object of furniture boasts having a inbuilt computer, bar, holder for discs and, of course, small arsenal of weaponry.

Beside cabinet’s owner, between the pair of huge windows, stood a double bed, which actually was used much more often than a massive bed with a canopy in his room two floors lower. On the cellar, between the table and the entrance Odysseus could see the massive device of a flexy-plast screen, which he used when he held a council with a administrative staff or military brass. The pair of lockers in both edges of the room mostly served as a storage to his personal belongings.

Faithful to his father’s utilitarian style, Odysseus tried his best to avoid using unnecessary furniture in his cabinet and place the used ones in a right pattern. Actually, the only one detail of interior broke the perfect symmetry of viceroy’s work room – a small podium with a bronze figure of a small tank on it – the present from his comrades from 145th Assault Armored Platoon when he was forced to retire and take the control over the Japan.

Shaking his head in order to clear his mind, Odysseus returned to his console. The 3D map of Uminari city occupied the left part of the massive screen, where the various icons displayed the positions of army and police units that currently patrol the city and its outskirts.

This moderately sized and very young city, build right after the war, now was the centre of hurricane that currently ravage his dominion. Well, he couldn’t say that former home soil of a Japan Empire was all tranquil and peaceful with all those JLF’s (Japan Liberation Front) raids but only today unknown terrorist not only performed an acts of terrorism, using cursed arts of mage craft but they also dared to try to breach aero-space defense field of Earth!

And while this insanely daring and arrogant attempt failed, the sheer terror of just possibility of an attack on the capital planet of an Earth Empire of United Directories stirred up entire planet. Who could say that next attack would fail, and even not next then what could they all say about the another enemy’s endeavor? If they could sneak a spaceship loaded with a nuclear warheads or something with the same destructive capacity even a single successful raid could bring an unimaginable damage to entire Empire.

And what worse – was this try truly a failure for enemies? Maybe even the fact that vessel reached the atmosphere was a victory already? Or maybe this suicidal charge was a smoke-screen? Who could say?

End even without that the recent report of casualties among the civilians and the police task forces that encountered an unidentified enemy unit fell like an acid against his skin. It wasn’t long (Thanks God!) but the fact that magic again come to reap a bloody harvest already griped his heart. He knew very well – the longer this accident would last unsolved the bloodier would be the price of a triumph.

Entire Earth Empire learned this lesson in a very hard way during Twilight War.

The right part of the screen occupied the map of entire Japan archipelago where all active military bases and operating units could have been seen. The amount of red dots – the border forces of Chinese Federation worried him a bit, but the presence of yellow icons – the armies of Russian Coalition eased the tension.

After all their closest ally can held China in check, considering that Empire of a Jade Dragon was the second most devastated nation in the war. Losing more than 35% percent of its population and almost 50% of a productive capacity, a Federation fall from its second place in the Empire rank and plummeted on the very bottom of a food chain. Even though the last years show a very impressive growth of their economics and the rate of rebuilding cities was good, the dragon was still small and relatively weak. Though, it’s still would be very unwise to underestimate them too.

On the map he could see that the crimson circle – an area of the sea where the remnants of a unknown vessel should have been fall – now were encircled by a three icons: the 22th, 31, 97th naval units under the command of a rear-admiral Simon Greenhill. The submarines and divers, as the latest reports stated, already found a trace where the derelict can lay.

Bearded man return his attention to a shining dot of a Unminari city – the showdown between police forces and the enemy group was his main concern. The report of the surviving policemen and the data from the factspheres and computers of their knightmare frames gave him a clear message of the presence of a Belkan warcaster (as the casting triangle was distinctly Belkan magic sigil) and the forces of this empire on Earth!

Once he received this report he send the message with the “emergency” mark to the Britannia’s mainland, hoping that father and Schneizel would read this quickly. On his part, Odysseus already sent a sizable contingent to reinforce the Uminari garrison and now worked on the establishing a defensive perimeter around entire Japanese land – he had no doubt that JLF would try to capitalize Uminari’s commotion to perform their vile deeds and he wanted to prove them wrong.

Of course, such incident couldn’t avoid the attention of the other nations of Earth. Ambassadors of Russian Coalition and Chinese federation – their neighbor countries – Sergei Fryazinov and Xi Liang Shing already contacted him to give him a sincere condolence about the death of a innocent people and ask about the sudden redeployment of the Britannian forces, but while Fryazinov asked is Britannia need any assistance Liang Shing wanted to know Britannia’s opinion about the breach of their home planet security

Giving them both his thanks and convincing them that Britannia for now don’t want to bother their neighbors with their problems (to Russians) and that they will use all of their resources to find the perpetrator and prevent such accidents from happening in the future (to Chinese) After that conversation Odysseus return to his work with redoubled efforts but now the fatigue starts to catch up to him.

A sudden shrill ring makes him jolt in his chair out of shock. The yellow and red icon of emergency call flared in the left lover corner of the screen, clicking on her, Odysseus, to his joy, saw that the name of the caller was no on but Schneizel El Britannia. With a resolute click he opened a conversation window.

The familiar scene of a well-lit room, decorated in dark blue plates appeared before his eyes. Amidst of a computer terminals, cabinets and the panorama of a massive table sat the Prime Minister of a Holy Britannia Empire. Schneizel was as tall as his brother, though not as powerfully build (but God help you if you think that Britannian prince couldn’t kill a man with bare fists if needed) and his serene and handsome face with piercing amethyst eyes under a crown of a golden hairs was well-known in the Earth Empire and even magic-using star nations.

As always, his brother wore his standard purple suit and white coat with a high collar over it, and just like its wearer, the suit looks perfect. But now the purple eyes of a Britannia Second Prince were dimmed with worry.

”Greeting, brother Odysseus.” The respectful and calm voice of Schneizel sounds downright pleasant for elder man’s ears after all the shouting he was forced to hear. “As always, your resolve to work without break are nothing less but inspiring.”

Odysseus forced a wry smile on his face, barely restraining himself from long yawn – actually his body desperately cried for a sleep right now, and he know that blond prince could see that too. And Odysseus knew very well what a workaholic and a magician of words his brother was too. Yet, he had enough strength to greet his dear brother properly.

“And I’m glad to see you too, my brother Schneizel. And you talent to make people feel better, fortunately, didn’t disappeared.” Once Schneizel nodded with a bit wider smile – an indication that he enjoyed Japan’s viceroy’s little joke – Odysseus accepted a much more serious and dark disposition. There was no time to beat around bushes.

“What can you say about this incident, my brother?” Schneizel’s face also lost large chunk of its previous brightness as he heard this line. With a quick work on a keyboard he open an additional window on both his and Odysseus own screen.

“This is a truly hazardous event, brother Odysseus. As you can see all satellite defense and sensor network in the Japanese area were shoot down due to hacker attack, which allowed the unknown space vessel to almost reach the coastline of our dominion. And not only that – the report from the Denver’s and New Detroit research centers state that inspection of the area, where the space ship entered normal space revealed that their hyper-jump was enchanted by the usage of unknown energy source which exactly the reason why hyper-space inhibitors didn’t force the ship to move into the normal space until it was too late.”

Odysseus paled, when he heard the last phrase. If enemy, whatever they were, discovered the way to snuck through the anti-hyper-jump security system it would mean that from now no star system can be safe from a surprise attack. And even without taking into account the possibility of a devastating attack on a populous planet, the sheer damage the economic would take if unknown assailants would start to attack the supply and trading routs across the entire Earth Empire, was dreadful to imagine.

There was just too many merchant convoys to give them an appropriate escort; heck just an attempt to create the defensive ring around each space station and each major trading rout would put a massive toll on already overloaded budget – and that was just the beginning of the list of possible woes. Now he started to get the true scale of the lurking disaster.

“Dear God, Schneizel! I immediately take this incident under my own personal control!” Odysseus almost shouted, but restrained himself at the last moment before words left his mouth. He needs to keep himself calm or he could just make all things worse.

“I know you’ll work with all you strength, brother Odysseus.” Praised him Prime Minister, though his eyes still held a steely glint in them. “But don’t be too hasty please – we definitely can’t afford to stir up the Earth Empire, especially in the wake of our diplomatic efforts on a Belkan front.”

“Oh?” Giving his younger sibling nod of a confirmation, Odysseus couldn’t help but pander his curiosity. Though mostly, bearded man just wanted to escape from a bad news even just for a while. “May I ask about the latest development?”

Schneizel’s smile grow a bit at those words – seems that foreign front had the good news. “Kaiser Shlein Van Baumsanger of Arnschwang Kingdom – or should I call them Autonomic Province? - signed the agreement of an economic cooperation. We’ll start working on integration of their banking system into our on the next week already. Well, the process may be not short but soon we’ll have another protectorate on Belkan territory.”

“As always, impressive, Schneizel.” Applauded blue eyed prince with a smile. “But how did you managed to…. convince him to join? As I could recall, Kaiser Shlein wasn’t pretty friendly in all your official meetings two years ago.”

Schneizel just shrugged slightly, before letting a slyer smile to appear o his face. “It’s a very lovely sight, when the people of one nation stand up, united by one, idea, but if this energy wouldn’t be controlled properly you can’t avoid a disaster. As, you know, two years ago we completed the building of a fifteen new factories – a joint project between Britannia and Arnschwang on their territory for a large convoy of natural resources; both sides think that it was a great deal.”

Blond man made input on his console and Odysseus’s gaze meet a 3D projection or a massive factory in new window.

“Believe me, brother, those are a fantastic projects – the combination of Earth and Belkan technology give them a productive capacity far above any industrial complex in both realms. Once the production lines went online His Majesty Shlein rally his people to gather together and use all of their efforts to turn their nation into industrial powerhouse of their border sector. And I must say that people of Arnschwang make a truly splendid job: banks make their credit policy very lenient for the all new workshops and factories, young people decided to join the industrial sector, regardless of their previous wishes – all in; the Arnschwang’s productive capacity skyrocketed.”

Odysseus took some time to investigate the charts and graphs, sent by Schneizel, before finding the answer and flashing a knowing smirk. Younger prince noticed the change in his older sibling’s expression and went straight to the point.

“After more than fifteen months of a hard work, when nation of Arnschwang produced a high-class military and civilian vehicles suddenly they noticed that they ran out of potential buyers. When Arnschwang went into industrial frenzy, they too concentrated on the building of production chains, forgetting about the stimulation of the market in the future. Yes, their banks created a good policy for the heavy industry, but they forgot to do the same for all other clients. And since vast majority of their work resources already was sent onto producing lines they simply didn’t have a proper target for the products.”

Schneizel shrug his shoulders, pretty much pitying the people of the Belk who step on the same mine as many nations of Earth done in their history. If you don’t have a client, all your hard work and spends would be all for naught.

“Since the attack of Japan, Belkans made huge changes in their combat doctrines and removed the limits of their armed forces. And thus Kaiser Shlein created thousands and thousands of war machines. But the economics of his country also couldn’t sustain the cost of maintains or even conservation or utilization. Ironically, they neglected the agricultural complex, which could at least help with the purchase of, at least, the civilian vehicles.”

“Still, couldn’t they sell their production onto the nearby Autonomic Provinces?” Inquired Odysseus, scratching his chin. “I think they could easily lower the price enough to make their Belkan compatriots storm the stores.”

“Sure they could – after all they share the border with four more Belkan nations. Buut…”

The small star map tells many things to Odysseus, and he could only adore his brother’s ingenuity and wits, when he created this massive plan.

“Shwarzwald Kingdom struggled with her own overproduction crisis of the textile industry and the outbreak of epidemic among the food cultures and was in a similar poor economic state. Hartwig Haegemony just didn’t need their vehicles, since this nation already had the similar economic and industrial agreement with Prussian Empire, and thus their vehicles had bad compatible with both their hardware and software.”

On the map Arnschwang had the golden color, while already stated countries shone with green and blue, other two had haunting orange and red colors.

Beldhamreich pretty much still a Chinese federation colony, and even though State Assembly already decided to “sell” them to Republic of France, they still doesn’t want to see any produce from other nation on their territory. And Obernau Kingdom simply had a very sour relationship with the domain of the Kaiser Shlein and thus they were pretty happy to use this opportunity to cripple their enemy further.”

Odysseus recalled all the political and economic movements in the Britannia’s government in past two years, while investigating the map more carefully, before snapping his fingers when he got the idea.

“Ah! Now I see why you requested such massive resources at that time, Schneizel! Shwarzwald received the same “special offer” as Arnschwang and thus suffered the same fate as they were equally unprepared for the possible outcome of such rapid development. Also, I’m sure that ecological catastrophe occurred due to mishap in the construction of containers for a new chemicals, they started to use in their new textile factories. Seems that they make some mistakes when they tried to reverse engineer our technology without proper assistance.”

Schneizel nodded in confirmation taking a quick side-glance on the cabinet on his right side. Older Prince knew that those data banks store the information about the culture, economic, military forces of all known nations and his genius brother never failed to use this information to maximum effect in his plans, just like in this one.

“You figured this out, my brother. Vast majority of a newly build factories soon started to fell under the pressure of a failed economic plan, flooding the work-market with hundreds of thousands unemployed ones per week. Due to outstanding growth of late payments their banking system starts to fall apart. Again, they too concentrated on the heavy industrial sector and neglected all other, which mean they simply had no crutches to reduce the damage from the fallout. When he meets the very possible prospect of a hunger, Kaiser Shlein asked me for a meeting.”

Odysseus almost pitied poor ruler of Belkan nation – after all it wasn’t pleasant to pretty much sign the surrender of your nation. And while Britannia wouldn’t marginalize the government or try to assimilate the people, Arnscwang (and, as he could get from the hints, Shwarzwals) would became a semi-independent nation under Britannia’s patronage in the close future. As their economic would be in the hands of Pendragon’s Ministry of Finance and their industrial sector now would live in a tight cooperation with Earth manufacturers and/or Belkan factories that already fell under Earth Empire’s control.

Odysseus also know too well that there was much more work on this case – after all economic crisis on such that crippled entire scale would take much longer in normal circumstances that just two years. He was more than sure that many bankers who unintentionally lead the financial sector of their nation into the deathtrap was convinced into false sense of a future colossal income by the “advisors” sent by his brother.

Also he was sure that detailed inspection would reveal a long and laborious work with a population of a Arnschwang, which lead to a disproportion of a workforce in a economic sectors. And viceroy was sure that there were many other undercover operations – a massive network that worked on subjection of a entire nation’s industrial power.

People of Belka created a truly marvelous set of rules that prevented the large conflict between them, but thus long lived peace lead to a complacency and appeasement. While nobles of Belka were no strangers to games in the shadows they were absolutely no match to treacherous masters of deception from Earth.

The people of Belka harness their mastery in the arts of magic and manufacturing for ages, but unlike denizens of Earth they never saw how pen and few gold coins can goes toe-to-toe with finest sword or arrow. After all if enemy managed to put poison in the food even the greatest and most well-equipped army would succumb.

Though again – once Earthlings dared to think about themselves as absolute superiors toward the users of magical arts, the Twilight War come to teach them how stupid they were in very bloody and spectacular fashion.

“Great work, Schneizel, you’re as always don’t leave your partners in game a chance.” Bowed Odysseus with a fascinated expression, pushing back the morose thoughts. With your success we took another step toward the Great Unification of Humankind.”

Britannia Prime Minister nodded in response, both taking the praise and encouraging his brother to continue. “And though we still need to remove many unwelcome elements our march toward tomorrow are not stopped. Yet, there is a unimaginable amount of work we still need to do. Oh! I wanted to ask…” Schneizel’s gaze intensified as he observed his brother, who shifted his position in discomfort. “How is our guest?”

“She is okay. I already contacted her – lady Lihua is okay.” Quickly answered Odysseus, confirming the safety of a no one but a leader of the Chinese Federation who currently enjoyed the hospitality of a Holy Empire of Britannia. By a studying at the Ashford Academy in the Uminary City.

“Her and Euphy safety was the other reason I sent such massive military contingent there.” Continued the bearded man, sending the information about the forces that were dispatched at Uminari. After the quick inspection Schneizel gave the first prince nod of approval – his brother prepared a good and balanced roster of forces for a battle.

“How large the possibility that unknown enemy discovered her location?” Asked a blond man, reading one of the reports that never ceased to appear on his screen. Odysseus couldn’t help but frown at those words. “I don’t know – we used all recommendation of a sister Marrybell, and make sure to create very plausible traces of her in at least four locations all over the Japan. I trust out people, and even father himself made a revision of our preparation…”

“I had no intention to blame your security personnel, my brother.” Raise his hand in a calming gesture younger prince. The ever busy console of a Prime Minister continued to flash new windows, which even reflected on the milky white skin of Schneizel’s face. “I talked to Euphy and her detour toward Uminary was a pure coincidence so I wouldn’t say that enemy prepared a large-scale operation that target two VIPs who currently reside in the city.

“I say we better not to drag too precision attention to our activities, so it’s best to let Euphy stay at Uminary, since there are already plenty of security personnel to protect her and lady Jiang. And we don’t even mention sir Kururgi, whose strength is well-known. I think Euhpy’s talents can be useful in this case too. She already proves herself so I don’t think we should think she can’t take of herself.”

“I had no intention to argue with you, Odysseus. So what are you intend to do from now?” Inquired younger prince, leaning back in his chair and reaching for the unseen auto coffee machine (Odysseus know about her existence very well) that stood outside the line of sight of the camera.

“I have no other choice but to ask Euphy for an assistance, to be truly honest, since I need someone I can truly and fully trust in deal as important as this.” Sighed blue eyed prince, clasping his hands together. He didn’t want to interrupt the happy life of his baby sister, but he was currently out of choices as he would be under the massive pressure from now. “Though, of course I will be nearby to help her. Actually, I intent to re-locate “Bombardier” – my flag vessel - to a Torrinson Base – our biggest garrison near Uminary.”

Schneizel took a pause to made few input on his coffee machine’s console, with was followed by a quiet murmur and then Prime Minister of Britannia returned his attention to his brother, gazing at him over his massive cup, which were filled with steaming hot coffee with milk. “You think that situation dire enough so we need a land dreadnought to deal with it?”

Odysseus responded at inquire with a sharp quick nod. “Yes, I have this feeling, my brother. After all, our enemies had the codes to shut down the entire Japan sector satellite defense network. Which mean – they had a connections in a highest echelons of military.”

“Indeed.” Replied Schneizel still toying with his cup. “Yet, we should be very careful and delicate – the situation we are now allow not a single careless movement. We can’t afford to use Chinese federation as situation on a Belkan front grow more and more threatening as many Easter Provinces now working at the creation of the pretty much anti-Earth alliance with the help of IAB. Your marriage with Tian Zi can diffuse one pretty dangerous mine in our backyard.”

The thoughts of this political maneuver still made Odysseus very uncomfortable. By any means poor teenage girl, who was barely younger than Euphy, was sent there as a political hostage. Usually it would be weird to think that ruling Empress would serve as a part of bargain between nations. Since no rules with the modicum of self-preservation wouldn’t put his own life in the hand of the security of a rival nation

But poor Jiang Lihua, whose parents and siblings who died during the war (as if anyone believed that all of the members of the ruling house of federation died in hands of outside enemies) was currently nothing more than puppet in the hand of the Council of Mandarins (or High Eunuchs, how people of Federation hatefully called the them). Actually, Mandarins sent Jiang away from the country just to make her grasp on power (as little as it was) even lesser and to silently remind her WHO in the charge in federation.

Father, His Majesty, was more than sure that damned Eunuchs wished for her to die – it will remove any potential threat to their power (three guesses WHO would choose the next family from the greatest houses of Chine to rule the federation) and give them the cause to blame Britannia in a High Imperial Council of Directors. Odysseus didn’t wanted to seriously consider that rumors about Chinese supporting Japan Liberation Front in exchange for attacking places where Tian Zi currently reside was true.

But again, the ambassador Shing while expressing a concern about the well-being of the people of a Federation that currently visited Japan, he “remembered” about his Empress only in the middle of the entire conservation. Though it was an improvement – Governor Bu Langyau, who was an overseer of Britannia/China economic cooperation tended to remember about hi de-jure ruler on much rarer occasion.

Pushing this thoughts away he continued the chat. “Is there anything else?”

“Yes, there is a result of a detailed scanning of the area, where unknown ship entered the space of the Sol system.” The small new window on the screen contained the image of the earth and small red icon encircled by the numbers of coordinates and the time of appearance. “The research told us about the anomaly in the energy reading of a hyper-space jump. The Denver’s research center sure that if this anomalies is the reason why the ship was able to penetrate our “wall”. As you know, Euphy requested a equipment for her personal forces she build up in Japan. Together with her order I send new scanning devices too. So can I ask you for help?”

“It goes without saying, Schneizel.” Odysseus clenched his fist at those words, wordlessly declaring his resolution. “I even know the first site for the detailed investigation – the Uminary city park, where the first attack of the magical construct occurred. Military already put the park under the quarantine and currently conduct research activities there. After the detailed investigation we found out that short-range scanners installed in the city detected a few energy anomalies that occurred in the city’s space over the park earlier on the day. So I think we can found a trace there.”

To his shame, Odysseus wasn’t able to suppress a yawn in the front of his brother. But Schneizel only give him a concerned smile, studying his older brother worn and tired frame. “You need a rest, brother Odysseus. Your diligence is inspiring, but the tired mind hardly can make a precision decisions. You worked enough for today – now you should let yourself rest.”

Odysseus nodded with blank look as his fatigue continued to consume his consciousness. Well, he intended to immediately go to the bed after this talk ended anyway.

“Thank you for your concern and your help, Schneizel.” A quick touch on the panel and the sofa unfolded like a book with a soft click. After another input the special manipulators moved from the niche that opened right over the sofa, covering the surface of a couch with a sheet, following by a blanket. Then manipulators moved back into the niche – smart, machine, though it still must be “loaded” with the bed sheet by a maids and pillow still must have been put on its place by owner’s own hands.

Blond man saluted toward his brother with a cup, and Odysseus managed to see how Schneizel took a sip from it, before communication window blinked out of existence. With a few more commands, Odysseus put the computer into a stand-by mode and slowly hobbled toward the sofa, yawning loudly.

Well, at least he would have a good long sleep, dryly encouraged himself bearded viceroy as he slowly prepare himself to sleep. After all he know that in a upcoming storm there wouldn’t be too much good news anyway.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#34
The deep sleep and healing spell finished the treatment of Yuuno’s injures at morning while the entire Takamachi household still was in the state or tranquility. The unspent energy, still left from the spell, wake little ferret earlier than he thought.

Changeling-mage sprung up on his feet lively, throwing the small blanket that covered him away, stretched his entire body, while yawning on the same time revealing small but sharp fangs, then Yuuno Scrya swiftly jumped from his “bed” and scuttled toward the window to savor the panorama.

The city block, where Takamachi family built their home, was located near the edge of a city and pampered young archeologist’s sight with a view of a hundreds of hundreds of light-gray and white houses, drowning in a green sea of plants. Moving his sight together with the massive structure of a highway, Yuuno’s gaze fell on the visible part of the upper districts of the city. He could see the silver line of a mono-rail on the edge of the construct; as Yuuno could see - that very unlike the part of Uminari where he currently was, the upper district was marred withy sky-scrappers.

Tiny mammal grimaced when the sunlight, reflected from one of the huge solar panels that towered among the buildings in their block. As he could see – the upper district boast much larger numbers of a devices, which occupied the roofs of a many tall buildings, that gathered the power of the sun, though he could sense another power sources in the city too.

Yuuno Scrya enjoyed the view, as he always welcomed the opportunity to see and research the architecture and technology of other civilizations, but the sight of cannon emplacements still soiled the mood. No matter how sparkling Uminari looks on the first glance – it’s still was a Britannia fortress in its very heart. Young mage’s eyes could barely find a place where they couldn’t see the war machines of the Empire.

He also could see that city blocks could have been easily separated from each other, preventing intruders from moving further or even purged right onto the enemy formation, turning multi- kiloton mass of concrete and metal into deadly bomb.

Scrya tribe member could only grimace when his sight fall on the black mass of the city park, where tragedy occurred yesterday. After all it wasn’t easy for him to look without flinching on the armada of Britannia aerial warships that hovered over the place where he leaved his escape pod.

This was a gargantuan problem – while Britannia already was in the state of alert due to Jewel Seed awakening and know too well that the magic was behind the incident he didn’t want them to find the pod since its computer had the data about all crew members and passengers of the ship and this meant that if local security would be able to crack the defense of a pod’s computer the Britannia would get the information about him as well.

Of course he could just state in his ferret state to avoid the detectors – after all even paranoid Britannia wouldn’t try to check each ferret on this island (at least, he hoped they wouldn’t), but he couldn’t stay in this form eternally, there would be a situations where he would need to revert to his true self and who could guaranty that there wouldn’t be a zealous soldiers nearby, ready to shoot or catch the unwanted guest of their planet.

As in answer to his thoughts, on the nearest overpass he saw the column of armored vehicles that move into the direction of city’s outskirts. After short observing Yuuno noticed, that the skyways now was used by military why the road on the ground level was left for civilian automobiles.

And if they would find out that Nanoha and her friends helped him the brave girls would be in danger – he doubted that Britannia would threat anyone who helped the intruders, even unwilling ones, kindly. And green eyed teen tried not to think what Britannia would do to said intruder if they managed to capture him. The fate of his ship and uncle already was a good testament of their hospitality.

Tan furred ferret shook his head violently – Britannia military’s harsh actions were one thing (and he was forced to admit that even honorable knights of Belka would shoot first at the unknown vessel that simply appeared out of nowhere in the airspace of a important planet), but innocent denizens of the planet didn’t deserve to suffer from the rampage of the ancient relics as powerful as Jewel Seeds. He needs to hurry up and seal them all properly.

The problem was that local authorities were more than prepared to fire at anything that they would deem as suspicious. And Yuuno already know about the Earth’s technology in the sphere of magic detection. If he tries to simply stand on the floor and cast wide-range searching spell in the city, occupied by the Britannia army, he should expect entire company of knightmare frames charging into his direction.

There also was the fact that one of the Seeds already fall into the grasp of Earth military, even putting the problem of such powerful item being in the possession of militaristic empire, he was afraid that scientist of Earth wouldn’t be able to seal the artifacts properly or even try to study them in unsealed state which would result in a tremendous disaster and casualties among the citizens of Britannia.

Well, to be honest, thought ferret, licking his nose, as he continued observing the increased activity of awakening city, even if Earth didn’t posses a technology to completely seal the Jewel Seeds, they had their mana-drain equipment which would allow Britannian scientist to reduce the energy inside the artifacts until they went into dormant state. If they managed to held the Seeds into this state then relics wouldn’t be dangerous, of course if some disaster wouldn’t damage the container and let the ancient creations to start charging again.

To be honest, such thing could be said about the properly sealed Jewel Seeds, held in the IAB’s Central Lost Logia Storage Facility. Maybe he just doesn’t want to admit that even non-magical civilization can take care of the Lost Logias just as fine as IAB. And honestly, Earth Empire already proved that she know how to bludgeon even the most powerful magical construct into the dust. Maybe he coul…

The flashing image of his uncle and many ruins he studied during his trips quickly changed his mind. No! he would betray his uncle’s expectations if he abandon his mission so easily. Moreover, as a human being he couldn’t abandon innocent people of this land who would be in grave danger once next Jewel Seed awaken. Britannia still didn’t know about the true nature of danger and until they get what actually happen the disaster that would occur eventually could claim many innocent lives.

Each next awaken artifact would be more powerful that others and had his own unique power. For example if relic have a control over the water would continue to suck mana from the planet’s energy field until its fully charged before awakening, it’s rampage could result either in an attack of the giant sea monsters of incoming colossal tidal wave. In both cases the number of casualties would be hideously high.

But again – just how exactly he would complete his mission before it’s too late? Again, he couldn’t rely on the “loud” wide-range spells as they would drag the unwanted attention to him quickly. It was frustrating – he was sure he could try to run away from the Britannian forces using the advantages of his small frame (in ferret form) and his mastery of the teleportation spells. The problem was that he need to stay still until Search Spell would locate the non-active Jewel Seeds and would simply collapse if he would forced to run away.

He could have use the short-ranged spells, which was able to locate relics if it was in the radius of 1000 meters from the caster… if he had small army of supporters of course, since trying to locate a small artifact moving through the thousands of kilometers of Japan alone would require a eternity to finish the task to simply find them. There was no need to tell him that his was short on time.

Through the window in Nanoha’s room Yuuno could see not only part of the Uminary but also forest and mountains behind it – just the small part of the large are of possible dispersion of ancient artifacts. Even though he was “lucky” that Jewel Seeds wasn’t scattered all around entire hemisphere of the planet, still he need to search through the acres and acres of a territory under the control of hostile (to mages at least) government, trying his best to avoid Britannia’s detectors…

Hey wait! Green eyed ferret even stood on his hindquarters, when a sudden idea occurred to him. He became even more convinced when one of the large airships in the far away halt his advanced and starts to hover in one place as if trying to sniff on something. Maybe he could use local equipment which shouldn’t gain unwanted attention. In the beginning at least.

Well, properly customized detector could do the trick as well as the spell, but he barely had any knowledge about the technology of Earth. Yuuno was pretty confident in his skills with machinery, honed by usage of the devices, built in the IAB, Belka or other nations’ space, so technically, after some teaching, he was pretty sure that we would be able to use equipment from Earth. The problem was that he needed to customize the Earth-built devices, not just use them and for this task he should either have an excellent knowledge about the local technology or know someone who was.

Damn! Seems that he really had no other choices but rely on his new friends’ help. From their talks he understood that Nanoha, Suzuka and Arisa not strangers even to a war machines, used by their nation and had a significant knowledge of Earth-based equipment. Maybe with their help he could get an idea how they could overcome this crisis?

And if not… Yuuno sighed lightly at the unsavory thoughts. City before his eyes continued to live, preparing for the new day, not aware about the new deadly threat that slowly gains power right beside it. In the very end he had no right endanger those innocent people.

And thus, if he wouldn’t find a proper way to start his search soon he would give himself into the hands of the Britannia’s authorities and tell them anything. And may Goddess have mercy at him.

His brooding was interrupted when his ears catches a soft groan, that came from the behind. Turning around Yuuno could enjoy the sight of a three lovely ladies spending their time in the kingdom of dreams.

Mesmerized yellow-furred mammal could only stare in awe when Arisa Banninga, who jolted on a left side of a bed, twitched too violently and tossed upper half of her blanket off. Yuuno could only swallow a liquid that filled his mouth all of sudden, mesmerized by a lovely sight of the girl’s pink skin, her elegant yet strong frame her ample…

With a loud mental shriek Yuuno starts to franticly shake his head, almost trying to toss raunchy thoughts out of his skull. Bad, bad Yuuno! You can’t have such inappropriate thoughts about your lifesaver, who risked her life yesterday and now risk her well-being while trying to help you to find the relics. Yes, Arisa is very lovely but you still can’t drool over her lovely brea… AAAAARG!!

Yuuno’s desperate telepathic screams had little effect on the line of his thoughts, but seemed to had greater impact on Nanoha who grimaced and twitched in her sleep. Accumulated negative emotions explode in a swift turn-around, which reveal Nanoha’s own lovely body (entire frame, this time) to distress ferret’s gaze. Including her already well-shaped “lower body”.

GYAAAAAAH!

It was seen this time poor visitor of Earth screamed out of loud as even Suzuka started to shift in her sleep. But Yuuno Scrya didn’t see that – he nose-dived into his bed, curled into balls and covered his head with his tail, preparing to lie in this position until girls wake up and properly dress themselves, adamant in his resolve to preserve girl’s dignity. And his own sanity too.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#35
Yuuno was lucky enough not to wait for too long until all three girl’s PSUs, which was left on a table started to emit a shrill sound that start to quickly grew in volume. Moaning and grumbling, girls, still drowsy and weak, sluggishly leaved their cozy sanctuary and then hobbled toward the table as fast as their can, desiring to silence the nerve-wrecking cacophony, emitted by their devices.

Mumbling and rubbing their eyed, Nanoha, Arisa and Suzuka move toward the locker, where they left their clothes yesterday. Embarrassed Yuuno, who still didn’t dare to move a inch from the time Arisa starts to move in her sleep, push his face into the yellow fur even more, as he sensed the presence of the trio of maidens nearby. He could hear the clean low sound, when one of girls (judging by the lighthearted chatter between trio – it was Nanoha) push the button on the locker’s doors, unlocking them, and then scion of Scrya could hear the rustling sound of clothes being pulled out.

A forty minutes later after the girls finished washing their faces, fixing the bed and taking a breakfast (pasta with meat balls, omelet with bacon and juice) all four conspirators take their seats in the bus (well, Nanoha, Arisa and Suzuka did – Yuuno already had his place in Nanoha’s bag). Once the seed-shaped vehicle starts to move, purple eyed girl let her new friend out of her bag, which then proceeds to jump on her shoulder and look around.

Well, it was Yuuno’s plan, his companions, on their part, immediately seized an opportunity to caress an adorable mammal. To be perfectly honest though, Yuuno couldn’t help but relish under the gentle touches of the delicate hands of the maidens from the distant planet. It was an absolute new sensation for him – to enjoy the company of members of the opposite sex. He was an introverted boy and avoided the loud parties for his entire life and rarely hanged out even with the members of his own clan, preferring the company of a few close relatives.

While uncle Kaiyen was always his number one in the list of most precious persons in the world he dearly loved aunt Mirceza, aunt, Wirisha, uncle Heddin, uncle Berlon, cousins Wienna and Schria and other people of Scrya clan who helped to raise, take care and teach him. He enjoyed the Goddess Ascension (which also was a holyday when people meet a new year on Mid-Childa) parties which his clan, but even more he like to spent a time alone with book and the files about ancient cities, civilization and technology. Yuuno admitted to himself, that his most preferable company was either a reliable silent machines or his uncle Kaiyen.

But now, in the first time for his entire life, he couldn’t help but savor every second under the care of Nanoha Takamachi, Arisa Bannings and Suzuka Tsukimura. Usually, he couldn’t help but flinch uncomfortably when even his closest relatives patted him, but now Yuuno Scrya could barely suppress a purr of joy when warm and soft palm of Earth maidens gently rubbed his fur or caressed his belly.

Relentlessly attacked by pleasure, Yuuno give into his ferret form instincts and once Nanoha reached out to tickle his belly again he licked her finger with affection, this action was meet with happy squeal emitted by all girls simultaneously. The other occupants if the bus looked at them with amusement, seems that sight of a trio of girls playing with pet ferret – the shrewd Suzuka give Yuuno a spare collar of one of her cats – wasn’t a common sight on this route.

Five minutes of cheerful play after, trio of friends let Yuuno go and let him to scuttle toward the window so he could look around. Scrya-clan mage already had the opportunity to inspect the Britannia city from close distance yesterday, when the ride on a knightmare frame, but curious archaeologist wanted to have a second look, in a light of the day.

Yuuno wasn’t disappointed – under the bright sunlight he could look more careful at architectural delights of Uminari. He examined the house that hid beside the brown fence, which was shaped like a wooden palisade – said two-store house, which was painted in the same color as a fence, consisted of two cubic sections were the first floor was two time larger than second, was ornamented a rows of a round solar panels that give him appearance (as Arisa pointed out to him) of a ancient fort that settlers from the old England built in a land of North America. This similarity was emphasized by the antennas that were crafted in a form of arrows that struck in the walls.

Another house, in the opposite to previous building, had the mushroom shape with his massive second cylindrical storey hang over the surrounding yard, while the first floor hid in the shadows. Though this building gain Yuuno’s attention because of its colorful fence – each section of the wall was made in form of the flower bud, moreover, there was no identical section. Still, teen boy had no doubt that those “flowers” as thick and sturdy as the other fences.

Through the windows of the bus, Yuuno also could inspect the vehicles that move on the road. As he could see, Earthlings (or at least Britannians) had the mixed approach toward their car’s aesthetic – personal vehicles and the machines belonging to the civil and medical service had the streamlined frames, akin the seeds or arrows, while the personal autos also boast various colorful add-ons.

Just like this six-wheeled red sport car that zipped outside the window – right above the manufacturer’s logo a miniature knightmare frame continued to salute toward his unseen enemies with his tiny spear.

The trucks, police and military vehicles (each major crossroad their bus pass by had a special niches, occupied by a sex-wheeled light tank), together with construction machinery, in contrast, had the stern blocky features, were painted in a dark and “cold” colors and hid from the world under the thick armored plates.

As Nanoha told him, cargo convoys were the tastiest prey for the terrorists and since said terrorist really liked to create artificial landslides to lure the emergency brigades into a trap it wasn’t a coincidence that all those machines seek an additional protection. Yuuno didn’t ask about the machines of medical brigades – after all, first and foremost they need speed to reach patients and then carry them to hospital if needed, additional weight would be a hindrance for them.

Scion of Scrya tribe was so consumed by the outside panorama that only Arisa’s shocked exclamation and Nanoha and Suzuka’s gasps forced him to divert attention toward the view outside the windshield. Yuuno froze on the spot in fear when he saw a small column of Britannian military vehicles that crossed the crossroad right before them.

It was strange to see war machines in the middle of the common road, as they had the highway in their possession at morning and thus Yuuno for few agonizing seconds thought that Britannian forces already found him out and come to take him in custody. But the convoy continued to move forward, completely indifferent toward their surroundings and the icy grip on his heart starts to ease. Changeling-mage’s natural curiosity quickly outweighs his initial fear and small ferret even leaned forward, trying to catch as many detail as he could.

Two light tanks on the front of the formation already moved out from the bus residents’ line of sight, followed by five trucks and then another pair of tanks. On first sight, all trucks were indistinguishable from each other bar markings on their frames, but for some reason, the third truck make his body tingle.

His famous instinctive sensitivity toward the pieces of unkown machinery, which made him famous (and for some members infamous) among his clan decided to kick in at this very moment.

“I’m very sorry for asking a stupid question, and I’m aware that you may not know the answer…” Yuuno gain girl’s attention by standing on his hind legs and wiggling his tail few times and then open a telepathic channel to each of them “But do you have any idea what those trucks’ cargo can be?”

Nanoha and Suzuka shook their heads slightly, confirming ferret’s suspicions that they didn’t know the but then, to utter surprise of not just Yuuno, but her friends as well, Arisa Bannings give them an answer.

“If the markings are correct – the truck carry a Gravity Emitters for the aerial forces.”

Nanoha and Suzuka almost turned toward their blonde comrade with wide-open eyes, but then quickly remembered, where they was and swiftly adopt a neutral expression. In their telepathic conversation though, both girls still were flabbergasted.

“H-h… how did you obtain such information, Arisa-chan?!!” Nanoha’s voice was a mix between scandalous and awestruck. “I hope you didn’t hacked the military secret channel. We all know HOW severe punishment for such misconduct!! Especially, when the city in the state of martial law!!!”

“No-no-no!!” Viciously protested Arisa, trying her best to not allow Suzuka to join Nanoha in the attack. “I heard this from my father. Our company is a part of anti-gravity engines producing line, so we have access to low-level secret files! Yesterday, papa told me that we move a party of a Gravity Emitters to supply base near the Uminari and even told us the number of the truck. Though of course he make all of us promise to not tell anyone.”

“Which you did.” Pointed out Suzuka druly with a frown on her face.

“Technically, we are NOT speaking right now.” In response toward her friend’s scolding Bannings family heiress flashed a wide grin.

Nanoha and Suzuka just sighed at those words with a slight shrug, but Yuuno could sense that despite their words, both girls were amused by their friend’s antic.

“You, nobles of Britannia, are very good with playing with words, Arisa-chan.” Giggled Nanoha, giving her blonde companion a playful pinch. Arisa shrieked playfully before returning the favor. Both girls were in a high spirit and were fully prepared to have a little pinching match but Suzuka resolutely interrupted them by loudly clasping her palm together. Though, she was forced to give an apologetic smile to nearby passengers whom she startled.

Once the military column passed the crossroad, the red sign “Stop” on info-line switched places with to a green-colored “Go” and bus’ engine roared to life again. As they left the meeting with military group behind them Yuuno finally dared to ask the question.

“So those devices are used to tame the force of gravity by the people of Earth Empire?”

“Yup, you can say they are one of the corner stone of our space faring sphere. And not only there. As you saw already – great aerial ships wouldn’t be possible if Earth Empire couldn’t adopt a degree of a control over the force of gravity.” Explained Arisa, adopting very Suzuka-ish look. As she prepared to continue her speech, bus speed up and make turn on the road that leads on the “upper level” of the city.

“Humanity’s space expansion took a massive boost two hundred and fifty years ago, when first Gravity Control System were developed. Of course, they main purpose was to protect the crew of the space vessels from being crushed by colossal g-forces when ships accelerated.”

Anticipating Yuuno’s question green eyed girl quickly respond. “Earth Empire still didn’t create a precise method of navigation, when we use FTL travel. Even now, we can only calculate a very approximate location where our ships would leave the hyper-space. And though the accidents when ship crush into something during the entering of normal space is incredibly rare – of course, if you wasn’t stupid enough to try to jump into the asteroid field – in 97% of events you would be forced to move millions of kilometers through the void.”

Yuuno nodded – he heard from IAB military personnel that often protect his clan’s expeditions, that one of the spheres, where Earth still was far behind, were logistic, as Earthling have no other methods of FTL travels, sans their crude, though powerful, hyper-drives. And teleportation technology wasn’t even discussed in the Empire’s science community.

“And so…” Continued blonde lady, tapping her thumbs together. “Intersystem maneuvers could took months to complete, putting a massive toll on both ships and their crew. The propulsion system, we currently use ion our ships, would liquefy our bodies without the Gravity Control, if we put them on a standard output, not to mention space combat. The former Japanese Empire, before its downfall was a leader in this field of research and thus they had most agile and fast capital ships among all Earth Directories.”

“Thanks for explanation, lady Arisa.” Trio of friends almost squealed in joy when Yuuno perform a graceful bow toward the member of Bannings household. “Seems that Earth had its own unique way of dealing with hazards of space travels.”

“And how did magic-using star nations fare in this field.” Asked Suzuka hungrily, though Nanoha also couldn’t his an interest in her eyes. Yuuno cutely tapped his nose with his paw before answering “There is many various methods even inside one country. There is Inertia Dampening Devices of IAB, Belkan Gravity Discs and many others. And it’s without mentoring hundreds of spells, developed specially for this purpose.”

“Incredible, Yuuno-kun.” Yuuno almost giggled himself seeing how Nanoha gleefully clasped her palm together, staring at him with almost childish joy and awe. “There are many marvels in this universe, so many incredible inventions. I would really like to hear many-many stories of your world…” She blushed suddenly, before adopting very cute and shy disposition. “O-of course, if it didn’t bother you, Yuuno-kun.”

Yuuno, who got almost mesmerized by auburn-haired girl’s cute expression, quickly shook his head. Suzuka inwardly was happy that their company occupied the very last seat in the bus and thus drag little attention to them. “No-no I would happy to told you everything I know. Of course, I would really like to hear some story about your world too.”

“Just ask, Yuuno-kun.” Came a resolute answer, Nanoha even struck her chest with her left fist for emphasis.

“Her lover birds, don’t forget about us!” Butted in a slightly peeved (and amused) Arisa, pocking Nanoha’s cheek lightly. “We’re team after all.”

Nanoha’s expression turns ashamed again, while Yuuno bowed again, looking at them Suzuka Tsukimura couldn’t suppress a slight snicker.

“Interesting, what would happen to this truck if, by accident, those Emitters suddenly came on-line?” Asked lavender-haired girl, Suzuka knew answer very well but she wanted to distract her temperament blonde companion.

“Nothing.” As Tsukinura household heiress expected, and much to Nanoha Takamachi and Yuuno Scrya relief, Arisa Bannings switched to her “professor” mode again. “First, Gravity Emitters are very energy-hungry and without a powerful energy source you wouldn’t activate even single of them. Moreover if we assume they was somewhat activated, considering how close all emitters in the truck to each other, they wouldn’t do anything.”

“Oh, why?” Inquired Yuuno, now very eager to hear another piece of information about technology of Earth.

“When Gravity Emitter active, he creates a “Main Gravity Distortion Sphere” – a zone of gravity, independent from the outside effects, around itself. If two or more MGDSs came to contact with each other they simultaneously cancel each other.”

“I suppose there is some trick to make a set of those devices to work in tandem somehow.” A bus moved through a short tunnel at this very moment and thus a bright flash in Yuuno’s eyes Nanoha attributed to powerful lamps, rather that his hungry curiosity. “I doubt just one device would be able to lift a mighty aerial warship.”

“It’s a super-simply trick, actually – just put a distance of a few meters between the Emitters and when they Secondary Gravity Distortion Fields, produced my main ones, start to overlap they would amplify each other and creating more powerful gravity-control field, which would be able to lift in the sky even mighty Logres.”

“Ooooh…” Impressed Yuuno let out a squeal, which would have been a whistle if he was in his true form. “So they also can be used to tame a g-force during the space travels.”

“It’s impossible for the simple Emitters that was in the truck.” Corrected him Arisa, glancing toward the possible direction of the convoy, of course now they could only see the tows of a tall buildings, hordes of the pedestrians and the infinite wave of cars. “They can be used only for the simple tasks like floating and lifting. In space we use entire complexes of the much more sophisticated devices. On a space vessel, inertia- and gravity-control mechanism is integral part of a life-support system.”

“Arisa-chan! Your small lecture was very informative, but we almost there!” Nanoha’s voice broke the serene flow of blonde girl’s explanation through telepathic channel, snapping her and the ferret on auburn-haired girl’s lap back into reality.

Yuuno give the lady of a Bannings household a polite nod and hastily retreated toward Nanoha’s bag as the bus circled into the open gate of Seishou High School.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#36
Okay, another update

Seishou High School occupies a five-storey high crescent-moon shaped building, which had pretty lively bright orange color that sharply contrasted with the surrounding buildings of a Britannia city. As Suzuka told him at morning – High School mean that you could enroll in first grade and continue to learn in the same building until you reach the last – 12th grade. For example, student of Makabi Middle school could only reach 8th grade and then were forced to either enroll in Makabi Technical Lyceum or seek another High School to continue your education.

Breaking their usual schedule, Nanoha, Arisa and Suzuka didn’t moved toward the entrance right after they leaved the bus, today they needed to make a small preparations. Trio of friends were eager to gave Yuuno opportunity to visit their school but there was a problem. Rules of a Seishou make it clear that all animal, brought to school building, must be placed in a special room, which rob them of opportunity to show their guest their Alma Matter. They couldn’t just put him in their schoolbags, since security protocol required all students to send their packages through x-ray scanner at the entrance four conspirators needed a way to smuggle a small ferret through the guard.

Thankfully, Suzuka already had a plan and after a quick dive beside the massive three near the main gates (Arisa know that camera wouldn’t see them there), Nanoha Takamachi marched toward the “Temple of knowledge” with a massive red beret on her auburn hairs. All girls and a ferret, which currently lay motionlessly in a tight curl under said beret, pray to all powerful beings that no one decided to pull a hat off for their amusement when their group would try to bypass school’s security perimeter. Otherwise, the possible situation would be far from being amusing.

As always – sergeant of Uminari police department Simon Greenbit, one of the rare breed of the non-Japanese members of the city police forces, sat on his favorite chair beside his console and slowly drink warm cacao from his massive green cup, with a phrase “Enjoy your work” on the surface. His unusual dark crimson eyes (as he cheerfully admitted – his mother was a fanatic of genetic makeup) shone brightly, reflecting the light from the monitor, standing out sharply against his dark skin and short nose.

Despite his small beer belly though, the sleeves of his well ironed shirt couldn’t hide his well-trained muscles and, since she often helped him with documents, Nanoha knew that that mr. Simon’s gun are armed and always prepared to gunfight. And he had the right to summon a SWAT unit if he deemed it necessary, as Britannia put the safety of the students very high, since Japan Liberation Front already used the teenagers as a living shield in the past already.

Noticing the familiar trio of friends, Sergeant Greenbit flashed them a broad smile, before giving them a small nod. Nanoha, Arisa and Suzuka didn’t liked the fact that they trick friendly mr. Greenbit, girls decide that they still just try to help their new friend and thus need to adopt an unsuspicious expression and make sure that their body language wouldn’t gain the guard’s attention. Being daughters of noble houses Arisa and Suzuka were defiantly taught how to create an appropriate mask, and Nanoha was a good pupil of her friends in art of deception, especially when she wanted to hide her fatigue from her mother and siblings.

Taking a deep breath, Nanoha moved closer and, carefully moving so her head wouldn’t tilt, put her bag at the conveyor belt that immediately sent her schoolbag into the hungry maw of a scanner. Hearts of a blond, purple-haired and auburn-haired girl pounded loudly in their chests as Nanoha moved through the frame of a detector, yet their faces betray no hints of their fear.

Thanks God, detector remained silent as Nanoha and Yuuno passed through the device’s frame, Nanoha even managed to give a small polite bow toward dark skinned man on her own. Arisa and Suzuka followed her example with the same “innocent” exterior, Arisa even exchanged a small heartfelt joke with the Simon. They could be proud of themselves – even their haste retreat, once they get their hands on their schoolbags; Simon jauntily brushed off as a display of their youth vitality.

“Whew… It’s worked.” Took her breath Suzuka, once the security post disappears behind the corner. “I hope we would be able to snuck Yuuno-san through at our way back without the problems to.”

“Don’t worry, Suzu.” Patted her left shoulder Arisa reassuringly, flashing her friend a confident smile. “After school we’ll have a military training course with our knightmares, since mr.Ookojyo an mr.Horukawa close friends with Simon, they wouldn’t check our bags, since they trust him.” Green eyed girl’s smile transformed into a mischievous grin before she continued. “We would have some troubles with squeezing Yuuno into our devicer suits, when we would need to get him into knightmare frame.”

“Geez, stop that, Arisa-chan!” Demanded Nanoha with a frown (and very small blush), glaring at her laughing friend. “We can’t risk like that – what would we do if detectors caught even a slightest trace of mana, radiating by Yuuno-kun? What do you think happen to him?”

Even without seeing anything, Yuuno felt how smile dropped from Arisa’s face together with temperature around them at Nanoha’s words. “Sorry, guys. I know it was a silly joke but… I’m scared. If even a quarter of what I heard is true we MUST preserve Yuuno’s true form at all cost. He saved us and I wouldn’t forgive myself if I let my saver to suffer like that.”

“Oh…” Little ferret even shuddered at the pain in purple eyed daughter of Takamachi house when she responded to Aris’a quick change in disposition. “I'm sorry for harsh words, Arisa-chan, after all I also shouldn’t forget how much I endangered you and Suzuka-chan and even your and my families by my actions yesterday but I…”

“Couldn’t leave Yuuno-san in danger.” Suzuka Tsukimura’s voice was gentle, yet firm and reassuring, though there also was a hint of melancholy. “We know that side of you Nanoha. And despite of all ours complaints we love you dearly because of your compassionate nature. So I’ll say it again, Nanoha-cham. I’m with you until very end.”

“Same here.” Declared Arisa firmly. “We’re going to go through this all together, Nanoha. I sear on my pride as a Bannings!”

“Arisa-chan… Suzuka-chan…” Nanoha’s voice didn’t shake but her eternal gratitude and joy could have been sensed by anyone in vicinity. “Thank you. I’m eternally grateful to Our Lord for granted me the blessing of having such devoted friends like you two.”

“Let’s hurry up, smooth talker.” Smirked Arisa, checking the clock on her PSU. “While we’re not on clock yet, we shouldn’t waste our time too.”

“You’re right, Arisa-chan. Let’s hurry.” Changeling mage jolted slightly, when she felt how Nanoha’s hand pressed the hat right over him slightly. After some time, he relaxed, feeling how Nanoha move extra carefully, so she wouldn’t let him fall. Yuuno’s continued to lie silently, even when he felt how “ground’ beneath him started to move up and down quickly – Nanoha broke into a trot.

Cacophony of countless voices and sounds assaulted Yuuno’s adrenaline boosted hearing as he snuggled as close as he could into the mane of auburn hairs, trying to suppress his fear before any incident that could expose him to the crown and endanger his friends. Thankfully, approximately ninety seconds later, and few loud sounds of sliding doors, frantic movements of the “ground” ceased. Then, the beret swiftly moved upward, leaving Yuuno vulnerable before the sudden wave of a bright light.

Blinking a few time, Yuuno tried to look around, but when his sight fell on a well-recognizable form of a toilet, he quickly get WHERE Nanoha currently is. With a loud shriek he again curled into a tight ball a second time this day, hoping that Nanoha didn’t thought he’s a pervert for glancing around in a girl’s bathroom. He didn’t have more time that few seconds to brood as Nanoha reached out and gently lift him.

“Here, Yuuno-kun.” Stated purple eyed beauty, pulling her open school bag closer to un-resisting ferret. Happy and grateful ferret quickly dove into the maw of an ash-gray plastic container. The inner space of a schoolbag already was covered in a layer of a cotton wool for his comfort and tan fur animal didn’t miss the opportunity to relax a bit in his cozy “bed”. Kyoya Takamachi, as Nanoha cheerfully revealed to him at the morning, created a small window for him at the sides of the container.

Looking around, Yuuno created a very tiny ball of a green light in addition to light that flew into his chamber through small square holes in plastic walls. Youngest Takamachi’s took the organization of her schoolbag very seriously – with a growing respect Yuuno Scrya inspected his surroundings.

There was no books as he could see, in the dusky chamber he could see a rows of a disc-shaped devices with a inscriptions like “math”, “chemistry”, “history” and e.t.c. on them; further inspection revealed that there also “discs” with exercises for each of subject. Instead of pens and pencils he found three metal pointers, laying in special holders, together with unknown devices (as he could recall – they were accessories for PSU). Large part of space was occupied by a large lunch box and thermos with a juice.

Intrigued Yuuno carefully closed the distance between his current location and one of windows, deactivated the light spell, and carefully looks outside. There was uncountable number of girl and boys in a brown uniform of a Seishou High School, speeding toward their classrooms, chattering away, giggling, shouting or simply having a heated discussion while enforcing their point by the expressive gestures.

On their way Yuuno noticed at least three vending machines and pair of TV-sets, which show another report about mysterious and dangerous events in Uminari. The walls inside of the building had more cool – light blue – color and were girded by the ubiquitous infoscreen. And not only walls – as mage could tell, infoscreens seemed to replace all labels in Britannia school.

With a great interest teenage archaeologist watched how pair of light purple cleaning robots, which looked like cross blend between ladybug and pressure-cooker, take the care of the floor. The elderly Japanese janitor, who stood nearby, wearing the uniform of the same color as robots, controlled their movements though sensory keyboard, attached to his PSU.

Yuuno got so caught in his observation that sudden stop almost threw him right into the plastic wall, only the years of the dangerous situations on the dig honed his reflexes enough to quickly put more strength in his forepaws.

Regaining his senses, he quickly casted a small light-bending spell – inside the schoolbag the outlines of the “window” starts to shine in a very faint green light, as his light-bending spell was completed. Now, only if you didn’t bring your eye very close, any naked eye couldn’t see anything but pitch-black panorama if you look on the schoolbag outside, while there was no changes for Yuuno himself, which let him now to move closer.

“Shiizaki!” The low, almost animalistic growl emitted by Arisa make a ferret cringe. Just what person could invoke such cold malice in cheerful and outgoing Arisa Bannings? Looking closer he found the culprit, right under the infoscreen “9-A” stood a Japanese girl with a short black hairs, whose icy blue eyes could rival a battle cannon or A-class in sheer piercing capability.

In addition to a cold glare, her otherwise lovely face, framed by two short pigtails held by green flower-shaped barrettes, was soiled by a scar that crossed both of her lips, who were tightly pressed together. To put it simply – she almost radiated with cold displeasure.

Girl’s cold disposition was shared by two boys, one and two years younger respectively, which stood right behind her, holding an unknown devices in their hand. The same hair color and similar face features revealed their blood relation, though teen’s green and brown eyes glares were just barely less powerful.

“Yes, can I help you, Bannings-san?” Girl’s voice was no less chilling than her eyes, though Yuuno couldn’t find any traces of impoliteness in it. Unknown girl even gives them a small nod, her siblings made the same gesture. But the air was still tense, just like Arisa’s back that suddenly appear before his eyes.

“I’m sorry for question…” Suzuka quickly step in, trying to defuse the situation using the same polite, though much more friendly voice. “Shiizaki-san, what duty could bring you and your dutiful brothers here? Oh, sorry! Good morning Shiizaki Yuuto-san, Shiizaki Ritoku-san.”

Shifting his stance, member of Scrya tribe could see how Suzuka give a polite bow toward said boys. Despite the size of the machinery in their arms both Japanese boys returned the bow, indicating that teens, just like their sister, also want to stay away from problems.

“Greeting, Tsukimura-senpai, Takamachi-senpai, Bannings-senpai.” Despite the coldness of their voices, the temperature started to rise – after all now it was clear that no side wished for escalation. “We wouldn’t take too many of your class valuable time; School Council asked us and our elder sister to bring those CPUs for the seats and the discs with programs for them.”

“Ah I see.” Arisa stance became more relaxed, though there was still lingering agitation in her body language. “I’m sorry for my uncalled aggressive behavior, lady Shiizaki, mister Shiizaki, mister Shiizaki. Please forgive me – seems my fear of those rising terrorist activities take a toll on my self-control. Please, go in.” Giving three small bows to her interlocutors, blonde girl take a step backward clearing a passage into the classroom for trio of siblings.

“Y-yes, and thank you for your efforts.” Due to sudden movement of the bag, Yuuno could tell that Nanoha bowed too. In response girl’s and her brother’s gazes became less frosty a bit.

“Well, thank you for your kind words, Takamachi-san. We well hurry.” Closog their uneasy conversation black haired maiden sped up into the classroom, filled by a chatty teenagers, her brothers followed her. After waiting for thirty seconds, Nanoha, Suzuka and Arisa followed them in.

Tri of friends sat in the corner of the room, near the window, Arisa first, followed by Nanoha and Suzuka occupied the very last seat. Hearing how male’s voice declared “Our Literature teacher - Mr. Bilering would be late for ten minutes: he have a meeting with the director right now.”

Sensing the opportunity to be helpful to his lifesaver, ferret-mage quickly dashed toward the rows of disks and quickly found needed one. And so, when Nanoha auburn-haired girl open her schoolbag, her purple eyes meet a sight of a ferret that carefully held the ODD with Literature course with his jaws.

Smiling at the cute mammal, ponytail girl gently scratched his chin before picking the disk up with her index and big finger and her pointer with three another fingers. Hearing the soft hum of the computer, in-build in her seat, Yuuno tried to relax and just hear what happen around, but he couldn’t. Nanoha’s skin, when he touched him, was so cold – she was deeply affected by this meeting.

Trying not to touch naked nerve right on the start, Yuuno tried to use different approach.

“Um, Nanoha…?”

“Yes, Yuuno-kun?”

“Your brother and sister also attend Seishou?”

“Yes, though, they didn’t start from the grade school like me – as I heard they attended Hirukawa High School at Tokyo before our family moved to Uminary.”

“Ah, I see. Thank you for the information. Well, seems that you decided to follow your sibling steps and graduate from the same school as your siblings. Your big family had really close ties.”

“Actually, we’re small family, Yuuno-kun. Standard family in Earth Empire had four children at least. I think eventually mama remarry and give birth to new baby brother or sister for me, Kyoya-niichan and Miyuki-neechan.”

Somehow confused by his new friend melancholic tone, Yuuno couldn’t help but ask.

“Uh, I’m sorry if I sound rude, but you say it, as having 4 babies is a mandatory there, Nanoha.”

“Because, it’s exactly as you said, Yuuno-san.” Joined their conversation Suzuka. “Earth Empire pretty much demand form their female citizens to raise at least 4 children.”

“And this is a more lenient version of the law that was changed 50 years ago.” Arisa’s mental voice was still morose, either because of the said law or because she still couldn’t clam down completely after meeting with lady Shiizaki. “Until then each women must have been give birth to 4 babies.”

“Oh my…” Now Yuuno regretted that he started the conversation but now it was too late to abruptly end their chat here and now and thus, cursing his own curiosity, he implored. “So, I suppose lady Suzuka, lady Arisa and lady Shiizaki also have more than one sibling?”

“Yup.” The first to answer was Arisa, but to Yuuno’s relied her voice grew softer and less harsh. “My mom and dad give me brother and sister – Quentin and Miranda and mama consider to have another baby in two years. And Suzuka have older sister Shinobu and two little brothers – Nobuyuki and Yuichi.”

“Then…I can assume, lady Shiizaki also have three or more siblings?”

“Hanami-san had older sister…” Suzuka’s voice was now dripped with sadness.

“Oh no…” Yuuno could feel how blood drained from his face. Now it was Nanoha’s turn to explain.

“Empire of Japan always took a great pride in their long-preserved traditions including social hierarchy and for many years it worked perfectly. Unfortunately, once Emperor Kururugi Genby ascended on the throne of Empire things… turns to worse. The relationship between inhabitants of the Empire Core worlds and Outer world always had some sort of rivalry, but for ages it’s newer went outside the friendly teasing. But in attempt to consolidate the power in the hand of his court, Emperor Kururugi starts to put the nobles loyal to him on the position of power all around Empire, while pursuing a policy of a… stern social and ethical elitism.”

Yuuno, to his shock, quickly peeked displeasure in Nanoha’s voice, but Arisa’s voice held much more disdain.

“In other word, old Genbu tried his best to whip his own people into nationalistic and militaristic frenzy. And since people of Outer World showed the most resistance to his policy he pretty much ordered his pet nobles, who gain almost all sweet places in Core Worlds to abuse their brethrens horrifyingly. And when, after the conclusion of Twilight War the full truth about Japan came out, almost entire Earth Empire bared their fangs against already half-dead country. In order to gain support of people inside the Japan, Emperor Charles pretty much reversed the state of the Japan, putting scions of the Outer World in the annexed worlds of a Japan. So, mr. Yuuno, what do you think happen when long abused and tortured people get the chance to settle the scores?”

Yuuno could only swallow nervously a his imagination started to show him a very bloody and terrible images about the blind brutality of a revenge. There was no need t tell that long settled pain, resentment and sheer un-fairness of their treatment would unleash a savage beast in the souls of the resident of Outer Worlds of a former Empire of Japan when they attacked their former lords.

“Daymyo Soichiro Shiizaki was stern but fair governor, but in his attempt to shield his family he got too many ties with Emperor Kururugi Genby close circle and thus once wrathful people seek for the target of their vengeance he and his family got involved.” Now Suzuka almost cried, hiding her face in her palms. “It’s happened ten years later after the end of the War, when the old wounds still didn’t healed completely.

The happy and careless world of the classroom now was separated from the four people, linked by shared pain. Rising her head Suzuka give her friends (and even Yuuno who looked from the hole in the Nanoha’s schoolbag) dry and solemn gaze.

“Planet Bluestore – former domain of family Shiizaki – was hit by a pirate ride and people of the planet, struggling with the hard process of the reborn of their home world, blamed lord Shiizaki, claiming that he helped the pirates in revenge for his lost position. Soichiro-dono, unfortunately, just couldn’t hold his temper in check during the meeting with crowd and viciously insulted them, calling them “pigs that could only put their inability on others. And then…”

Arisa quickly “step in”, allowing Suzuka to avoid revealing the horrible truth.

“He was beaten to death so savagely, that he was unrecognizable when police break the in. His older daughter, who was with him, was gang-raped into insanity and later commits suicide. Hanami, who was just 5 years old at that moment, almost got killed too but was saved, together with her mother and brothers, by forces, sent be her uncle – the rich noblemen, who visited a planet to meet his relative.”

“After moving to Earth, Shiizakis settled with said uncle’s family and started a new. But the pain and rage still burn in deceased lord Soichiro children’s hearts. Eventually, they start to support the “Sons of chrysanthemum”- the ultra-right organization that glorify the past Japan Empire and despise all other citizens of Earth Empire, half-breed and people who just want to live in peace with other Earthlings.”

Arisa’s voice quickly transformed into ma growl as she recalled not the most pleasant memories from her past. “Needles to say – Hanami never liked me, though considering how I behaved when I first meet Suzuka I can’t blame her. What truly piss me off, that bitch turn against Suzuka immediately when she found out she became my friend! And after that she flashed her face again and again when she needed to botch either Nanoha’s election on class president position or tell anyone that there is more fitting candidates on the post of karate club vice-captain! Damn, I was trained by Nanoha’s older brother, who could wipe the floor with entire club!”

“But Arisa-chan…” Nanoha quickly raise her voice, gaining her friend’s attention. “Hanami-san NEVER participated in bullying, she always calmly accept her defeat in debates and she even vouch for our innocence when Suminoe-san tried put the blame for breaking the fight on us.”

“Only because teacher forced her to swear on her pride…” Lady of Bannings household voice grew less confrontational before she grudgingly admitted. "Okay, she is fair and never play dirty, I give her that. But after all Suzuka and her family did for her she had no fricking right to give Suzu a cold shoulder.”

“Lady Hanami and Lady Suzuka knew each other?” Inquired Yuuno.

“Said uncle, who saved her – it’s Takeshi Tsukimura, Suzuka-chan’s father.” Nanoha bit her lower lip in frustration and pain. “Even after we all moved to Uminari Suzuka-chan and Hanami-san still couldn’t rebuild their sisterly bonds they shared in the childhood. Even after all those years I couldn’t help but think that I broke Suzuka-chan family.”

“Stop it this instant Nanoha-chan!” Purple-haired girl’s voice hit them all like a whip. Though a moment later she continued in her usual gentle voice, addressing her startled friends. “You didn’t anything wrong, not you, nor Arisa-chan. I also can’t blame Hanami-chan for this choice, even though I can’t accept it. I just can only hope that someday she will understand that you two are wonderful people and join us.”

“Suzuka-chan. Suzu…” Nanoha and Arisa wanted to sooth their obviously sad friend but before they could that, a stout man in a strict brown business suit entered the class and trio of friends and small mage were forced to break their conversation on this grim note.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#37
Entire frame of a main terminal of Torrinson Base rumbled when pair of colossal aerial cargo ships PCAV-45A Galaxy one by one landed on the prepared landing pads. Maddened rattle of thick glass panels, which, together with special sound-proof layer in the walls, protected the ears of terminal occupants, starts to fade away, greatly pleasing many military officers who nervously gazed on the tormented window.

In their mind they understood that special glass lived through worse experience, yet still some lingering fear refused to go away. To his shame, Major Suzaku Kururugi of a Britannia Military Forces also couldn’t completely beat this irrational anxiety. His embarrassment only grew, together with anger on himself, as he could see that not only small group of officers wasn’t affected at all by this sequence. But even his princess continued to simply stood and watched entire process calmly with her usual serene expression.

Despite the fact, how beautiful her milky-skinned face was – so much like ancient Greece images of Artemis, The Goddess of Hunt – it’s pained Suzaku greatly, that now his sweetheart smile on rarer occasion than all those years ago, when he first meet her, when he was sent to Britannia mainland to meet his future wife.

He could only chuckled, remembering how furiously he protested against being sent “to land of monsters, to became a slave of a doll-loving foreigner pipsqueak”, and only fear before stern retribution prevented him from throwing tantrum before his father. Fool! Suzaku even now wanted to slap himself for being so blind even then, how couldn’t he realize that Japan became the nest of a demons before his birth. It was all before him – the pale, stone-like faces of housemaids and retainers; the broken expression on his cousin Kaguya, the tears of his mother, the disdain on Todoh-sensei face…

It was all before his very eyes, but his blind loyalty toward his father and glorified imagination of his country, which he wished to liberate from the clutches of evil Empire of Britannia, pretty much robbed him of his mind. He should have seen that Kururugi household continued to be a hideous blain on a body of Earth itself even after the collapse of Sacred Empire of Japan.

Thankfully, all rude words, he prepared on his way to Pendragon, died when he meet the spirited tempest of joy named Euphemia, her older sister (and later pretty, much his own) Cornelia – the mighty lady of battle and their other siblings – Lelouch, Nunnaly, prince Odysseus, prince Schneizell and other. And later, his younger self meet many other people, who raised him, instead of his broken family: his teacher in knight-mare combat, and warrior, second only to Emperor himself – lord Bismark Wladstein, professor Lloyd Asplund – an eccentric genius, who give him weapon to protect his new homeland and lady Cecile… he blushed slightly, when he thought about beautiful raven-haired woman. After all – she was second lady in his heart, together with his precious Euphy.

The nightmares of a Twilight War affected Euphy, just like countless people across entire Earth Empire. Forcing to quickly found an enormous strength in the depth of her being or fall, Third Princess of Holy Britannia Empire managed to impress not only her closest siblings, but many people across Britannia itself with her proves, silencing all talks about her inutility without her older sister Cornelia.

Suzaku could only sigh in dejection, thinking about sacrifices his love done to gain her new power, he could only pray in gratitude to God, for Euphemia didn’t lost too much of her innocence in a process.

Yes, she still retained her love and great compassion, but her cute cheerful ditzy antics were gone, together with her faith that you could solve any disagreement with just talks. Yes, even now she preferred pink colored clothes, but now she wore a strict two piece business suit, and its pink fabric sharply contrasted with row of a jet black buttons. And her personal gunblade, which Britannian princess always took with her, was a grim reminder to anyone that now Euphemia Li Britannia had the will to resort to un-diplomatic methods to convince her adversaries.

Green eyed major, eyes flared with cold murderous rage, when he thought about all bastards who were responsible for all pain and suffering, his fiancée and billions of other good people were dragged through thanks for their machinations.

Though, his anger also quickly give in to a wave of joy as he saw how a new aerial ship, hovered right above pair of cargo vessels, which already were swarmed by a military vehicles and lifting machines. On first glance it was nothing more but pink and white colored Caerleon-class aerial frigate, but closer inspection quickly revealed many differences.

This aerial ship had larger and much more powerful engines, supported by increased numbers of gravity emitters. The number of cannons on the upgraded Cerleon’s hull was lesser than on standard ships of the same class, but they were more powerful and there was not one but two Hadron Cannons on the aerial frigate’s prow. Suzaku knew, that ship’s heart – nuclear reactor – also had superior specs that usual NPP-24 Blaze that powered countless Caerleons all across the Britanniam which also allow the ship to had improved Blaze Luminous Barrier Shield. And his bridge could have rival a command center of a space ship in a command and coordination capacity.

Of course, for such improvements, this Caerleon paid with reduced troop transport capacity, unlike his brethrens, this vessel had lesser numbers of knightmares and infantry on the board, while his tank’s hangar and VTOLs landing pads were removed completely. Though the ship, as Euphemia insisted, had much larger and more advanced medical bay.

Yet, despite all its flaws, PMAF-4A Mozart was one of the best modifications of the dutiful Caerleon and his princess personal chariot of war. Well, since he’s part of Euphy’s retune for now, he could claim this ship his new base of operation too and, and after recalling ship’s specs, Suzaku was sure, that he would enjoy his service.

Well, he could enjoy even time on a half-dead rusty cargo boat, if it’s give him chance to fight the enemies of his homeland and atone for his sins. His green eyes flared – yes, there is too many dangerous beasts in human skin whom he still didn’t kill, but their time will come. He swears on his pride.

The low thump of connecting airlocks brings him back to reality from the realm of his vengeance-centered dreams. Ashamed of his behavior Suzaku quickly straightened his back even further, gazing at the rumbling circle, metal doors with almost fanatic zeal. Finally, with a loud hiss, two massive valves moved sideways, opening a path for everything and anyone that was brought here by aerial warship.

Behind the doors stud another group of Britannia military personnel, though behind them the welcoming committee could have seen fork lifters that carried massive silver-gray containers – the supply from the mainland. The leader of newcomers was a tall lavender haired man, whose blue eyes flared with almost childish joy, in a sharp contrast with his comrades he didn’t wore a uniform but rather he preserved his dignity (though Suzaku doubted that this person would care even if he would attend the party at Imperial place completely naked) with the help of plain black pants, pair of dirt-covered boots and long white lab coat.

Earl Lloyd Asplund aka Earl Pudding – one of the best knightmare frames engineer in the Britannia and the leader of Special research Division “Camelot” and creator of the famous knightrmare frame Lancelot – THE first 7th generation knightmare frame and Suzaku’s personal steed.

They first meeting occurred three years ago, when lady Marianne (whom he considered his second surrogate mother) invited young Knight to meet a certain man – a promising genius in the Britannia military, scouted by prince Schneizel himself. As she revealed to a 14 years old Japanese teen, professor Lloyd Asplund was in search of a devicer that could tame his newest creation – a machine, he claimed to be harbinger of a new age of a knightmare frames.

Suzaku too adored lady Marianne to even dare to doubt her words even slightest and, due to her connection, he moved at test site 342 in Pendragon where eccentric earl continued to work on his beloved machines. Lady Marianne’s foreboding proved to be right – the addition of a young prodigy to a Camelot give the project wings and not only Suzaku gain a fame and name to himself, his machine and his team in his first combat missions against Japanese insurgents, but he also give Lloyd enough information to present a whole new line of knightmare frames to serve under the banner of Holy Britannia Empire.

Together with Lloyd stood a tall beautiful woman, whose uniform had unusual orange color, but her strict mannerism and expression allowed blue eyed maiden to fit into the row of soldiers behind her. Woman’s cap, of the same orange color, lay on her indigo hairs, wore in bob-cut hairstyle, as if it was glued to them and didn’t move an inch when she saluted sharply toward greeting commission.

This time Suzaku struggled no to show overwhelming joy, when he saw miss Cecile Croomy, Lloyd’s assistant, another well-known knightmare frames creator and Camelot’s Deputy Chief. She also was another woman, who took a very special place in Suzaku Kururugi’s heart.

“Greeting, Earl Asplund. I’m glad to see that you unharmed and I hope that your joutrney wasn’t soiled by troubles.” Euphy was the first to starts a conversation with polite curtsey. Well, actually etiquette demanded Lloyd to greet the imperial princess first, but Euphemia knew eccentric professor too well to knew that he either doesn’t bother or simply doesn’t even know about those rules.

At least he was educated enough to answer to a proper greeting. Waving his hands two times like berserker scarecrow. “Hello there Princess Pin… BUEGH! I mean – Your Highness Princes Euphemia.”

Sending another glare at her wincing superior, who now was busy cradling his elbow-caressed ribs, Cecile returned her attention to pink haired princess. “Many thanks for your concern, Your Highness. Thank for the divine protection, there was not a single unexpected or even dangerous incident on our way from the mainland to the Special Administrative Area Japan.”

Cecile reached out, holding pink haired princess her tabled. Taking a hold on the device, Euphemia Li Britannia starts to read the content. Lloyd seemingly overcome the pain and with his usual energy lavender haired professor added his own cheerful remark. .

“We brought all equipment you requested, princess Euphemia. With all those lovely toys you would be able to create one truly marvelous bunch, under your command.”

“It’s a knight order, Lloyd” Half-snarled half-moaned Cecile, resisting the urge to bury her face in her palm out of despair – why just can’t Lloyd learn about dignity of humans just a bit more?! Thank God, the officers in both groups know Lloyd well enough to avoid starting a scandal. “And I hope you wouldn’t call a future members of the Her Highness’ retune a knightmare’ component?!”

“Awww, have more faith in me, Cecile.” Answered Lloyd, waving his hand casually clearly barely registering what his aide tries to tell him. But then he suddenly adopted much more serious expression. “We have upgrade packs and details for further maintains and customization, for 12 Vincent Wards and, of course, I didn’t mention that special upgrade for your machine, Your Highness.”

“Good job, mr. Lloyd.” Praised an older man Suzaku with sincere smile – eccentric or not, but Lloyd was astonishingly good when he worked with knightmares (you still need to remind him that ejection system are IMPORTANT part of KMFs, though). “I’m sorry if I sounds rude – but how long you want to rest before you could start to install new equipment of knightmares?”

“Just give me one hour to eat and check our equipment.” Earl stretched his arms over his head, working out the stiffness in his joints. “I can’t wait to test those lovely things myself.”

This time Cecile’ sigh was filled more with amusement instead of disapproval – after all, Lloyd was Lloyd and you need a lot of time (and nerves) to change him, but she also know how good lavender haired nobleman skills was with machinery so she could have rest assured that knightmare frames would receive a proper attention.

“Well then, I think I’ll refrain from interrupting the work of a specialist. Please, take care of our steeds, Earl Asplund. If you need something – please tell us.” Again, Lloyd broke the code by simply nodding, but, as always., he get away with that –while both group of officers starts to exchange the pleasantries, the absent-minded researcher already moved toward the exit from the hall.

“Well, since mr. Asplund leaved us, can I hope that you’ll keep us company, mrs. Croomy?” Giggled Euphemia, as she walked away with her knight and dear friend, letting General Apson to take care of the personnel.

“With pleasure.” Cecile flashed a smile in return, as their group entered the elevator. Suzaku didn’t interfere for a while, just observing his beloved ones with an amused expression. This expression quickly dropped when, after the doors closes, Cecile suddenly leaned toward him and give flabbergasted knight a quick kiss on his lips. And before poor guy could recover Euphemia made a similar attack, kissing him too.

“We're still even, miss Cecile.” Declared third princess, pumping her fist in air jokingly. Happy, almost childish smile on Euphy’s face bring a joyful expression on the face of her knight – it was always so pleasant to see a return of the carefree and playful Euphy, returning, even for a moment, from the abyss, created by a Twilight War.

Indigo haired woman simply shrug at Euphy’s playful remark. “Well, the day is not over yet. I still have the time to turn the tide of battle… ”

Cecile didn’t have time to finish her sentence as the elevator reached their level. Quickly regaining their composure, the trio passed the security post at the entrance to living quarters with absolutely straight faces.

Swiftly passing by rows of the dark-gray metal doors Euphemia, Suzaku and Cecile soon reached the ones that had the label “Colonel E. Valentine” attached on its surface. Purple eyed girl touch the scanner with her PSU, then put her fingers on canner and then, with almost pianist-like movements, she input the code. The lock clacked quietly, signaling that Euphy could now open the door into her private chamber, which she did.

Adopting the same principle of minimalism as her brothers and sisters, who serve in army, Euphy’s room almost had no differences from the standard officer room. The same single bed with a simple, though cozy, mattress; metal table with in-build computer and plastic stool and small locker near the bed. Only a beautiful expensive lamp (the present of her mother) and the small arms booth (present of her sister) give the room a small measure of individuality.

Once they enter the room, Eiphy quickly dashed toward her locker pull out a portative freezer and ten seconds later a bottle of wine decorated the table. Wishing to prove her integrity of a guest, Cecile revealed a small box, which she pulled out of her pocket – in the box laid three little, though expensive, glasses with the engraved Britannia’s coat of arms o them; one of them she almost forcefully put in reluctant Suzaku’s hands.

As a mistress of the room, Euphemia took a responsibility to open the bottle (stopping her helpful knight with a small wave of arm) – a few swift, though powerful, movements of a battle knife later a cork were removed. Sighing in defeat, green eyed knight allowed beaming princess to dill his small glass with dark crimson liquid.

“Toast!” Declared Euphemia Li Britannia rising her glass in air. “For our meeting!”

All three people in the room emptied their glasses in sync. Suzaku didn’t liked alcohol and tried his best to not consume it and thus vine tastes unpleasant against his tongue, but Britannian warrior admitted, that he liked the warm feeling in his belly. And the pleased expression on his beloved women’s faces was enough for him to bear with the taste of wine.

“How are things goes in our home, in Penragon?” Inquired Euphy, putting her drink away and staring at Cecile, hungrily waiting for the news. Woman in a orange uniform, clasped her arms together, playing with her glass, which she held by her thumbs.

“Let’s see, war games between princess Nunnaly and Princess Carline’s persona companies ended up in a draw, which made both of the soundly unpleased, which led to a fistfight between two of them which also end in draw. Your father – His Imperial Majesty – started an inspection of Earth garrisons and took Her Highness Victoria with him – His Highness Schneizell is left in charge until His Majesty absence. Her Highness Constance and princess Adelaide went to a tour, inspecting the major hospitals under their surveillance in Earth Sphere…”

Cecile made a small pause; Euphy decided to help and swiftly filled lady-engineer’s glass. After taking a sip, blue eyed woman continue her report with recovered energy.

“Week ago we get a new producing line for Gareth-class Knightmare Frames on Mars, so we expect a solid increase of the receipt of those machines in the forces in very close future. Ack! Sorry - you asked me about the situation in Pendragon and I again got caught in my worlds of mechanics…” Flushed hastily put her glass away and give an apologetic bow to her interlocutors.

Euphemia just giggled at older woman embarrassing expression, giving her a soothing gesture. Suzaku loved and respected Cecile too much to laugh at her discomfort, so he limited himself to a long understanding gaze he gave to his another love. Without a doubt – Cecile Croomy was much more level headed than her superior, but even this serious woman had a moment when her passion to engineering went into overdrive.

“It’s okay Ms. Cecile.” Euphy gently patted older female’s forearm with a little smile. “I want to hear more news anyway. As a princess I always want to know what happen all around our realm, not just capital city.”

Overcoming her embarrassment, Cecile got back to her speech. “Ah, well – His Highness Schneizell program “Faust” continued to bear the fruits. Our research of the ancient technology, originated from the super-state called “Al’Hazard” already allow us to create a prototype of the new Advanced Battle-Control System “Beholder”. One of them we brought here together to install on princess Euphemia’s machine.”

Once those words leaved indigo-haired woman’s mouth the atmosphere in room dropped on a few degree. Sighing, Euphy leave the bottle on the table before breaking the uncomfortable silence, deciding that she, as a room’s owner must took the responsibility.

“Please Ms. Cecile, can you give us more detailed information about this system?”

Euphy hated the hypocrisy of those words, but she also know that she, Suzaku and Cecile have no luxury to move around this topic. This system was an important military project that should help Britannian forces in upcoming, and this mean lives of counteless people would depend on it, battles and that’s why she volunteered to participate in this project. As a test-subject, to be specific.

“”Beholder” use a new 3d helmet that allow the user to receive more detailed information much faster, due to usage of the complex of a new sensors on all machines in the battle group and the attached UAVs. Also, not only commanding elements, all soldier receive a new communication system and 3d helmets to improve the coordination and speed of giving and receiving of orders.”

Euphy and Suzaku saw the specifications and information about new system and they trusted Cecile’s judgment to know that she didn’t extol a new technology. But they also knew what lay behind it and thus both of them couldn’t muster even a grain of excitement as Cecile continued her presentation.

“The core of the “Beholder” still the same?” Suzaku tried his best to sound strictly professional and neutral, but despite his best efforts, orange clad woman caught the glimpse of displeasure in his tone. But she couldn’t blame him for that – not after Twilight War.

“Unfortunately – yes.” Son of the Kururugi house managed to suppress a wince and simply nodded in confirmation, wearing the same neutral expression. “Despite our best efforts we still have no successes in reverse-engineering a processor and few other important parts of the system so we was forced to simply connect the Hazardi devices to our machines.”

“I know how are you feel Suzaku.” Euphemia Li Britannia also couldn’t fight the lingering fear before the unknown technology of ancient civilization, mostly because they were magic users. As silly as it was – the Twilight War made a god job of giving the mage craft arts a very bad PR. “Father also wasn’t thrilled about my participation in this project. But this is my duty as a princess of the empire. I MUST bear this weight – it’s my responsibility to help our brave soldiers, who risk their lives. You, as a fellow warrior should have understood that.”

“I know this Euphy. I know that I have no methods to mend your decision, as you already have such resolve and thus, despite all my repulse I will help you to use this technology” Those words felt like an acid against his skin, but Suzaku Kururugi knew that sometimes you can only choose a lesser of two evils.

“Bering taught by my revered teachers, I understood how great this new mechanism can improve the battle efficiency and this survival rating of our forces and believe me, Euphy, in other circumstances I would jump in joy at the prospect of equipment of such technology in our army. But…”

Suzaku emptied his glass that he didn’t touches all this time, the bitter taste on his tongue felt very suitable to his mood, shadow on his face grew deeper. “But I don’t like to use the technology, whose principles of working are unknown for us. Lord my witness, even if there wasn’t a grain of magic in it I would be still against it – Lord Bismark taught me that warrior should rely only on reliable and well-known weaponry if he want to avoid the unpleasant surprises in most unfavorable moments.”

Green eyed major made a pause to give his two lovers a very stern gaze. He even raised his right hand a balled it’s into the first for emphasis.

“I definitely can’t call “Beholder” a well-known system at this moment and even the fact that we would test this system outside the actual battle can’t soothe my worries as this time we forced to use the unknown device that wasn’t studied enough. And, considering the situation in Japan, I can’t say that we wouldn’t force to enter the real battlefield until all tests are done.”

Purple eyed and blue eyed maidens exchanged a glances and the sighs – they defiantly couldn’t say that they love wasn’t right. No sane soldier would want to go into the battle, without a deep knowledge about his firearms, as his live depend on them and even test pilots want to have as many information as it possible. And so, relying on the technology, integral part of which could only be described as “something we don’t understand, but hope it will work properly” just couldn’t increase the spirit of testers.

The fact the system have a trace of magic just made it all worse – during the war even the most harmless things could have been turn into the deadly weapon or trap by enemy’s magic and even now there was no guaranty that all traps have been found and disarmed. For all her resolve, Euphy admitted that she can’t get the fear out of her soul every time she thought about her deploy, using the “Beholder”. Cecile shared her worries as well and they both knew this.

“The origin of the technology samples still the same? The Special International High-Security Zone Taklimakan? From that site?” Inquired Euphy, referring to ruins the Al’Hazardian found in the China during the war. Federation itself proposed to turn the desert around the underground cavern, where colossal underground city was placed, into the Zone, administrated by the Council of Directors in order to provide a necessary level of security, control and funds for the research of the ancient marvels.

Even the power-hungry and greedy mandarins understood full well that only combined efforts of Earth could extract a needed knowledge from the creation of the ancient mages. Though, the deaths of many of their brethrens during the war at the hands of the enemy seemed to help to clean their minds, as even those self-centered individuals get the fact that they could only win or die and federation on its own clearly had no strength for that winning on its own. Especially in its half-dead state after the war.

“Uncle Vivian and his team still… didn’t successes right?” Purple eyed princess voice betrayed some hints of resign. Her uncle – Vivian zi Britannia, her father’s twin brother and one of the members of the Emperor’s court - lead the massive team of researchers and engineers who relentlessly dig into the mysterious soil of the site, searching for new devices and equipment of Hazardi and later the methods of using them for the betterment of Earth.

Bulldog of Britannia’ zeal at work rivaled only his hatred toward the enemy, because of whom not only he loses many dear friends, relatives and siblings, saw the suffering of his homeland, but he also now was trapped in the body of twenty four years old man, despite being as old as her father (though he and her father only smiled at her downtrodden expression when she learned that her uncle stop aging and declared that they know millions of people who would happy to receive curse like that).

But even his mind end dedication still couldn’t break a seal on too many secrets. One of them was the core of the “Beholder”.

“His Highness said that they found some clues how the system work. But for now they’re just too vague, too unreliable to work for now.” Admitted Cecile with even sadder voice, indigo-haired engineer even lowered her head, as her lingering anxiety about the mysterious system core also starts to emerge. “He said that dr. Hemmers team put a few security measures at the “Beholder” if the machine starts to behave funny but… but lord Vivian said that we still should be very careful.”

Even Euphy now couldn’t muster strength to continue a conversation. But before silence could before too oppressive Suzaku, as he felt responsibility for Euphy and Cecile’s fall of spirit, loudly coughed, gaining his two loves attention and, after taking a long breath, made a declaration.

“Again, I don’t like such blind jump-like situation, but I also admit that we also can’t afford to cower in fear before the mysterious art of magic. As long as threat of a war float in air, we need as many knowledge as we can obtain. And so, I’ll give you two my full support.”

Both women beamed at those words, visibly pushing all their doubts away at devicer’s words. Britannia’s motto was “Marching ever onward to tomorrow” and surrendering to their fears before the unknown would be most shameful for the princess of the empire and member of her court. After all, despite all odds, sufferings and loses, Earth Empire led by Britannia emerged victorious from the Twilight War. They would conquer and defeat all mysteries of the “Beholder” system just like they defeat their nefarious and elusive enemies in the past.

“Okay I think we can let Earl Asplund to work on our machines for now, so let’s change a topic.” Clasped her palms together pink haired maiden with a reborn smile. Cecile nodded at that proposal with smile on her own, while Suzaku just shrugged, though his frown also lessened.

“As I heard soon high schools of Uminari would participate in the Trial of Iron, right?”

Suzaku’s faze finally get rid of all hints of displeasure as the genuine smile appear on his lips and not only him – Cecile Croomy and Euphemia Li Britannia (yes, she was too much of Cornelia’s sister despite her peace-loving nature to be mesmerized by the marvels of Earth military techniology. Of course – Twilight War also take a major part of change in her likes and dislikes), as a fellow knightmare devicers also enjoyed to watch the spectacular contest of skills and wits between the teams of determinate fighters.

Also, they Britannians were really eager to see the skills of a commanding officers ofeach tea, - their crafty plans, daring strategies and skillful tricks; just as much as the class of the faithful mechanics, who would make sure that the dutiful machines would work as a clock in most dire situation. What was the most pleasant feature of this show – it was non-lethal battle, where defeat just meant you would take some time to pout, instead being mourned by your beloved ones.

“I think it would be mean to say that only our dear Suzaku eager to see the prowess of the young ones.” Smiled Cecile fondly, recalling her own childish excitement at the previous Trial. “I can’t wait to see the skills of the local boys and girls.”

“Same here Cecile.” Now fully tossing aside all differences between their social classes, Euphy gently held blue eyed woman’s hand by her own palms. “I want to see the bright future of our country in their determination and passion. After all, those young warriors are base of our mighty army that protects the peace of our realm. “ The shadow crept back on her face when she recalled not very pleasant memories about accident that occurred few years ago. This incident that earned the deadly wrath of many warriors of Britannia and for eternity soiled the reputation of JLF. “I hope there wouldn’t be a repeat of Sapporo Tears incident.”

“I wouldn’t let the bastards of JLF to do it again.” Green eyed teen’s bloodcurdling snarl could sent even a hungry bear in a desperate flee. “I would not let those trashed to kill more innocent students in their mindless felony.”

Cecile cringed too, remembering the attempt of a Japan Liberation Front to bomb entire contest by taking a entire team from the Kaikawa High School from Sapporo and installing a powerful sakuradite bombs into their transports.

Unfortunately for JLF, one of the brave students managed to break free and sent a warning message, Britannia military, under her older brother Odysseus orders, started to work on a covert rescue mission but before they could do so something alerted JLF and paranoid mission commander blow entire convoy, killing his men and hostages alike.

The Trial of Iron was very morose event at that year. There was no fun, no excitement, no salutes at the conclusion – entire week was spent in a grim remembrance of the tragedy that took away so many young lives. After that incident JLF’s members rarely was taken alive.

“I swear, until my heart beat in my chest, I’ll fight to death with entire division if it would be needed to save those brave boys and girl lives.” Declared Suzaku Kururugi with resolve and sheer presence could crack a glass now. “I would do my best to make sure that not a droplet of a innocent blood would be spilled. I swear this o n my pride as a Britannian duke, as this rank was bestowed on my by His Majesty so I’ll have the power to be a shield of Britannian people. I swear I’ll make the ground crimson with blood of the infidels who dare to bare their fangs on our people”

Cecile nodded with the same grim resolve. Her blue eyes now look almost black from the wrath she felt toward the cowardly murderess, whom she not forgive even now.

“I know that we same the same desire – to prevent the casualties and preserve the happiness of our dear younger kinsmen.” Euphy’s gleaming eyes was thankfully devoid of a dark murderous glimpses, but the resolve in them was no less strong. “I personally intend to see that and thus I’ll take the Mozart with me this time. The roar of his cannons would the voice of our wrath is someone try to hurt the innocents.”

The wine flew in all three glasses as two women and one man repeated their wows. After that, Euphemia resolutely took both of her bellowed ones and lead them toward the bed, where she intended to finally get rid of all their worries. No one objected.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#38
Usually, being forced in a cramped space for hours, restricting your own movements, would sour many people’s mood but Yuuno Scrya got used to this in his archaeologist expeditions years ago – for example, his misadventure on Rexode 2, where he lay in the small tunnel, reinforcing the unsteady walls with his barrier, while using special tools to pull out the artifacts of old from their damaged chamber.

Moreover, he was able to obtain knowledge (as limited this dose of information would be) about the Earth Empire’s science. He also was very grateful for Nanoha’s help – she left a spare PSU in her bad and transferred the data from her own device on it, letting a small ferret to see what’s happen on each lesson.

Math lesson was a good opportunity to check the formulas and theorems of Bureau against imperial counterparts. As he expected many Earth theorems were re-worded versions of science of the IAB, which wasn’t too surprising though – right triangle would be right triangle in any corner of universe after all.

He almost melted out of joy at literature lesson – today, he, together with Nanoha’s class, made a short trip into the world of Edgar Allan Poe’s story “Black Cat”. As dark this story was, it gave green eyed teen chance to analyze the writing style of the author and what he wanted to tell in this story.

It’s reminded him about the story of a similar premise from the Belkan mythology – The Everloyal Jack, about the mental and moral degradation of the one of the lords, whose predilection to the bitter-root’s juice (an infamous Belkan drug) cost him his skills as a jack-marshal, warrior, family man and friend and, in the end, his freedom and sanity, who, during the entire story, believed that his prized warjack got possessed by the evil spirit and tried to ruin him.

One day, in the state of intoxication, lord tried to improve his machine cortex, before the important tournament. Needless to say it didn’t ended well – lord almost kill himself when he accidentally fall from his machine, if not for loyal machines’ interference, which caught him a mere inches from hitting his head against the boulders of the floor. But the “check” mistrimmed a targeting system of the warjack and this lead to a fatal incident on the tournament, where ill-placed shot killed lord’s own eldest son.

Heartbroken lord wailed and hollered, holding his beloved son body in arms, cursing the jack for treachery, oblivious how disgusting his drunken rant look to all present people, who already knew about his fatal attraction to drug, but still overlooked that since lord never let it affect his mind.

Lord starts to lose his companions and his family quickly grew wary of him, which plunged him into a deep depression and increased the amount of the drug he continued to consume despite the pleas of his wife and children. His hatred and depression only grew from day to day as eventually in explode into a mindless attempt to destroy his own personal jack, whom he blamed for his woes. His wife tried to stop him from this callous act, and she even successes, but enraged lord killed her instead.

Trying to escape the judgment lord set entire workshop on fire, but when his own sons and special commission come to investigate, the charred, barely functional jack suddenly burst from the wreckage of the building with corpse of the lord’s wife in his arms, revealing his crime to the world.

Yuuno was forced to admit that he enjoyed the beef stew, cocked by Nanoha as much as he relished the Earth literature. To be honest, his empty stomach (at that moment) would gladly exchange the ten hours of hearing of the best Earth mythology for another pan of the youngest Takamachi culinary art. The blood of chiefs were strong in the Nanoha, there was no doubts about that.

Again, being in the classroom, filled with microwave ovens, cockers, refrigerators, give the guest from the IAB opportunity to see the cooking techniques and products, Earthlings use in their cuisine.

Among, the usual terms like “beef”, “onion” and ”oil” he could hear such intriguing new words like “miso”, “nutmeg” and others. The tasty smells only increased his interest (and hunger), as he hear shouts, gleeful shrieks and sometimes brooding moans of working girls, who were busy creating a various sorts of a beef stew.

Geography finally revealed to Yuuno Scrya the full panorama of the capital planet of the Earth Empire of United Directories. The detailed map of Earth, projected by PSU, shows tiny mammal the continents and oceans of Earth, smart machine marked each region, quickly allowing Yuuno to learn the important terms.

Once he enjpoyed the view of Earth enough, PS show him planet with borders of the leading Earth nations. The absolute winner in terms of controlled territory was Britannia that held entire west hemisphere in her clutches, with additional territories in the east hemisphere that were listed as “Korean peninsula”, “British Isles”, and “Japan” – all territories under crown jurisdiction had the bright red color.

Russian Coalition and Chinese Federation struggled form dominance in Eurasia, with their respective green and dark blue zones of influence. Africa and Eastern Europe were divided between Republic of France (yellow) and Prussian Empire (Purple). The south Asia’ region was occupied by a aquamarine territory of Indian Commonwealth.

To his dismay there was no history lesson today to tell him the story of these dominions but Nanoha, Arisa and Suzuka were more than happy to give him the information. During the long lunch break, girl told him how the end of 21th century marked the rise of a nationalism and massive re-industrialization and militarization on the Earth nations.

Young archaeologist listens about the creation of the bases and cities on the moon and numerous stations around the Earth. About the birth of the infamous laws that were basis of the Earth Empire “mandatory motherhood” current law. About the local, yet vicious battles in the Asia and Africa as the tension grew between the rivaling alliances.

His blood froze, as Yuuno heard about the worst genocide in the humankind history, when Nations of Earth in the middle of 22th century unleashed “Great Purge” in attempt to stabilize the demographic misbalance on the human population, which was the gamble of the developed nations that diverted the growing aggression of its populace on the underdeveloped countries that couldn’t retaliate in kind as alternative was possible nuclear war.

The sheer number of people that were mercilessly killed in regions of Africa, Near East and Middle Asia were simply nightmarish. As Nanoha morosely stated each regions lost from 65 to 85% percents of its initial population and the survivors were put under insanely strict birth and social control programs.

As horrible as its sounds, the 22th century was remarked as true start of a space colonization program, artificial islands project and other programs that not only lead to a massive improvement of the condition of life on Earth, but also give birth to a current mighty star-spanning empire.

Though all girls, together with Yuuno, agreed that the methods were too cruel and should have been avoided. Though, to the credit of the current humankind, Nanoha, Arisa and Suzuka told him that there was no one among people they know, history file they read, or program on television they saw that considered this nightmarish event as anything more than monstrous crime.

After the break the class 9-A separated, as the student went on the different lessons in accordance to their chosen course. Nanoha, Suzuka and Arisa went to the military course and thus went to a seminar of robotic technology and maintains. Green eyed ferret noticed how Suzuka’s voice grew happier and exited as they moved through the labyrinth of corridors toward the basement, where all lessons with actual devices and tools were held. He also noticed that Nanoha and Arisa showed much less enthusiasm in their cues as they moved on stair.

The seminary hall looked like workshop with the rows of desks, concluded Yuno Scrya, observing the spacious chamber. Walls almost disappear behind the consoles of the various machines and devices: robotic arms, lifters, soldering, frills and many others tools awaited to be held by the hands of young technicians.

At the opposite wall, he could see massive doors – as Suzuka told him, they lead in the storage test area where students worked on a actual machines, like old knightmares of lifting machines. At the lowest part of the room was a massive platform with podium under the info-screen projector.

As more and more students continued to fill the auditorium, the guest of Earth noticed that while boys held advantage in numbers, this advantage by no mean could be called distinct. According to his calculation on each 3 boys you have 2 girls. Then his line of sight got obscured by the already familiar wall of the desk – Nanoha put her schoolbag at the special holder again.

Quickly scuttling to another “embrasure” in the bag, mage-boy could see that boys and girl moved toward the row of lockers, from where they pulled out smocks, gloves and goggles. Just like many centuries ago, goggles were held on wearer’s head by a rubber cord, he could sense that frame of goggles had inbuilt electronic in it, which correspond to Suzuka’s early words that their goggles not only protected their eyes, but also could work as a microscope and show necessary drawings if you need help.

Gloves were equipped by simple device that adjusted the size of the garment until it tightly wrapped around the wearer’s hand. The school gloves had the dark orange color with black areas on the palm and where fingers should touch the object once you curl your hand into fist.

Only smock of the same color as gloves was just a piece of cloth. Though he enjoyed how the fabric embraces Nanoha, Arisa and Suzuka’s lovely bodies… UWAAAA! Why?! WHY?!! Why the curses of puberty fall on him only after he was left in such situation?!

It was a good thing that student were noisy as they continued to talk, gossip, laugh and brag, otherwise they could hear (as faint it was) how the poor ferret bang his head against the wall of a schoolbag.


~***~​

The seminar ended a bit too quick for Yuuno’s taste, whose hungry interest toward the Earth technology was gleefully satisfied by Suzuka’s mental lections. Even a single seminar show that purple haired lady not only had the great interest toward the devices and machines of her nation, she had the matching talent.

She finished today’s exercise second fastest in her class - the first was very boy with ash-gray eyes - Michael Rayline - and then managed not only give her guest from far away detailed explanation, but also helped Mr. Rayline in aiding their classmates. Amused Yuuno finally saw the frustration on Nanoha and Arisa’s faces as they worked on their own exercises.

The goal of exercise was to find the malfunction in the “foot” of the knightmare frame (Sutherland-class as Suzuka quickly pointed out). The student usually worked in pair as Nanoha told Yuuno as brunette and blonde was paired together, while Suzuka joined the stoic green-haired bespectacled girl with blue eyes (Mimori Kano – one of trio’s good friend and Suzuka’s fellow techno-geek, as Arisa revealed to an amused archaeologist); needless to say mrs. Kano, finishing her task, already walked across the room, supervising her classmates successes and pointing out the mistakes to other.

When Yuuno asked, shouldn’t the pairs finish the work on their own Nanoha replied that army is a monolith structure, where you always should have faith that your comrades would help you otherwise it’s just a ragtag bunch of armed monkeys (the last words she told with obvious blush in her voice – seems that she just repeated the words of one of her teachers).

Considering that their teacher, after finishing his detailed lection, simply sat beside his podium while watching his pupil activity, and saying nothing against the help, her words were true. Said teacher – brown eyed, gentleman in the strict dark blue costume with raven hairs and the same facial features as Nanoha and Suzuka – Hiiro Ichimonji caught Yuuno’s attention when Nanoha revealed his age – 88.

Yuuno couldn’t give him more than 40 years, but he know what could cause such dissonance. And Arisa confirmed his guess – Mr. Ichimonji used the life-prolonging procedure that slowed the process of aging. As mage of IAB learned, this procedure was wide-spread among entire Earth Empire and people get the open access to it. Just like people of IAB, Belka and other nations, known to Yuuno. Though, he was sure that Earthlings used their own methods, considering their attitude toward magic.

Scrya clan members rarely used this procedure, but it was mostly because archaeologist mages had naturally prolonged lifespan due to genetic engineering their ancestor performed on their genes.

Nanoha and Arisa still pouted a bit – in the end they were forced to ask Suzuka for advice. Inwardly, Yuuno had a thought that the speed with lavender haired girl found the malfunction in the fixing of the front roller of the KMF’s foot they overlooked hurt girl’s pride a bit. But, on other hand, Nanoha and Arisa were well aware about their weakness and thus their banter at the end of the seminar were filled with self-contempt and decision that from now, until the next seminar show the results, they would shorten their time of rest by hour to spent it on reading the technical literature.

One more time Yuuno caught himself noticing how unusually serious his saviors are. Or maybe it’s shared trait of all Earth Empire’ teenagers? After all, he visited Autonomic provinces of Belkan Empire to know that society of Belka treat anyone who didn’t have even a basic grasp of engineering as a retard. Though, to be fair to Belkans, having a very basic knowledge of the topic is enough to shut up any gossips.

Next lesson was actual CQB-training session. The gum was located one floor higher on the first floor of the school. This time Yuuno was prepared to any awkward situation and long before Nanoha Takamachi, Arisa Bannings and Suzuka Tsukimura entered girls’ changing room small ferret carefully placed himself on the bottom of purple eyed girl’s schoolbag, closed eyes and dozed off, creating a small sound-proof barrier around himself.

Yuuno spent almost half of hour in silence, hearing the faint shouts through the thick walls. But then “his” PSU flared to life as Nanoha open the transmission. Though, after careful examination, mage concluded that it wasn’t his auburn haired savior who used her PSU as camera.

Considering that he saw how sweat-cowered Nanoha fought Arisa, both girls uses a practice staffs, made from tough rubber. It wasn’t hard to figure out that operator was Suzuka, who sent on bench in the corner of the gym. All present people, boys and girls alike, wore the orange-colored sport suits (jerseys, long pants and white sneakers).

Yuuno, together with Suzuka, continued to observe the sparring match between two friends. Nanoha skillfully blocked Arisa’s thrust by locking their weapons slightly above their heads. On the same time, she moved her entire body in clockwise pattern, forcefully moving both staffs slightly away and down, which open a way for daughter of Takamachi household to aim the butt of her weapon directly at green eyed girl’s face.

Arisa answer to that by swiftly slipping down, letting Nanoha weapon to miss it by mere centimeters, while kicking her opponent left foot, using her body weight to increase the power of the attack. It worked and Nanoha even fell down on the mat, but auburn haired girl managed to shift her body before a hit and deftly rolled away from Arisa, before blond maiden could press her advantage.

It wasn’t hard to notice that girls enjoyed themselves as they tested their skills against each other. Again and again, in the flurry of exchanging strikes, occasionally both girls flashed brief happy smiles at each other. Even though strong spirit of competition and desire of win were undeniable, Yuuno could sense that Nanoha Takamchi and Arisa Bannings’s fight was more happy chatter rather than vicious struggle for domination.

“Nanoha-chan and Arisa-chan are so happy, aren’t they?” Yuuno almost jumped when Suzuka Tsukimira suddenly started a conversation, for now the reserved kind girl preferred to answer on his question, rather than initiating a chat with visitor from the another star sector. “I admit – they weren’t like that always. Sparring matches between Nanoha-chan and Suzuka-chan were pretty intense in the past. And on occasion, when those two forget about the restrains, their fights explode into a vicious and spectacular and never failed to gather an audience. Oh kami, I stopped counting how often our teachers were forced to intervene.”

Suzuka chuckled in amusement, prompting Yuuno to release a quick “heh” on his own, gazing at show, translated by blue eyed maiden’s PSU. The targets of their gossip though continue their dance, exchanging a series of swift blows.

“Well, just like Nanoha-chan and Arisa-chan not really like our seminars of robotic technology I’m not very found of our lessons of self-defense, but still I couldn’t help but adore the dedication my dear friends puts in their trainings. For all my displeasure with their enjoyment of those violent bouts, for all reproofs Momoko-san and Jessica-san, Nanoha-chan and Arisa-chan mothers, give them, we all silently wished them best of luck as their continued to hone their skills. But year ago it’s all changed…”

The sadness flow through their mental link like a flow of icy cold water. Yuuno keep himself silent – there was no doubt some traumatizing accident occurred and caused a change in their two friend’s attitude. And thus he didn’t dare to press the topic, but Suzuka continued on her own.

“Nanoha-chan and Suzuka-chan had two prominent adversaries from the Sapporo – Ichizaki Shiina and Linda Brasswell, they meet two years ago at the Trail of Iron at the conclusion of our Middle School term. The showdown two on two those two pairs had left many spectators speechless and left their machines in shambles. Even we engineering team, despite all work we had to restore the knightmare frames, couldn’t muster enough irritation to give them a dress down after seeing such awesome display of skills.”

Blue eyed girl’s voice grew dreamier and more relaxed as she recalled something nice.

“After the fight those four emerged as close friends, sharing the secrets, gossips and stories as if we they know each other for years. I admit I was a bit jealous of how concentrated Nanoha-chan and Arisa-chan on our new friends before I talked to them myself, after that I simply couldn’t do anything but welcoming those two awesome girl with open arm in our circle of friends.”

The PSU’s screen flared. Revealeing a two photos to an intrigued mage. The first girl had the thin face with sharp features, yet her pink eyes cheerfully watched at the world through long measly white hairs with pink ends, as her mouth flashed a broad cheerful grin; the other girl had chocolate-colored skin, green serious eyes, though her hair were built into a cute ponytail, yet her cute little shy smile remind Yuuno about Suzuka.

“We spent the two weeks after the conclusion of Trial, playing together. They spread Midory-ya discount coupons with us, wearing the same maid costumes as I, Arisa-chan and Nanoha-chan.” Suzuka snickered, remembering something, before revealing truth to Yuuno. “Shiina-chan never grew tired of repeating how cute and cuddly Nanoha-chan looks in her maid costume and how she wants to take her home."

Another flicker and Yuuno witnessed a group photo of the girls, standing in the center of the café, wearing frilly maid costumes. In the center of picture stood Nanoha, who indeed looked really cute in this garments, looking both happy and embarrasses, as the girl with white and oink hairs pulled her into embrace with a blissful expression on her face. Suzuka and Linda (the dark skinned girl, concluded green eyed mage) had both shocked and amused expressions, while Arisa looked positively jealous.

“Then we took care of the dogs at Arisa-chan’s mansion and played with cats at my home. Took our time in arcade, cafes and shops… There was so much fun, that we didn’t even notice that end of the Linda-chan and Shiina-chan’s vacation come. At their departure we exchanged the numbers to keep each other in check and we as the date of the new Trial of Iron come closer we all barely could wait to meet each other again. I remember how we spent entire night creating a schedule of all entertainment we want to test…

The photos on the screen followed one another before Yuuno Scrya’s eyes. He giggled when he saw the scene where Shiina and Arisa, both wearing over the top serious faces, stood face to face, wearing two sleepy cats as hats, while Nanoha, Linda ands Szuzuka laugh at the background. Blushed slightly as the scene of girls, wearing a thick bathrobes pulled the very large canine toward the room – judging by the bubbles that flew through the threshold, it was bath. Suzuka Tsukimura on her part, continued her presentation.

Suzuka’s happiness when she recalled the happy memories of her friends tasted like a delicious cream, yet, despite this pleasant sensation, Yuuno was bothered by one fact – telepathic channel shouldn’t have transfer the people’s emotion in such way. Actually, even the most precise communication could have transfer only faint echo of people’s emotions. There shouldn’t be such direct empathic transmission! It wasn’t like that when he told with anyone, even with Nanoha and Arisa. Earth and her habitants continued to surprise him and young archeologist didn’t know should he enjoy all those new mysteries or be wary.

Tidal wave of cold that washes over him quickly pushed those thoughts away. The pain filled voice of the Tsukiumura heiress revealed dark memories from her past.

‘It was our lust conversation with. NO! It was the last time we saw Shiina-chan and Linda-chan alive!”

Strangled sob, emitted by Suzuka, gripped Yuuno’s heart, as the image on the screen moved left and right as purple haired girl rubbed her eyes.

“Two days later the emergency news broadcast told us that their convoy was destroyed by the bombs, installed by JLF that took entire team of Kaikawa High School hostages. Yuuno-kun… it was painful to hear that there were no survivors, that all those people we meet at the competition are gone, that our precious friends, Linda-chan and Shiina-chan are dead!”

It was a bit scary: Yuuno could see, judging by the picture on the screen, that now Suzuka sat straight and only sounds Tsukimura heiress emitted was rhythmic breath, yet inside she trembled with cries and her broken wail continued to shatter her listener’s heart.

“It’s feel so surreal – looking at the screen and seeing the wrecked machines, that carried our friend and their team to us. Watching how rescue teams recovers the bodies from place of catastrophe. You may laugh of us, but nor I, not Nanoha-chan or Arisa-chan agreed to believe it’s real for hours. Until we mustered some strength, or insanity, to cll mtheir homes and only tearful cried of their families finaly make us understand – our dear friends dead!”

Yuuno batied his own cries, us those heartrending words remind him about his uncle’s death – lady Suzuka already suffered enough for him to plunge her further into the river of pain.

“After this nightmare we couldn’t attend our training sessions for weeks – the talks in the school already was painful enough and seeing the places, directly related with combat arts – the arts that killed Linda-chan and Shiina-chan – was just too much…

Yuuno stoically withstand the crushing waves of girl’s woe, trying to sooth her with gentle words – even after all passed time this tragedy seems to haunt daughter of Tsukimura family. Surprisingly, Suzuka managed to force her voice to sound firm, putting a leash on the overflowing emotions, while she wasn’t able to suppress them completely, at least blue eyed girl make sure they wasn’t consume her.

“But with the help of our family and friends we slowly come to accept it. Come to understand, that we need those lessons to gain the strength necessary to protect our world, families and those, who need help. It’s became apparent, when I, Nanoha-chan and Arisa-chan fend off the student from the parallel class when they try to bully our underclassmen. Yes – this incident convinces us that we should stop wallow in self-pity and finally accept the truth of our world.”

Suzuka tsukimura voice now rumbled like a thunder – no traces of previos wekmnesses, and Yuuno Scrya, felt how his pain and self-pity goes away too. Cursing his momentary weaknesses and feeling new unyielding resolve, he meets the upcoming thrones of painful sorrow with resolve.

“Together with knowledge that while we play in the war at the mates, countless people died in the real battles, while protecting us. And while we again started to enjoy our successes in class, Nanoha-chan and Arisa-chan buried all their bloodthirsty enthusiasm once and for all. War is not a play – we understand this truth oh so well.”

Suzuka firm and brave words fueled mage’s desire to help her. And he suddenlu get the idea, how he could do the trick. It wasn’t some type of known technique, he knows. Rather, acting purely on instincts, Yuuno Scrya concentrated and starts to “envelop” suffering maiden in the feeling of support – after all, if she could sent her feelings through the link, maybe she could receive them as well. And, to his surprise, it started to work.

The warm sense of compassion he emitted removed the dark bubbling pain from the girl like blanket wipes the cold water. The piercing pain faded away, leaving both Earth noblewoman and IAB archeologist in the state of cozy silence.

“Sorry for this stunt, Yuuno-kun, and thank you for listening». Gently thanked Suzuka her unseen friend.

“No, it’s I who should thank you for sharing such important secret with me, lady Suzuka”

“Such refined manners.” To Yuuno’s jubilation, Suzuka’s voice became warmer again. “The seekers of the past have really impressive standards in the domino of Interstellar Administrative Bureau. You teacher deserve a highest praises, Yuuno-kun”

“T-thank you. Thank you from the bottom of my heart, lady Suzuka” Green eyed ferret didn’t told how happy he was to hear the praise, extolling his uncle efforts to raise him. No, Yuuno know very well, that many members of Scrya clan, despite their words, thought that Kaine was a good parent to him. But Suzuka Tsukimura was the first to say such kind words directly.

“You’re welcome, Yuuno-dono. Oh! Arisa-chan and Nanoha-chan are finished. Which mean that after the shower and quick preparations we’re goes at the Seishou training ground outside the city for the most important part of this day’s curriculum.”

“Oh?” The sheer excitement in her voice overwhelmed Yuuno Scrya, making him fidgeting in anticipation.

“The battle training, using actual military equipment and training rounds. Kinghtmare Frames mock battle, to be specific. It’s time to show our true capabilities, Yuuno-kun”



Merry Chisrtmas and Happy New year, everyone. Thank you, all dear readers, who still read my story!
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#39
It was hard not to notice the excitement, shared by all occupant of the bus (minus the driver, perhaps), as the municipal transport moved closer and closer to its point of destination. Maybe, it was because of the Britannia warlike nature, or simply children was eager to play with most advanced toys, but regardless, every boy and girl in the vehicle continued to display their high spirit. Truth to be told, even he, an archaeologist form the different culture, couldn’t help but feel the anticipation before the upcoming event.

Thought, there was an anxiety, mixed in, since Nanoha warned him that they would need him to sneak from the bug, before they’ll pass through the security post – the laws on the training ground were much stricter and the scanners there were much more advanced and would easily found out the “passenger”. Suzuka show him a detailed map, so he could found them once he sneak in (thanks God, the guardsman wasn’t zealous enough to hunt even a stray animal that entered the area, if they didn’t behave suspiciously of course).

Yuuno wasn’t a novice in the tracking – he wouldn’t be able to work in the maze of the ancient installations without the skill to find the way to his friends and/or to special location – but he never before in his life would be robbed of his magic. After all – the training would be hold on a military base and thus the amount of gauges that could notice magic would be high and even a quick attempt to cast even a simply tracking spell would result in the collision with military forces.

Thankfully, Scrya tribe always put a great emphasis of honing survival skills of their children, as there was an occasions where magic was off-limit by various reasons, and thus uncle Kaien never missed an opportunity to sent Yuuno running through the woods, with an mana-supressing collar on his neck. It just it would be first time he would put those skills to an actual test in the very first time in his life. Moreover, in the situation where even a slight mistake could have a grave consequences.

“Keep yourself calm, weakling.” Snarled Yuuno inwardly, feeling how self-irritation started to raise. He need the information about the Earth sensor technology if he wanted to stay under the radar for long. And the opportunity Nanoha, Arisa and Suzuka give to him would be to good to waste. After all, military camp would have the same gauges as every military base in the Britannia dominion and thus if he managed to analysis, with Suzuka’s help of course, the working patterns of mana-meters he could adjust his devices to work in the magic-stealth mode. It will give him more tools to find the Jewel Seeds, at least, for some time.

Bus come to stop with the same soft jolt as at morning, and spirited student, sprung up, took their schoolbags and sped up toward the doors. As, they planed, trio of friends walked in the very end of the line of a chattering teenagers. The bus station and camp was separated by a 300 meters of the road through the forest – a plenty of time for Nanoha to pretend she need to check her boots, covered by the bodies of Arisa and Suzuka from the possible cameras, and covering the escape of a slick mammal from her bag.

The smells of the forest pleasantly tickled he nostrils of his ferret body. Yesterday, during his misadventure in the park, he was too consumed by the pain from the losing his uncle, dread before the possible disaster Lost Logias could unleash, and later desperate plans of battle, once he almost run into the plant-monster.

But now, as he could enjoy the coordinated work of his muscles, as he continued his run though the grass, maneuvering around the rocks, trunks and occasional pieces of junk.

Military camp was surrounded by a solid fence, three meters in height. Metallic alloy, from which it was made, was light and cheap to be used in the walls of base around the countless installations around the human-occupied space, yet solid and durable enough to withstand the fire from portative cannons (bar AT-weaponry, of course). The construction teams, using the last building technology, could set entire perimeter in the matter of few hour, creating a first line of defense for the base and its occupants.

The cameras, installed on top of each fourth pillar, that held sections of fence together, lazily glanced around, ignoring the rare animals (dog and cats to be specific) that dared to move close to the wall. Which, thanks Goddess, meant they paid Yuuno very minimum attention, deciding that a single ferret not very threatening too.

Well, in a way it was true – Yuuno had no intentions to harm soldiers or sabotage to base’s working capacity.

Even as a ferret, Yuuno could easily climb a tree and then simply jump over the fence; albeit, only after he found suitable obscured spot behind one of the hangars. He know, that ferrets normally wouldn’t be into tree-climbing but he doubt that garrison of the base, assuming, they would notice him, had such knowledge and even so, would be they able to differ ferret from weasel from example. And even so, why couldn’t they just overlook a particular ferret, who just KNOW how to climb?

Okay, he ALMOST convinced himself, now would his Britannia unseen friends kimd enough to follow his example?

He landed on the concrete, bounced few times before finally stopping and taking a few moments to look around. He stood in a small niche, created by rows of massive dark red containers, covered by a camouflage net, and the wall of the hangar. He could sense a faint smell of the tobacco in the air, which means that occupants of the camp used this improvised hide-out as a smoking room. His speculations proven to be right, when, once he glanced into one of the rifts between the containers, his gaze fall on the small ashtray.

Carefully leaning out from the containers, Yuuno scanned the area. The military camp wasn’t too large, which made sense – the Uminary and surrounded area had a pretty low strategic value and thus a small garrison was more than enough. There were three big hangars, counting the one, behind which Yuuno hide, and six smaller ones. As he was told, the base had a single knightmare frames company, supported by a company of soldiers at its dispose.

The soldiers quarters was located in a trapeze-shaped three-storey dark gray building, made of the same metal as the fence. The command center of the base towered over all constructions in the base, and massive radar array on the rood mad the building even taller. Those two building were equipped by the sophisticated devices – the Blaze Luminous Defense System, as Nanoha told him. Larger and more well equipped bases had them even on their, much more sturdier and bigger, walls, but again – Uminari wasn’t that important.

Yuuno cringed when he saw how two tanks entered the camp’s gate, followed by a trio of slick Knightmare Frames. Even a quick glance could tell that they were more advanced that those, who take down the Jewel Seed-created creature yesterday.

The low growl of tank engine reminded him about the bus, they came here. Oh wait! He had no luxury to waste time there – he needed to find, Nanoha, Arisa and Suzuka ASAP!

Another a few moment of the frantic searching, Yuuno finally found a hangar with number 27 on it – Seishou High School’s stronghold on this base. There was a three man, dressed into a blue uniform of the Britannia military, stood before the open gates of the hangar, patiently waiting for the student to come out. They didn’t wait for long (to be specific, it was Yuuno, who observed them, who didn’t wait for long) before the accurate line of the girls and boys, dressed in military uniform come to greet their superiors.

Following the protocol, student formed a straight row before the gazes of officers and gives them a sharp salute. It was worth noticing, that bigger part of the row, wore the brown uniform, while two groups of twelve teens boasted a light gray full bodysuits.

Considering that he noticed familiar manes of auburn and golden hairs among those twenty four people he could deduce that they were a knightmare frame devicers. As if it wasn’t obvious already – Arisa already explained to him that KMFs platoon consisted from four squads. Town authorities deiced that army-grade squad of four machines would be too costly and thus they used a police forces size of unit – 3 knightmare frames.

Nanoha and Arisa stand close, but while, even with his enchanted eyesight in ferret mode, he couldn’t see their faces clearly, Yuuno somehow feel that both girls had very serious, almost grim, expression. Lady Tsukimura didn’t joked when she said that memories of their fallen friends left lasting scars on their souls – each time they enter the deadly machines of war, they would remember that many people who entered the battle in those machines didn’t come back.

They come here to learn how to be strong enough to come back, to support their comrades, and to protect their homeland. And even guest of the Earth, could have seen that not only his new friend behave with such level of dignity. He could sense that previous lighthearted bravado, he saw in the bus, completely disappeared from all present students. Their backs were straight and posture unwavering, just like their gazes he could sense even from all this distance.

Now he saw not a bunch of carefree young boys and girls, but a line of resolute young warriors in training. Yuuno shuddered when he remembered Arisa Bannings’ answer when he answer her: why does Earth Empire feel necessary train even teens to be warriors? Because there was no such place as a safe zone anymore in this space. And if we want to change it we need to bludgeon anyone who threatens into submission!

Engineering platoons were bigger – twenty eight people in each – and thus he almost missed Suzuka who put on her head a brown cap, blending into the row of trainees. The military engineers didn’t have the aura of a morose glory of the devicers, but were no less determined and serious. After all, no army can battle without a properly working rear echelon – their work wasn’t as glorious as the duty of the pilots but only idiot would dare to say that they were less important.

They were a medic and valets of the elegant and deadly knightmare frames and caretakers and healers of the armored vehicles of Britannia. And it was their work that keeps deadly war machines of Earth in the shape where they continued to inflict fear on the IAB’s population, Even thorough all those trillions of kilometers that separated dominion of Earth and territories under Bureau jurisdiction.

The smooth and calm speech of the officer that stood in the center of in the trio was replaced by sharp voices of one of his subordinates, who checked the info on his device’s display. The students, one by one shouted their names in no less loud voice – roll call has begun.

Okay, decided Yuuno, it’s time for him to move – he can hide in the hangar and wait until Suzuka come back. Another quick glance give ferret-changeling enough information to plan the route. Once he confirmed that the area more or less clear he turns around and jumped.

Between the wall of the massive hangar and the fence was a small gap – definitely small enough for human, but large enough for a small mammal to squeeze in. Once he went through this passage three times, always slowing down at the end to stretch his neck forward and check the surroundings, he turned and dashed toward the drainage channel. The groove was covered by lattices, so soldiers and vehicles could freely move around, but they also give Yuuno a protection from the eyes of garrison and other unwelcomed witnesses.

Thankfully, soldiers of Britannia took their duties of keeping their base in a proper state and the narrow pass was clean from leafs and… other stuff. And only water makes this venture uncomfortable. Also, his hear skip a beat when a six-wheeled tank trundled right over his head. Thankfully, the lattices were created with usage of the military grade steel and they were thick enough to withstand even the weight of rumored main battle tanks that were almost two hundred tons in weight. Assuming, they would just pass over of course.

Finally reaching the hole on the other side of gutter, teen archaeologist quickly sneaked behind the corner. There he allowed himself to take a small rest and wait. Soon he heard the high pitched screech and, moving in a group of three, twenty four Knightmare Frames quickly leaved the hangar.

Maintaining their formation the knightmares lined up on the ground. Before mage could ask himself – what are they waiting for? – a massive armored vehicle, which roof was filled with various devices and sensors, escorted by a single tank, sped up from the direction of the command center.

Once the machine reached the formation of humanoid machines, knightamers began to move again, swiftly moving toward the entrance of the military camp. Soon, the area was clear as the gates closed behind the tank.

Scion of Scrya tribe, on his part, curled on the ground, waiting for the upcoming events. Just like they agreed, soon the familiar lavender haired girl appeared in the mammal’s eyesight, stretching her arms and almost innocently looking around. Suzuka added a small backpack with instrument to het attire, which made her look even more mature, but Yuuno know, that said backpack was almost empty inside this time.

A quiet “kyun” gained girl’s attention, as Yuuno sprang on his paws. Lady of Tsukimura household nodded in response, giving Yuuno a small smile, before slowly crouching to “check her shoelaces”. Green eyed ferret didn’t waste the time – he closed the distance between them swiftly, climbed up toward the dark blue and yellow backpack and sneaked into the hospitably opened maw.

Suzuka stood up as gracefully and slow, which was both due to her training and because she didn’t want to be rude to Yuuno who currently shared her backpack with instruments. Once she finished her play, blue eyed maiden hurried back to her place.

Yuuno didn’t dare to move in the constrained space of Suzuka’s backpack and so he just laid here, together with boxes, cases, drills and numerous nozzles. He barely restrained himself from coughing, surrounding by the smell of oil and solutions.

Thankfully, the trip wasn’t long and soon backpack was carefully placed on the floor. As ferret-turned mage could see, he was in the some sort of a cabin. He get the opportunity to check the surrounding area very soon – a Suzuka’s arm appeared in his sight and made e three quick snaps with her fingers, giving him a signal that he can come out.

Yuuno crawled out and saw that Suzuka’s workplace was separated from the hangar with two tin partitions. She had her own computer, small table, on top of which he can saw a cup and penholder, while all the other space was occupied by unknown machines.

Silently, Suzuka picked him up and then put a curious ferret on the table, where Yuuno saw pair of weir devices – both were pretty large, yet one was compact enough to be hold by a single hand, while the other was carried around like a backpack, with attached probe. Without waiting for the question, blue eyed maiden explained the situation to her guest.

“It’s MM-10A and EES-7 – two most commonly used mana-detectors in Britannia. All other gauges, no matter how string and accurate they are just advanced versions of those devices. If you study them, it’ll allow you to know the limits of their sensitivity toward your spells, Yuuno-kun. But I want to warn you – while their most commonly used, there is advanced detectors, that only given to a special forces, which are much more hard to trick. Needless to say – I don’t have access to them. Sorry.”

“No need to ask for forgiveness, lady Suzuka…” Shook his head teen mage. “You already did so much for me so I doubt I’ll be able to repay. Forgive me for putting you into the danger by helping me. And forgive me again, as I need your help in order to understand basic principles of the work of those devices.”

Suzuka repeat Yuuno’s action and shook her head with a smile. She made a small pause to activate her computer – the sign “Hello Suzuka” in purple letters appeared once the screen flashed to life before mage’s eyes – and then one of the mysterious machines.

“I’m really eager to see the magical devices in the work, so you owe me nothing for the help. And please, just call me Suzuka, you don’t need to call me lady. Actually, Arisa-cha has the same request – we want to be your friends really much Yuuno-kun.”

“T…Th… Thank you… Suzuka…” Young archaeologist never thought that it’s possible to wheeze in the telepathic conversation. But on other hand he never was so rattled, in a good way, in his life – it was the first time when people outside the Scrya tribe express the wish to become his friends so cordially. “It’s a honor for me… I swear…”

Suzuka giggled, watching how little ferret starts to bow cutely. The temptation was too strong and feline-loving girl reached to stroked her new friend a few time, enjoying the feeling of his soft fur.

“To be honest, I and Arisa-chan started to fell envious about how easily you and Nanoha-chan found a common ground. It was hard to skip that you already call her just “Nanoha”. Seems you already like Nanoha-chan really much Yuuno-kun.”

Daughter of Tsukimura household was too nice to giggle at increased bewilderment of the ferret-mage. She almost could see the blush through the fur on his face.

“Uh… well… she is my savior and I happy to call her my friend. T-that’s all…”

"Okay-okay. I believe you, Yuuno-kun.” Suzuka gently removed her hand from the head of mammal and adopted much serious disposition. “Shall we start?”

“Yes, please.” Yuuno quickly shrug off all his previous shyness and moved toward the the gauges, left on the table. After quick inspection he pointed his left forward paw on the smaller device. “Let’s start with… uh, how did you call it, Suzuka – MM-10A. Please, use the Raising heart first to make a first check.”

Suzuka nodded silently and pulled a small red gem, which Yuuno gave her at morning, from her pocket. With a slick and swift movement she put the Britannian device at the special stand on the machine and then quickly input several command on the keyboard.

The big secret work has begun.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#40
Yuuno lost the count of the time he and Suzuka spent on searching the limits of the devices’ sensitivity and tuning of his spells. The biggest obstacle, as he feared, was the poor compatibility between the devices created on Earth and Mid-Childa. The fact that Raising Heart was a magical device while Earth gauges not wasn’t a big problem – such irony! – but the difference in soft, program languages and just creating a simple link between devices proven to be a gargantuan wall.

Only, Suzuka’s technological proves and flair allowed them to create a more or less steady link between her console and core of an Intelligent Device. Good thing that Scrya tribe due to its curious nature have a few contacts with Britannia merchants and thus they had access to a special programs that allow the computers of two nations to communicate or this entire ploy was doomed from the very beginning.

Now the screen of the computer was split in two windows, one half was filled with familiar symbols of Mid-Basic, while the other continued to work, using the Earth program language. The Raising Heart, still in her gem form, had two wires that was connected to computer, attached to it, and flared occasionally when Suzuka initiated another test.

Yuuno himself, projected a small emerald screen, hiding in the gap between the table and one of machines, and working on the adjustment for Raising Heart mana’s output, using the data he get from the Suzuka.

Suzuka arranges the working place in such way that any accidental visitor would see her performing a maintains of the mana-meter. Monitor was hid from the line of sight by Suzuka’s body (and she already prepared a record from a former test-run of gauges and could activate it with a single push on the keyboard if the visitor had to enter her niche. And Raising Heart was hidden in the same spot as Yuuno.

“How interesting.” Broke the comfortable silence Suzuka, gazing at the screen. “It’s just my imagination or Raising Heart tries to help us with the tests?”

“Well, of course.” Admit Yuuno with hint of pride for the work of his tribe’s Device Meisters. “It’s a true Intelligence Device after all. In fact, Artificial Intelligence is the sphere where we, mages, have a distinct advantage over the Earth Empire. Ugh, I mean no offence, I swear.”

Suzuka simply giggled at Yuuno’s panicked words, showing that she not angry at all. Encouraged, ferret-mage continued his tale. “The output, or course, vary from the Devices of various types but even the simple Storage Device and most cheap cortex have its own measure of intelligence.”

“Sorry for disturbing you, Yuuno-kun.” Purple haired maiden starts to speak immediately when he stop talking, without breaking her work. “But can I ask you a few questions about the technology of Mid-Childa, since you mentioned your prized Devices. Especially, I really want to know more about labourjacks and warjacks due to my field of work. You can refuse to answer, of course, if you think I touch some state secret.” Quickly added embarrassed girl, fearing that she could ask the wrong question.

“No, no problems at all, Suzuka.” Yuuno was as quick to calm his friend down, noticing her state. “Just say, where I can start my report.”

“Um… from the beginning if you can. Even the history of those machines intrigue me.”

Suzuka had no reason to worry, in fact, she made a scion of Scrya tribe ecstatic – what could a bookish mage wish more than an interested listener?

“Well, the very first jacks were created long-long time ago – in the ancient Empire of Al’Hazard. I think it a moot point to say that those reliable machines were used as cheap and trouble-free helpers in a manual labor and military affairs. For millennia the very core pattern of those vehicle’s creation suffer no changes, though, to be honest - all warjacks and laborjacks, currently used by various nations’ can’t reach the sophistication and power of the machines of Hazardi.”

“Hmmm…” Trailed Suzuka, inputting a new command on console. “Well, we, Earthlings, also heard about the mighty civilization of Al’hazard. But to think their creations would be useful even thousands years later… I, to be honest, both scared and impressed by the technology level of their nation. I really want to talk with you about them later, but now let’s go back to the topic. Can you give me please, the approximate description of the jack, Yuuno-kun?”

“Well, usually it’s a humanoid machine, whose height vary from the 3,5 to 4,2 meters. Power plants and chassis also vary not just from the series of jacks but also from various owners, though well-known and reliable plasma reactor is primary choice.”

Archeologist made a small pause to give his listener time to soak the information. On first glance, he didn’t tell too much, but he know that such skilled mechanic as Suzuka Tsukimura already started to create a schematic view of the described vehicle.

«The most important part of each jack it’s Cortex – the main processor and the simple Storage Device in one gadget. It’s a brain of each vehicle that guide each action and movement and if cortex either damage of sabotaged then jack is pretty much dead. Of course there is a back up computer for the occasion where cortex really gets destroyed so machine still can operate, but jack’s usefulness would be greatly reduced.”

Suzuka frowned, studying the reading on the monitor; her finger quickly tapped on the keyboard. Still, disappoint with result she leaned down, disappearing from Yuuno’s line of sight; then ferret heard high-pitched sound and with a joyful shriek blue eyed girl get back on her seat. Yuuno took it as a signal to continue.

“Cortex are so valuable because they have ability to study and improve their jack’s performance during the timeline of work. And because of that the old jacks are considered to be more expensive than newly created machines from the factories. Assuming, that they had a proper maintains of course.”

Yuuno twitched his whiskers cheerfully as he finally mad Raising Heart to perform an simulation of a Protector spell without triggering a response from the mana-meter.

“To be honest, it much more fair deal for warjacks, since while veteran woodman is always welcome I don’t think that new, fresh lumberjack would be that behind in the field of forestry; but the difference between veteran of thousands of battles and green novice always would be enormous. But the downside of the old cortex it’s his inability to adjust to the different body/chassis of a jack as he pretty much grew to accept only this core configuration. You can give him different weaponry or tools but no new propulsion or manipulation system.”

To his big surprise and, a moment later, huge joy, Yuuno accidentally found an archive about jacks In the RH’s memory. Quickly sending a message to an exited Suzuka he send her a copy of the files. He would need to translate them for the girls (he know that Arisa and Nanoha would like to see this information too)

“The similarity between Cortex and Device allow the controller of the jack – it’s a Observer caster if he control an laborjack or warcaster – if he use a warjacks – to control his minions via mental commands, compressed into the impulses of mana. It’s like a text being transformed into the code of Morse for example. If the cortex damaged and thus jack now put under the control of a standard computer, then mage would be forced to use either input from the console or verbal commands.”

His paws continued to dance on his own console – the tuning process was far from being over.

“jacks also have a Mana-Flow Circuit installed in their frame to give them boost by the charges of the raw mana - either to make them more agile or more powerful. Of course, if caster have entire group of jacks under his control, such method would be very draining, but there is tons of spells that work especially on jacks and group of jacks and Mana-Flow Circuits also made the vehicles even more responsible to the spell boost.”

“I heard that recently, your compatriots starts to use the pilot-controlled jacks...” Noted Suzuka, while checking the surroundings. To her relied the other members of engineering team were busy with their own tasks to interrupt her work.

“Well, to be specific, the Panzerritters were created by the Belkan Empire Autonomic Provinces… during the war with your compatriots, lady Suzuka.” They both cringed at this reminded and Yuunio quickly continued his story, hoping to pass dangerous topics ASAP. “They, of course, larger than warjacks, since the constructors need more space for the cockpit, life-support and Cast Support system.”

“Interesting.” Trailed daughter of the Tsukimura family, while checking her tools, searching for electric screwdriver as she intended to pick up another small task, while computer and her guest performed a test run. “Continue, please.”

“Until the war, most warjack utilize the bi-pedal chassis, since most inter-national disputes were settles in a properly conducted war-games (though, emphasis goes on “war”) and thus their drawback in speed could be nullified by a proper spells; though I can’t say that wheel-based or track-based chassis was rare occasion either. But during the war, when previous battle doctrines and even attack spells were rendered useless, the Belkan armies suffered heavy loses.”

Scion of Scrya tribe made a pause, now giving himself a tome to recall all images and video-reports he saw from the time of war. They were very chilling show to watch – scorched wreckages, burned remnants, horrifyingly mauled bodies.

“Thus Belkan command officers often find themselves in a situations where the available spell-list were very ill-suited for the upcoming battles. In the early war Belkans often saw a very humiliating and disheartened image, where their reliable steel giant sluggishly tried to chase the fast and agile Japanese Gekkas that pretty much danced around them, while raining fire on a warjacks. Currently, the track-base chassis are mainstream, since they give optimal combination of speed, maneuverability and passability even without spell-enhance.”

He also remembered the huge mock battle between IAB forces and Belkan contingent, where he was dragged by his uncle (uncle Kaien loved this stuff – if not for his loyalty to his deceased brother wishes, Kaien Scrya would definitely join the IAB’s army)

“Currently, warcasters control their battle groups either form the special chambers on a landships or from the cockpits of their panzerritters. Earth armies proves themselves to simply too good at sniping the mages who dared to enter the battlefield without the good layer of protection between them and enemy’s ordnance. Warcaster’s armor, which now quickly replacing the Barrier jackets are more emergency measure rather than first line of defense.”

“You seems to be well-educated in this stuff, Yuuno-kun.” Noted Purple haired engineer, repairing the broken gyroscope. “Though, I suppose, considering how often you work on excavation sites, you need to work with laborjacks pretty often, right?”

“Your guess is right, Suzuka.” Yuuno smiled foundly, remembering his first actual control over the laborjack. It was an easy task – just make the 3,7 meters tall machine to carry the cargo from the aircraft to the cite, rinse and repeat for 6 times. He was so proud when he completed the task, smiling uncle Kaien give him the “Memoirs of a Arbiter Douer Phaiz” – the book he longed for as a present. “As an archaeologist and mage of Scrya tribe I received the training to be able to control jacks too.”

“Only laborjacks?” Inquired Suzukam putting the gyroscope into the tester.

“The difference in control of the warjack and laborjack are minimal, Suzuka. If you can manipulate the Cortex and flow of mana you can either build a home with group of laborjacks or crush a mountain with the unit of warjacks.”

“Thank you for info, Yuuno-kun. I don’t want to stay in debt so I tell you about Knightmares.” Nodded Suzuka, checking the result of gyroscope’s test. “We, Earth Empire, use exosuits instead on the laborjack, since, just like you said, our artificial intelligence technology still far behind yours.”

There was hint of a professional jealousy mixed with awe in her voice with left green eyed teen smile with pride inwardly.

“Our Knightmare Frames are so agile and have such fluid human-like movements in battle due to neural-link system. It would be hard for deicer to perform such maneuvers with the joystick and pedals alone, so he/she got and special sensor-rings attached on their wrists and feet. Using the movements of entire body – the seat also have gauges installed in it - together with command from joystick and pushes on pedals, devicer can pretty much dance in his machine, as you mentioned, Yuuno-kun.”

Blue eyed nobility made a pause when one of her compatriots passed near of her cabin – the noise, created by all machines was loud enough to cover her voice, but it wasn’t wise to risk. Then an overhead crane, that loomed lifelessly near their “hideout” come to life and trundled toward the center of the hangar. Once the danger disappeared, daughter of Tsukimura family continued her lecture.

“There is a problem though – devicer have a huge problem from controlling non-knightmare frame, since their bodies are get used to a neural-link. The moving from one type of knightmares to another is not that hard, as vehicles neural-frame helps devicer to adjust, but even a veteran devicer would have a problems when he try to use a tank, for example. Though, after the course of rehabilitation and training he/she could do that.”

“Thank you for information, Suzuka.” Thanked her Yuuno, making another few taps on his glimmering keyboard. “I want to make another test and casts newly adjust Small-area Search Spell. Considering the data I have now this should went under the nose of the gauges.”

“Okay I’m ready.” Replied Suzuka, increasing the speed of her own inputs.

The small spark of a green light flashed to life on the tip of ferret’s outstretched right paw. Said spark quickly grew into the small sphere that explode into the nothingness a moment later, sending a wave of magical energy.

One second passed. Two second passed. And then the standard routine of the base was destroyed by loud howl of the alarm claxons.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#41
“Article 101: Set of a 6 mana-meters MM-10.” The loud voice of short but bulky man, whose resemblance to an mythical dwarfs was only strengthen by his rocky face and a massive square jaw (though he was cleanly shaven of course as Captain Alfred MacDanniels never failed to bring a punishment on any violator of the military regulations).

“Check!” Come a response from the tall dark skinned private who currently used his exoskeleton ability to extend his “legs” length to reach the highest shelf, where said mana-meters were left.

“Okay, Dave.” Responded his friend and superior officer, clicking on the small icon that immediately flashed a green tick, signalizing that base still have this equipment. “Whew! Okay, we beat this rack, so I think we have the luxury to make a small pause and rest.”

“Awww, man, finally!” With this joyful shout 28th years old Private David Poolswing deactivated his exoskeleton and jumped down, happily stretching his stiff muscles.

Lieutenant Shelby T. Pennygood, on his part, made a small pause in his work to have a quick bite on his sandwich. The lovely mix of tastes of the ham, cheese, tomatoes, cucumbers and bread swiftly raised his mood and, taking a sip from his flask, the 32 years old officer of the supply service come back to checking the equipment on the entrusted to him warehouse.

He didn’t really liked this boring job and wholeheartedly considered this every week check a hollow job – after all, there was no supply convoys in this month yet and he doubted that someone needed the old machinery they still couldn’t get rid of in this warehouse- but his sense of duty (and fear before the wrath of the Captain MacDanniels) keep him behind his console.

“Shelby, you dumb bastard!” Out of boredom, dark gray haired man started an inner monologue again. “Old or not – this building filled with fully operational equipment of His Majesty Armed Forces and if any type of hostile shitheads put their hands of it, can you even imagine the sheer scope of destruction they could unleash.”

Lieutenant Pennygood liked to berate himself, considering this as a self-criticism, which, as he heard, was an integral part of any mature and self-improving person. It also helped his to divert his attention from the boring routine task too.

Happy Poolswing still “danced” nearby of his steed – the old but reliable HMLF-24 Lumberjack. The user could work, using this machine (it wasn’t full blown exosuit after all), only in the areas of the optimal conditions for humans, due to open cabin and simple frame, but he was great for such rear echelon base like this one.

Painted in yellow humanoid vehicle was 3,2 meters tall with it simple fork-shaped hand manipulators, with inbuilt slots for torches and drill was a good working mare with a nicely balanced suspension and skilled devicers like Dave could move across the racks with a grace of living human, albeit, very bulky one. Lumberjack even had his own landspinners so, if the situation call for this, he could skate around with a speed of 50 kph, instead of his own leisurely gait.

“And once again we found our poor selves rotting in this gloo… okay! Well-lit… chamber, filled with relics of the old.” Shelby couldn’t help but laugh at the over dramatic statement of the David, who was busy wiping the sweat from his cleanly shaven head. “Once again, Captain MacDaniels murderous wrath sentences pair of unfortunate soul for the hours or torturous existence in that hellish prison.”

“You know, Dave, I can sue you for the attempt to force me into suicide by your horrendously bad play.” Cackled older man, smirking at the red eyed (damn, why his parents/ancestors pick this color for genetic make up?!) man’s pained expression.

Dave was a scion of the relatively new colony of Holy Britannia Empire, where the conscription was still under the ban – standard practice of the Earth Empire, to give newly colonized planets time to grow. But the Dave’s carrier as the clown in the interstellar circus came under the screeching halt when director was arrested for the illegal animal traffic. Poor guy’s reputation (just like his friends) were grossly marred by this incident and (unwilling to come back to home in shame) quickly enlisted into Britannian army.

Because of this he reacted sharply at any barbs on his acting talents. This feature were mercilessly exploited by his compatriots who never failed to laugh at poor guy's downright funny indignant expressions.

“Fik you, Shelby…” Grumbled red eyed man, puffing his cheeks, which made older man laugh even louder. “I try my best to light our mood and this how you repay me?!”

Since brown eyed lieutenant failed to show any shame, son of the distant colony only sighed, before stating. “Man, I’m bored.”

“Same here, Dave.” Retorted Pennygood, massaging his own stiff neck. “This work is as interesting as a herd of sleeping sheep’s, but we have our orders. And you know, I wish we’ll have no surprises until kiddos finish their trainings and go home. I have two little spitfires at home on my own and I can’t stand seeing baby being hurt.”

“Well, they not babies technically.” Said Private Poolswing in response, though his disposition became more serious. “And while their instructor is not part of army I know this Ohgi Kaname-guy – he is not bad.”

“Agree. And while I would prefer to see our own instructor taking the lead, since it’s our base who supervise them, we a bit short-handed in personnel now.” While he talks, lieutenant made a few inputs on his console – he open a new window, where he listed the content on the other racks, they still had their work as he said.

His younger subordinate also studied nearby rack, filled with various equipments, he would be forced to scout through soon – they still would need to spent few hours to finish their task despite their efforts. Usually, they would already inspect entire warehouse, but Dillan and Justin were assigned to a scouting party that was sent to a diametrically opposite side of Uminary to investigate the yesterday’s clash and thus he was forced to assist Shelby on his own instead of team of 3 exoskeletons.

“Well, back to work the, right?” Smiled Dave sadly, before turning back to his steed as stone-faced officer nodded at his inquire. “Man, I just really, really hope that there would be a show to kill our boredom. Like super-robot showing the trick or something!!”

“Yeah, that would be nice.” Snickered Shelby T. Pennygood pushing another buton on his console.

And then lights in the warehouse died out.

“What the…?!!” Exclaimed two man in shock, looking around frantically. They were lucky that their warehouse were big enough to deserve his own set of windows (now matter how narrow they were) otherwise they were granted with dubious honor to find a source of light in pitch black darkness. Though Dave quickly activated his exoskeleton and activated powerful searchlights, installed on his machine.

“What is going on?!” Gasped dark gray haired man, futilely trying to reactivate his console. “Even if there was a power outage base have a generator. Fick that!! Each building has its own emergency battery – we still should have an electric supply even we was the single building left!”

“I dunno, Shelby!” Cried even more scared Dave, now sending his machine into the trot, hastily shortening the distance between himself and his superior – they better to struck together now. And lieutenant’s consol was near the exit anyway. “Call someone through your PSU! Mine are still repairing!”

“And what did happen to a spare one?!” Snarled officer at his friend’s careless and very inappropriate for Britannia’s soldier behavior. Though his ire was mostly born out of fear since, for some reason, his PSU couldn’t establish a contact even with nearby security post. “I hope you didn’t sold or lost it!”

“Whoa, no!! I just left it in my room, I swear!” Protested David, moving his exoskeleton around the various obstacles in his path. Rock-faced man couldn’t help but admire the show of skills, displayed by his man – Dave managed to move bulky frame through the gap between the rack and the support beam, without touching another rack. Moreover, as he finished his maneuver, red eyed soldier noticed the box that was dangerously close to fall from her shelf if something rattle the rack just a bit – with careful motion of the fork-hand he put her into the proper position.

Once the humanoid vehicle reached the Shelby’s position dark haired man secretly sighed in relief – after all, who didn’t want to have a big strong wrecking machine nearby in the emergency situation like that on your side?

“Fic! The PSU are working, but I just can’t establish a link – line is dead for some reason!” Snarled Lieutenant Pennygood trying not to crash his own PSU by gripping it too hard, but his nerves already reached their limits. “Okay, Dave, aim you searchlight at the doors – I’ll try to do something. If it wouldn’t work – wreck it!”

Dave nodded in agreement as his instinct now screamed at him about upcoming danger but before he moved his machine the entire chamber suddenly was filled with light. Unfortunately, it was very ghastly light.

Ghostly aquamarine shining that came from the furthest corner of the warehouse. Pulsing like beating heart, it grew stronger and stronger, shining at the everything inside of the building, creating a horde of a dancing shadow.

Mesmerized men gazed in growing fear as the new and new furiously spinning rings, constructed from the glimmering mist and filled with unknown symbols, appears all around them. Shelby and Dave wake up from their paralyze quickly once they noticed the growing energy tendrils that starts to shoot out from the shinning, snaring everything in their way.

“Fic with that! Crush the doors, Dave!!” Bellowed Shelby T. Pennygoor, pulling his pistol out and aiming at the source of nightmarish light.

“Aye. Sir!” Snarled black skinned man sending his exoskeleton into charge. The metallic legs rumbled over the floor as the bulky machine dashed toward the doors. Dave released a lour war cry as the Lumerjack, with a loud screech tore through the reinforced steel, startling the group of soldiers that gathered nearby.

“Alarm! Alarm!” Cried David desperately, hearing the gunshots from the ducky maw of the warehouse. “Dangerous magical activity!! Sound the alarm, goddamit!!”

David couldn’t stop shouting even though that sensor operators already noticed the radical switch in the magical field of the base (if not noticed how one of the soldiers tore though the walls of one of the warehouses screaming his lung out) and, considering all shit that happen yesterday, promptly pushed the alarm button.

The previously drowsy peace of the base now crumbled under vicious howls of the alarm claxons, curses of the garrison and roar of the engines. Massive gates of the hangars were already open, letting the Vincent Wards – now prime workhouse of the Britannia army – lead by their advanced Vincent Commanders counterparts, to move out to engage the enemy. To assist them, the light tanks Terriers also left their hangar, moving in lines and reading their turret cannons to burry enemy under the storm of shells. Unfortunately, their base wasn’t large enough to support massive and powerful Armstrong-class battle tanks, who could shield their forces with their massive frames and crush the enemy with their enormous guns.

David, who calmed down at the scene of a gathering forces, was quickly encircled by armed and worried comrades.

“Whoa, Dave, what the fic is going on?!” Exclaimed Private William Ebone, pressing his AR-23 tightly to his own chest, almost trying to hide beside his own auto rifle, glancing nervously at the breach in the wall of a warehouse, from where ghostly light, which now reached such brightness that now illumination could have been seen even from a huge distances away.

“Like heck I know, Willy!” Retorted Dave, slowly giving in to anxiety and fear – his entire body itched from the desire to ran away without turning back. “I and Shel… I mean – Lieutenant Pennygood performed a check when this shit happened! All energy died away and we couldn’t contact anyone and then this fracking laser show started!”

“Hey, you said, you were with lieutenant?” Noticed Sergeant John Kim, narrowing his eyes as warehouse starts to visibly rattle. “But where is he now?”

“He…” The subject of their conversation barged from the breach, before dark skinned exoskeleton operator could finish, cursing and rubbing his eyes. Once he wiped the tears out of his eyes, Shelby noticed stunned cohort of soldiers; then he charged at them, wavering his hands in the air.

“Run, idiots! RUN!!!”

Britannia warriors were more than happy to oblige – leaving the role of a vanguard to a exoskeleton using Dave, shouting and cursing, group of men put all their efforts into creating as wide gap between them and rumbling building as they could.

When they were half-way between warehouse and line of knightmares, with a thunderous roar, powerful explosion tore building apart. The aquamarine line engulfed entire frame, thean a powerful disc large of energy lit the surrounding and the silhouette of the building blurred for a split-second’ and then powerful burst of the aquamarine colored energy ripped warehouse from the inside out.

People were sent flying, as deadly shrapnel fly everywhere, but Shelby was lucky enough to dive into the ditch, while fleeing soldiers was saved from severe injures by the steel frame of a Lumberjack, though some man still sustained a minor wounds. Dave was almost knocked down by a shockwave, but sheer terror before possible catastrophes that could happen to him under the weight of his vehicle, boosted his skills enough to stabilize exoskeleton.

Their trainings paid off as downed soldiers quickly get back to feet, taking a glance at what happen with warehouse; but once they saw the result they swiftly drew they weapon.

There was something amongst the ruins of the wrecked building. I someone asked, many people would say that unknown object held a resemblance to a mythical jinn – humanoid torso was attached to a floating tube-shaped base.

Devicers of a Knightmare Frames and sensor operators inside the base HQ and Terrier’s cabins magnified the image to see more details. It was obviously mechanical being – the “body” of the violator was an amalgamation of the numerous machinery that was stored in the warehouse that now was melted and pressed into the twisted parody of the Knightmare Frame. Even though that many wires and hoses that covered many parts of the frame looked like hideous blood vessels.

His hands had three joints and ended with a massive cylinders-shaped devices, belted by a tank tracks, though usually tank tracks didn’t have such razor-sharp edges. Each shoulder had Slash Harken attached to it, though their harpoons were equipped with some type of unrecognizable machinery.

His triangle head looked like weir cross blend between tortoise and boar, whose tusks were a former burners, placed under the pair of factspheres which took the role of eyes. The torso was an amalgamation of barely recognizable now exoskeleton and spare cockpit of a Knightmare Frame and the populous system that was attached to said torso, was built around the old jet engine.

On the hips of the “torto-boar” soldiers could see pair of crude sphere-shaped devices, with attached propellers. Said propellers soon come to life, spinning furiously, then both spheres detached themselves from the main body and starts to hover in circles around the machine in clockwise pattern.

The weir robot slowly hovered among the wreckage of a destroyed building, where could have been seen the various equipment that survived the explosion. “Jinn: continued to float aimlessly among the smoking ruins, doing nothing but emitting weird sounds and again and again turning his head toward the direction of the city as if searching for something, but then his gaze fell on the group of soldiers and second later at the military formation behind them. The air was pierced by a loud shriek as automatons factspheres flared with orange light, then he promptly raised his hands, pointing both hands at the line of defenders.

There was no need for a specified order for al knightmares to open fire at this obviously hostile gesture. The auto rifles of KMFs blazed, sending shell after the shell toward the grotesque figure, who now look as if he tries to protect himself by shielding his body with his own outstretched forward arms.

And somehow it’s worked – the tracers curved in the air, showing how shells change their trajectory nearby of the unknown machine, striking everything but intended target. Thunderous roar reverberate across the battlefield as rocket launchers released their deadly cargo – leaving a plume of smoke behind them, dozens rockets hungrily lunged toward the enemy, whose arms now was engulfed by a bright green light. Said light only intensified as rockets closed in and then a chains of explosions occurred.

Unfortunately, even without the mana-meter and radar readings it was obvious that rockets didn’t reach the target – they explode too early right in the air.

“His energy readings are rising! Everyone scatter!!” Bellowed Major Albert Dains – commander of base D-34 royal panzer infantry detachment, sending his own Vincent Commander into the series of frantic maneuvers. Other knightmares followed his example, together with light tanks that quickly drive backward.

For a moment entire area was filled with bright aquamarine light, and then come an ear-ripping boom, when magical construct launched his own counterattack. The enemy attack itself wasn’t visible for human’s eyes but the tidal wave of mud, rocks and grass, created by it, that rocketed toward the Britannia warriors, was a good indicator where danger is.

High speed of reaction saved the lives of soldiers and their machines – the massive hangar that could withstand even a direct hit from the landship’s cannon (though, the second hit would tear him apart) repeated the fate of the warehouse, disappearing in the storm of energy and sizzling lightings with a thunderous retort.

“Holy shi…” Started one of the devicers, gazing in shock at the ruins, before angry roar of his superior officer drag him back into reality to see that enemy are not finished. Wrapped in the same purple light, pair of Slash Harkens came flying, as jinn-like automaton pressed his attack.

Vincent Wards deftly moved to avoid the attack, raising their Blaze Luminous Shields for additional protection. But Slash Harkens, who were as twisted as their owner didn’t behave like they should usually do – they changed their trajectory just like shells, KMFs send at the ‘jinn’, but unlike them harpoons used this unknown effect to hit their targets.

Both machines still was swift enough to take the upcoming attack by their green glimmering shields but strange Slash Harkens again defiled the logic. The light around then intensify and instead of bouncing backward, both harpoons’ tips starts to spin. Shields try to withstand the attack, and for few seconds it was seen that they would do so, but then green light flickered and disappeared and both Vincent Wards were impaled. Their devicers perished together with their machines that were torn apart by another energy discharge.

Screams of rage and despair filled the comm. link as soldiers grieved about their fallen comrades and loathed the bastard who takes their lives. Filled with vengeful rage, kightmares charged forward, forming a new battle formations, intending to tore the enemy apart. Terriers also were enraged and their cannons, who had better range, already bellow propelling new and new shells toward the assailant.

Yet, those barrages still do nothing, as enemy pulled both of his Slash Harkens back and charged at the horde of upcoming knightmares, reading his unknown but deadly weapon as both oh his spheres continued to float defensively around him. But now it didn’t bother soldiers of Britannia at all, as their rage already pushed their fear back.

They already prepared the sakurahydrogen-filled warheads and the HQ apparently stats to realize how enemy manage to shied himself from their attacks. Their nations faced mages before and prevail. They were a halberd of Empire and they will grind this bastard into the ground.

The question was how many would pay with their lives for that.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#42
Entire frame of her KMF rumbled, when she fired from rocket launcher. Leaving a visible plume of smoke the rocket whizzed through the air, aiming to hit the center of the mass of another humanoid machine, but the enemy reacted quickly and skated back, avoiding the attack.

The opponent’s Sutherland also avoided the burst o fire from Arisa’s auto rifle, by shifting his stance and now moving so the chest of the machine almost touched the ground. Preventing blond girl from another attempt, enemy return fire from his own rifle, and then shoot another volley into the ground, momentary blinding Arisa and Nanoha’s line of sight by a wave of mud and grass, mixed with paint from the rounds blasted into the air.

“Kek him!” Snarled Arisa, as her face adopted the expression of irritation, frustration and involuntary respect, seeing how their elusive enemy’s blue machine disappears behind the threes. “This Westhill is one slippery bastard!!”

“Well, Arthur-san renowned for his ability to learn and adapt to his enemy’s battle style. And he had enough time to learn the techniques that would cause us massive problems.” Pointed Nanoha’s though the communication line, carefully studying both the image ion the main monitor and readings of her own Sutherland’s radar – their enemy was still here and he was prepared to show many of his deadly tricks to them, she was sure about that.

Despite the fact that most dangerous adversary, they could meet in this battle, still was near, Nanoha couldn’t help but enjoy this challenging situation. What was a point of a training if you wasn’t forced to go all out, using your entire array of skills. She wouldn’t be able to protect her world if she wouldn’t be strong and only such mock battles could sharpen her abilities and speed of reaction.

She knew that Arisa, inwardly, also enjoyed their bout with Arthur Westhill, who made them work really hard if they wanted to earn their victory. Even though it wasn’t this chilling fire that rampage through their nerves in the past when they dive into the whirlwind of battle, Nanoha Takamachi and Arisa Bannings still cheerfully enjoyed an awesome game with their friends and classmates.

Today’s training course was another mock battle between the teams, but now they had wider access to various pieces of equipments and thus Nanoha finally was able to get second rocket launcher to her machine and more rounds, by discarding auto-rifle and spare magazines to it. While it rob auburn haired maiden from the reliable all-rounder weapon (Knightmare Frames auto-rifles now always had an in-built grenade launcher), this customization let her use her skills with heavy weapon at their peak.

And, just to say, it was really big mistake to think that Nanoha Takamachi was defenseless in close-quarter combat. Though, it’s still was preferable to exchange the blows with youngest Takamachi at the close range, rather than try to avoid her sniper-like shots with heavy weapon, and everyone agree with that.

Once the battle commence Nanoha and Arisa, following the plan Nanoha suggested to commander Sawanaga, separated from the main forces and moved into the depth of forest, waiting for the enemy flanking forces that would try to move through the one of the detour passages and strike their “base” – after all holding a enemy base camp, even for a while, would earn a impressive chunk of victory point for your team.

As blonde and auburn haired girls expected, it didn’t take too long for enemy group of fours knightmares to enter their zone of responsibility. Without a hesitation, pair of friends move to intercept enemy group, even though it was two against four battle.

To enemy’s credit, no one of them was shoot down by Arisa’s or Nanoha’s surprise attack. And even though they admit, it was very possible, still both girls wasn’t happy to see that all of enemy KMF’s devicers were above average. Yet, it also mean that main rival group forces, that currently clashes with the bulk of their own group had lesser number of good devicers, which meant their side had an advantage in a massive clash that currently ravage a massive glad few kilometers to north-east.

Okay, this mean they need to use such opportunity and thin enemy’s ranks further.

The students’ performance onto the training ground and in mock battle earns them the special Capacity Points – the better you are in the training, then more CPs you have. Those points trainees could spent either to earn a discount in their school’s cafeterias and shops, or to customize their KMFs.

Of course it was easy to call people, who spend their points just to have more food or buy more goodness, fools. But when you in a constant need for various equipment and materials, either for you own studies, or for you own club betterment, you barely in a position to be picky.

Actually, Nanoha, Suzuka and Arisa feel bad that they had such good support from their families so they could spent their Capacity Points as they wish, while some people was forced to carefully check their “point-purse” every day.

But this leeway let Arisa to “buy” a Blaze Luminous defense project for her KMF. And even though this system greedily devour the power from her Energy Filer, this equipment was pivotal for her and Nanoha’s defense. Especially, considering that enemy’s group didn’t heavy heavy ordnance at their dispose.

Hiding her own machine and Nanoha’s Sutherland behind the glimmering yellow field, Arisa cover their retreat into the depth of forest. While their initial attack failed to inflict actual damage on the enemy group it still forced them to split and now two enemy KMFs struggled to reach their comrades who recklessly (yet without lowering their defense) chased their attackers. But gap between four machines grew more and littler with each second.

Thankfully, they reached the Nanoha’s trap faster.

In the middle of the patch they took lay a long pit filled with dry ground and dust. It wasn’t very reliable ground, but agile knightmares would still move through them with ease. Just like Nanoha and Arisa’s did, even though they move on the edges of the dried pound. But then, they suddenly stopped, still hiding beside Arisa’s shield and preparing to meet enemy head on.

Even if their opponents were shocked, they didn’t show that. Instead, both Sutherlands charged forward even faster – they didn’t attempt to move around the dust pound – it would leave them vulnerable for the flank attack from the Arisa and Nanoha who had the advantage of standing still, which mean they could take aim the better, since Arisa’ Blaze Luminous could with stand their fire and their comrades still wasn’t close enough for cover fire.

Instead they fire their round right into the mass of dried earth, creating a massive and this cloud of dirt. Now Nanoha couldn’t fire freely – as, she didn’t know where her enemy was now and thus it would be unwise to shoot blindly due to slower recharge speed of her rocket launchers. And NOW they had the opportunity to move as they wish- either move around the mud, or charge straight through the cloud and engage pair of girl in melee.

Nanoha, though foresaw this and fire her rockets at the both pathways that skirted around the former pound. She didn’t hit the enemy, but she forced them to move through the mass of dirt. On which she shot indiscriminately ten minutes ago – the massive amount of paint turn the center of the pit into the swamp, viscous enough to catch even a knightmare frame (that didn’t have a special platform for the dangerous terrain of course).

Still, cloud of dust was thick enough to hide the enemy form the girl’s eyes even if they struck. Yet the Slash Harkens that flew from the dust to grab on nearby threes was a good indicator that their plan worked – while their enemy acted swift and professionally, they involuntary revealed to their adversaries that they need a grab on something steady to get from the sticky mud.

Enemy devicers were really good and pair of Sutherlands darted from the vanishing cloud almost in sync, trying to force enemy to choose whom they should shoot first. But Arisa was prepared even for this and long burst of fire, covered both machines in a red paint. Arisa and Nanoha shouted in joy when the voice of the Instructor Ohgi declared that Echo-3 and Echo-4 considered to be destroyed and now must to move toward their camp ASAP.

Needless to say – comrades of “fallen” warriors were not really amused by this incident and their attack on a still cheering girl was filled with fiery anger. Enemy leader, seemingly the best pilot of their group, land a volley after volley on Arisa’s energy shield, landing his hits in a dangerous proximity to a center of a defensive barrier, where the projector was located. The direct hit would disable the shield and leave them open for enemy attack.

Nanoha tried to cover and fire two high-speed rockets at enemy machines, but both Sutherlands of their adversaries, deftly moved around the threes, who took the blows instead, harassing them with short bursts of fire. But this forces the two members of the opposite team to stop their attempts to break green eyed girl’s shield.

For a following ten minutes both parties were struck in a tangles dance of a series of attack, trying to get around enemy’s defense. Nanoha, using Arisa’s protection, tried to bombard enemy with long-range fire, while enemy KMF’s, using their more middle-range and lose-range oriented customization to perform a series of a hit and run attack - both of them had two auto rifles, instead of one; and while leading Sutherland boast a massive array of Chaos Bombs, his partner had a six-barreled machinegun “Greatbull” – monstrous weapon that would empty his magazine very fast, but such volley at point blank range would cause a crippling damage even for a super-heavy tank and would punch through Arisa’s shield with zero problems.

But for now, Nanoha and Arisa managed to held enemy in check and prevent them from using their weapon effectively. The problem was that constant usage of the Blaze Luminous would empty Banning’s family daughter’s Knightmare Frame’s Energy Filler pretty soon if they didn’t break the stalemate. The battle of attrition was not in both girls’ favor.

Thankfully, as Nanoha though, absence of a four good devicers couldn’t went without a impact on a flow a big battle between two fraction main forces. Soon, Sawanaga-senpai, using their advantage in skills of the devicers, managed to went into a massive offensive which enemies was currently struggle to meet head on. Two friend’s pursuers visibly lost their drive as their comm.line (as they both speculated) now was filled with cries for help.

Now they were forced to made a hard choice – either remain there and continue to press their advantage, until enemy crumble, which could take who know how long time and still didn’t guarantee them a certain victory, while their forces was obviously in a pinch; or try to get back to their comrades’ aid, but thus would open their own backs open to attack from their opponents.

In the end they took the second choice, but with variations – “Greatbull” armed Sutherland completely forget about his adversaries, turned around and darted toward the occurring battlefield at maximum speed, while his partner left to fight on his own.

Now the situation changed and Arisa and Nanoha went into the offense. Since now she was attacker, blonde girl’s machine spent energy at much slower pace, Arisa poured the content of her Energy Filler it into the swift and elegant maneuvers as she tried to goad enemy’s KMFs into the Nanoha’s line of fire, but their opponent quickly show that standard tactics wouldn’t work at him.

Arthur Westhill definitely didn’t show (but not blond, nor auburn haired girls dared to think their crafty opponent show majority of his cards) that he as agile and fast as Arisa’s, or apt in completely rain pummeling his adversaries like Nanoha, but he was astonishingly good with breaking his enemy’s carefully planned attacks or tricking said enemies into each other.

He used short burst of fire from both of his knghtmare’s rifles, to force Arisa into using her Blaze Luminous shield more than she wanted and thus empting her Energy Filler and then disappear into the forest, before Nanioha could retaliate with her heavy weapon. He used his Chaos bombs to separate two girls and then attack Nanoha, as she was more vulnerable in close combat (moreover he often jumped into the vicinity right between two girls’ machines, preventing them from firing immediately). And there was two times already when Nanoha almost hit Arisa with her barrages when tricky Arthur used duo’s attempt to use pincer attack against them.

In short – Arthur Westwood continued to be a very painful thorn in Nanoha Takamachi and Arisa Bannings’ side.

“Arrghh! I really want to punch him in face after this mock battle’s conclusion!” Snarled Asisa, using her factspehere to try and catch at least glimpses of the enemy.

“I don’t think it’s a proper behavior, Arisa-chan. After all, I think Akeno Mimori-san and Ludwig Bernstain-san, whom we lured into our trap felt that we behave very fairly.” Pointed out Nanoha in a strained voice as she also tried to predict the vector of the upcoming attack. She know, their enemy won’t left them alone and soon guns would blaze again. She loaded a “Trident” round in the launchers now – once shoot, the container would explode in the air after two seconds of a fly, releasing a three small rockets, flying in the triangle like pattern. While penetrating power of those missiles in real life wasn’t too great it was enough to punch through the armor of the knightmare frames – those shells were created to intercept fast, light-armored targets.

Nanoha slowly moved her Knightmare Frame backward, until it’s almost touched ejecting pod of Arisa’s machine with its own. Now the sounds of forests were punctuated by echoes of the battle that rages a few kilometers away from them. But calm panorama in the situations like that - when you know that enemy is still aiming for your neck, tormented them more with anxiety, rather than soothe them.

Seconds passed, then one minute of waiting was replaced with another, but enemy didn’t appear. The anxiety soon get the company of the confusion as Nanoha and Arisa, while didn’t putting their guard down, slowly trundled their machines away from each other.

“Uh, he got away?” Slowly asked Arisa, as her sensors continued to show her that only Nanoha kept her company in this area.

“Well…” Trailed Nanoha, as her Sutherland slowly circled around massive old oak, prepared to fire once she catch even a glimpse of hostile targets. “Arthur-san, after all, needed to prevent us from chasing him and his friend down. And, as we both can see – he succeeded.” The last words she uttered bitterly, starting to get that they were tricked.

“Kek him!” Snarled Arisa, slamming her fist into the display of her machine. “Slippery bastard made a good job, wearing our nerves thin, with his attacks, knowing that we would need to made a quick pause to catch our breath and create a plan of a counter-attack. And once he get we wait for him to make a move he moved his ass to join the main battle.”

“Seems like that, Arisa-chan.” Sighed Nanoha in resignation as the factsphere of her knightmare frame disappears in its slot on the forehead – the scanning reveal a total absence of the enemies in the direction she examined – there was possibility that enemy simply hid beside the terrain feature but her guts tell her that Sutherland’s sensors are right. “We got too full of ourselves because of our initial success and underestimated our adversary.”

‘Yeah, I think you’re right.” Agreed Arisa Bannings morosely, sending her KMF toward the space between threes – the shortest route toward the battle as the map told her. “Let’s go and help our comrades, Nanoha.”

“Y-yup, Arisa-chan!” Agreed Nanoha, gunning the throttle of her humanoid war engine and quickly dashing after her blond friend.

The threes around them greased into the multi-colored mass as a pair of a Sutherlands stormed through the forest. Remembering the fate of their opponents, Arisa and Nanoha performed a deep scan of their surrounding through factspheres each ten seconds – yes, it was straining for the machines, but they didn’t want to risk. They already talk about this with Suzuka and their purple haired mechanic agreed (reluctantly though).

The map shows them that there was a small rift (four meter deep) half-filled with water, hundred meters ahead of them. A very good place for ambush, as their sensors could see what could hide insie the wound of earth, which looked like a wiggling worm on the map, moreover, there was only one three steady enough to withstand the impact of their Slash Harkens, when their machines would jump across the rift. But Nanoha already prepared her own countermeasure for such course of actions.

She already changed the ammunition of her rocket launchers and now two massive shells were propelled in the air. Flying by parabolic trajectory those massive shells quickly disappears in the maw of the rift. But since Ohgi-sensei didn’t announce any “deaths” their paranoia proved to be wrong in this case.

Arisa and Nanoha slowed their steeds to perform a another deep scan, but as they could see there wasn’t any knightmare frame in vicinity, or at least no KMF with working Yggdrasil drive (with mean – it was a harmless knightmare, as the restart sequence wasn’t only drag enemy attention to it, but also would take at least 40 seconds and it was a plenty of time to shoot such enemy down). Seems, that this area was clear to move.

Green eyed devicer moved first, both Slash Harken flew through the air before slamming into the thick trunk, digging into the wood. Quickly gaining a velocity, Arisa’s machine charged forward and then jumped…

Just to have a cylindrical frame of a Chaos Bomb jump upward from the rift and explode in the air filling the space with the blue paint. Arisa’s Sutherland landed already “dead”.

“Ohra-2 is down. Proceed to move to your camp as fast as you can.” The calm voice of Ohgi-sensei almost was drown in angry roar and curses emitted by Arisa’s Banning’s mouth, who clearly described her desire to find a “slippery bastard” and shove the shovel into his ass.

Nanoha’s on her part, quickly moved her Knightmare Frame toward the bushes on the right side of road. They were mistaken about the nature of the ambush and trying to move further would be very bad ide…

Entire frame of her machine rumbled when something struck her Sutherland from the right. Purple eyed girls gaped in shock, hearing how Ohgi-sensei proclaimed her dead too. Nanoha could only gasp in shock as the tall boy with dark blue hairs and blue eyes walked from the bushes with bazooka on his shoulder. Arthur Westhill – their tenacious adversary – give Nanoha’s machine a small polite bow before turning around and running toward the furthest edge of the pit – where the rift made a curve.

Nanoha almost hit herself for such blindness – as she initially though, Arthur his KMF in pit, bit hie didn’t left his machine in the very center of the pool. But hid it behind the corner, when not her barrage, not the explosion of a mine (now she realized how blue eyed teen spent his time when she and Arisa wait for his attack) could harm his Sutherland.

She wanted to slam her face into console of her machine (while Arisa wanted to do the same but with Arthur Westhill’s head) out of frustration. But now it was too late to do anything – she and Arisa now considered to be dead and should have gone to a graveyard area – a large glade beside their camp, where all their “fallen comrades” gathered and waited for the conclusion of a mock battle.

“Heh, Arthur-san get us this time, isn’t he, Arisa-chan?” Smiled amethysts eyed girl at her friend, as she open a direct comm.line to her friend’s machine. Green eyes of Arisa Bannings gleamed with rage and humiliation as they both saw how the knightmare of a source of their topic climbed from the pit.

“Damm it!” Half- snarled half-moaned Arisa, as resignation slowly but steadily overpowers outrage on her face. “I screwed up today – I was obliged to check is there any foreign objects in that damned pit before jumping. Sorry Nanoha – it’s my fault you’re down.”

To emphasis those words, blond girl give her friend an apologetic bow, on which Nanoha answered almost in panic. “Stop-stop, this Arisa-chan. We’re team after all, and thus your mistake – my mistake and vice versa! We both underestimated Westhill-san: first time when we thought he would be a easy prey for two of us alone; and second – when we simply moved through closest patch to our comrades, without thinking that such master of traps couldn’t predict this.”

“Yeah, no matter how I can dislike this outcome – this guy beat us fair and square.” Arisa this time flashed a small bitter smile of respect, admitting her opponent’s skills and intelligence; Nanoha answered with the same bitter smile – inwardly she felt the same humiliation and pain of loss as Arisa. Without a word, both girls decided to train hard and get back at Arthur Westhill in the next mock battle.

This train of thoughts was interrupted when the voice of Instructor Ohgi, filled this time with anxiety and agitation, burst out of communication channel.

“Attention! Attention! To all trainees – the base are under attack! I repeat – the base are under attack! The training are canceled – all trainees should immediately proceed to move to point H6 and then follow me to the safe location!!”

Captain of the police forces continued his emergency broadcast, but Nanoha and Arisa didn’t hear him as they bodies was frozen with terror! The base currently was under enemy fire, the very same base where they left Suzuka and Yuuno!

“We must help Suzuka and Yuuno, Nanoha!” Cried terrified Arisa, whose pale face now almost shine in the confined space of KMF’s cockpit. Blond girl tried to send her machine into maddened dash, but equally pale Nanoha quickly move her Sutherland to block other knightmare’s patch.

“Arisa-chan, wait! I know how you feel, but what can we do with paint-filled rounds! The enemy obviously have the firepower to threaten entire military installation! What can we hop to achieve?!”

Arisa gritted her teethes, struggling to contain her rage, fear and panic inside. While she was a bit reckless, she was a smart girl and Nanoha saw how voice of reason managed to hold her in check – trying to attack well-armed enemy with plastic knife was very BAD idea. Without the real firepower Arisa Banning wouldn’t be a reinforce to base garrison, but rather a dead weight, a distraction.

“What are you waiting for?! Didn’t you hear Instructor Ohgi’s order?!” The Sutherland, piloted by their recent opponent, quickly darted into vicinity, stopping few meters apart from the machines of the agitated girls. Another comm.window appeared on the main monitor, revealing the pretty rattled face of the Arthur Westhill, who looked as scared as auburn-haired and golden-haired girls.

“We’ll already going, mr.Westhill.” Quickly answered Nanoha, manipulating her knightmare frame to move from Arisa’s patch and turning her machine toward the new point of destination. “I’m sorry for dealy – it’s just one of our friendwa left on the base…”

The blue eyes grew warmer and expression of sympathy and concern appeared at handsome face of the teenager. “Don’t be mrs.Takamachi – you have every right to worry about people that dear to you. But for now – let the professionals to take the care for this problem. Just believe in the warriors of Britannia and safety of your friend.”

Without saying anything more, dark blue haired boy disappeared from the channel and his machine charged. His KMF made a quick circle around the two of his compatriots and then moved into the depth of forest.

“Let’s go too, Arisa-chan. I know – Suzuka-cha would be okay. Yuuno-kun would make sure she wouldn’t be hurt - he strong and smart!”

Telling this again and again inside of her mind, purple eyed girl followed the machine that already almost disappeared among the threes. Arisa followed her after a small hesitation.

Now the usually lovely forest reminded them about the ghastly incident in the park yesterday. Incident that had a casualties.
 

Hoki

Well-Known Member
#43
Is there any reason why Sutherland is in bold? It would be fine to not have it in bold since it is the name of a common KMF model. Unless of course the name of that particular KMF is Sutherland, which, given how multiple characters seem to be using it, seems not to be the case.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#44
Well, I just thought it wouldn't be a bad idea to show the name of the various machines, used by the various nations. Like the names of the Japanese warships' classes.

Though, maybe, it's indeed would be easier to concentrate of the names of a specific models.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#45
The Terrier’s drivers reacted quickly, and immediately moved their machines from the line of enemy attack, once they gauges starts to shriek in warning. They base’s garrison already learnt in a hard way how bad it was to stay in one place, while the “Jinn” was in vicinity.

Swift six-wheel tanks were fast enough to move few meters in various direction from their previous location a seconds before wave of destruction hollered through the air, leaving a long furrow in the ground - a new scar on the face of the military camp.

Unfortunately, a moment later another shockwave smashed into one of the retreating tanks, ripping him apart, before devastating the rear of the another armored vehicle – the mechanical fiend learn his lessons as well.

Four knightmares and three tank (and its without counting the damaged vehicles) were a good testament how gradually more dangerous with each passed minutes this unnatural construct becomes. The problem was that beast could enjoy his time, toying with his pray and adjusting his tactic, as he continued to shield itself with the same weird phenomena then divert the trajectory of projectiles soldiers of Britannia shoot at him.

Even the concentrated bombardment couldn’t get through – not only the round couldn’t reach the target, but the enemy also used his defensive mechanism to slam the projectiles into each other, creating a massive chain of explosions that demolishes the upcoming shells.

And then Jinn retaliate with his own attack that ripped the ground apart. The destructive power of those shots proved to be more than enough to rip through the live of knightmares or armored vehicles with ease. Thanks God, for now, irreplaceable casualties were small. But it was only now and list of damaged machines grew larger and larger with alarming speed.

As unpleasant it was to admit, but as it was now – the exchange of blows on distance was in the invader’s favor.

Aldbert Dains hissed in frustration and rage – he already lost two devicers (thanks Lord the Willy was fast enough to eject his cabin a moment before his knightmare was blasted apart) and he feared that at least four crewmembers from the destroyed tanks wasn’t lucky enough to survive. Just from where this weird fucker came?!

Apart from this, his main question was: how can we wreck this bastard ASAP?! And frankly, he didn’t care what enemy’s machine want or why did he do all of this?

“Okay, guys! Since our shots doesn’t fare too well, let’s see how this shit fare in close combat! Squad 1 and 6 follow me! Squad 2 to 5, provide covering fire! Let’s move!!”

The echoing chorus of “sir, yes sir!” and six Vincents Ward leading by pair of Vincent Commanders, moving in arching pattern, to threw enemy aim, charged toward their prey. Other knightmares and tanks redoubled their efforts to drown enemy under barrages of fire, making sure, unknown vehicle would be too busy with them to concentrate on the upcoming threat.

To an extent, this plan worked, under the heavy fire, Jinn was forced to completely abandon the attack and concentrate on defense – the two floating spheres increased their speed exponentially, almost blending into one line above the robot, as the aura of light around them increase its radiance. A massive cloud of dust rose as the storm of wind come to life under the enemy’s influence.

And few moments later, warriors of Earth understood that visible show was only the tip of iceberg. The loud screeching song filled the cabins of the KMFs together with uncontrollable, while unstoppable quivering started to torment entire machine. But the worst part was that knightmares, with each passed moment, responded to control with increased difficulty.

Like a moody mount, once reliable machines, now forced their devicers to put all their strength just to change the direction of movement and there, as if the humanoid machines tried to break through infernal blizzard. To make situation more dire, the speed of Vincents starts to decrease too.

The power of knightmare frames lied in their speed and mobility, as their armor was less thicker than frame of the APC, and thus slow and barely controllable KMF was a pretty much either a not-to-hard target or unique coffin.

Jinn get this idea too and, using the proximity to Britannia’s machine, which make sure other vehicles couldn’t fire freely, fearing the friendly fire incidents, charged forward, aiming to engage his adversaries in a close combat. The spike-filled threads on his “arms” started to move with a loud screeching sound as the construct slide toward upcoming Britannia’s vehicles, whose devicers now could barely control them.

The slow powerful strike come in a form of a wide arch, aiming to hit and then shred torso of a Vincent. But the devicer, despite the furious resistance o the joysticks managed to rise his right hand and activate Blaze Luminous defensive system. The pale yellow energy field managed to withstand the powerful blow, even though entire frame of the machine rattled violently.

Still the KMF fall on its knees and the jinn raised his other arm, intent to deliver a finishing blow. Thankfully, those few seconds were enough for Britannia’s soldier to activate the ejection catapult. The pieces of a destroyed machine fly in every direction but the cabin, successfully leaved the danger zone.

The attempts of the other members of two squads to punish the enemy didn’t have any success either. Enemy was pretty quick and agile, despite his blocky and scruffy look and the ability to hover allow him not to worry about the surface roughness. But this wasn’t the trouble, the fired Slash Harkens didn’t move too far from the knightmares before falling on the ground and the rifle’s rounds or launched grenades didn’t fare better.

But at least, such behavior of their machines and weaponry and the reading of the gauges, confirmed the suspicions of the HQ about the nature of the enemy defense.

“The fucker manipulates the gravity!” Snarled Albert, rolling backward in his Vincent Commander, observing his enemy’s erratic movements with his narrowed azure eyes. “Everyone, pull back! Trying to corner him without heavy armor would cost us in too many lives!!”

The other devicers obeyed immediately and Albert didn’t blame them for such, almost panicking, haste – in a situation when enemy can negate you advantages with such ease and you barely know anything about him, to pull back and regroup was a single choice of action.

Seeing their trouble, the second line immediately resumed the bombardment, keeping enemy too busy with his own protection, to chase their comrades. But the construct suddenly darted sideward, moving in a counterclockwise pattern, putting the retreating knightmares between himself and the main forces.

His arm-cannon shot upward, aiming at the nearest Vincent, who broke into the series of desperate maneuvers, trying to distract his opponent. It didn’t worked, while the knightmare managed to avoid the attack of enemy’s weapon, the shrapnel, created by the attack, severely damaged humanoid machine’s legs, forcing devicer to activate the catapult before next attack ripped his crippled machine.

The series of curses and enraged shouts filled the comm.line as the knightmares scattered further, trying to create the open line of fire toward their elusive and tricky opponent. Jinn followed them with vigor, obviously having no desire to make things easier for his adversaries.

Albert, seeing how blocky bastard intend to hit Oswald Buttercup’s machine from the behind, send his machine on interception course, quickly creating a small plan in his mind.

He fired from a grenade launcher, aiming at the floating orbs above enemy’s head, which were a source of his gravity shield. As he expected it didn’t work, but his stunt drag enemy’s attention to his Vincent Commander. He didn’t know how enemy would react, but, trusting his guts, blond major send his knightmare at the enemy, while drawing his KMF’s Maser Vibration Sword from the scabbard.

His instincts were right, thanks God, and instead of firing, jinn-shaped machine darted forward, raising both of his hands over his head, intending to crush red and white Vincent Commander with a powerful overhead strike.

The gravity mercilessly attacked his machine, while the screech of the tormented frame assaulted the blocky-faced major’s ears, while he struggled to maintain the control. The joysticks jerked like a reins of the mad horse, the pedal of the accelerator now groaned our of the sheer pressure under the foot of the agitated devicer, whose life now completely depended on the results of his gamble.

The distance between to machines narrowed with incredible speed as both opponents now used their propulsion systems at their maximum capacity, though their desires was vastly different. Jinn obviously opted to get rid of the upcoming adversary in close combat, while Albert hoped that once he cross the “border” his situation would take a drastic change.

The field around the invader looked like a tornado from the outside – unknown construct protected itself through the manipulation of the gravity, they already figured this out. But Albert was sure that area of the gravity distortion effect not a circle with the magic-using machine as the center, but rather a ring. Such swift and agile maneuver he displayed would be impossible for the invader if his own frame was under the effect of the increased gravity.

Which mean he needs to get close enough to get away from under the effect of enemy defense system. The trick was to do it fast enough until his machine’s internal mechanism didn’t start to fall apart. The demolished Vincent Ward obviously sustained too much damage to do it, but his Vincent Commander had more sturdy and robust frame. So he had the chance to pull it.

The image of the mechanical demonic spawn almost filled the entire central screen of his Vincent and Albert, with rising sense of dread start to thought that his gamble failed. But then he felt it – the mad resistance of his joysticks disappears as unseen hand that grinded his machine suddenly lost its power. Albert, moving purely on the instincts, changing the pose of his machine, by tilting entire body to the left and sliding under the powerful two-hand strike.

The fountain of dust and grass soared into the sky as jinn’s attacks leaved a spectacular in the ground. The gravity way come back with vengeance, gnashing it’s fangs into the already weakened frame, but the children of the Britannia’s military industry still held.

Major Dains couldn’t help but smirk triumphantly, knowing that he achieved two of his objectives. First – since enemy’s machine was too concentrated on him, he let the other knightmares from this unsuccessful assault to get away from him. And now, since Major Dains also flee, the jinn were exposed to Britannia’s cannons, that immediately roared to life, intending to rain-pummel the invader into oblivion.

And second, his daring venture gave him very important information – the reading from gauges, processed by the computer give him the full size of the enemy’s defensive system’s area of influence. Albert promptly send the info to HQ, before inspecting the report, using a small breather time, as the damned misshaped construct now was forced to concentrate on the defense.

The gravity distortion starts from thirty meters from the machine and rise from the border of the circular are to its center, until abruptly ends three meters away from the jinn. Which means that “eye of the storm” was 6 meters in diameter – which mean, since the attack from the same level wasn’t too effective, they need to attack this weak spot from the sky. Either with help of the aviation or with artillery’s lobs shots.

His thought were interrupted when the enemy unit starts to glow bright aquamarine color and the spheres that float above him, starts to spin with a fan-like speed. For a moment, the storm, which protect enemy’s robot disappears, but before Britannian tanks and knightmares could use such opportunity, jinn slam both of his hand into the ground, creating a utterly monstrous mud-wave that rocketed toward defensive formations of the base garrison.

Blue eyed major gasped in terror, looking how wave of destruction come at his compatriots with great speed. Roaring in the mix of fear, rage and despair he turn around and tries to fire at the damned bastard, but jinn managed to avoid his attack by quickly charging on the left.

Albert pursued mysterious construct with vengeance, wishing to at least avenge his comrades’ death as they had no chances to avoid or defend themselves from the attack. But then massive flash of the green light dragged his attention. And stone-faced major couldn’t suppress scream of joy when he saw how attack smashed itself against powerful Blaze Luminous barrier.

The source of barrier was a truly massive sixteen wheeled truck – an emergency support and recovery vehicle Halifax. Those machines support armies of Britannia of the front lines, either by supporting knightmare and light tank formations with their powerful shields or by pulling the damaging vehicles from the battlefield and later repair them, as Halifax was equipped with a mechanism that made him into a pretty much moving repair facility.

Seem that Captain Elisabeth Ching – base chief mechanic managed to warm this big boy up in time. Heck, they all should be thankful that their commander was influential enough to get such machine for them in first place. Bu the way, where is commander when they face such trouble…

“Great job, Al, you found the breach in fucker’s defense!” The comm.line was suddenly punctured by a gruff voice Albert, and all other soldiers knew too well and about whom he thought a moment ago. “Now let me finally pat this shit for all he did to my men!”

With this a new visitor appears on the already chaotic battlefield. Dark blue and gray Vincent Commander, equipped with Floating System burst into vicinity, aiming his large Hadron Cannon at the perpetrator of the commotion. Considering that there was only 3 Vincent Commanders on the base and even is someone achieved such feat to recognize devicer by color scheme (though such guys should have been locked in mental asylum long ago) there was only one Floating Unit on the entire base (small base like their usually had zero Floating Units, but supply department made a exception in respect to their commander) and it belonged to a machine piloted by no one but the Lieutenant-General Paul Westhill.

The appearance of their commander visibly raised the spirit of the battling garrison. The tanks and knightmares redoubled their efforts to bring enemy down. The fire grew more intensive, the maneuvers of the vessels became more daring and bold as now devicers and drivers feel more confidence in engaging their foe.

After all, their commander was a not some useless REMF but battle-hardened veteran with well-earned reputation. And the base garrison was prepared to put their lives in his arms.

Paul Westhill’s career was a truly fascinating story about the raises and falls of the talented but hot-headed man. Paul was an honor student in his class in the New Orleans’s Military Academy and already was married to a Samantha Kleinen. Young promising officer (20 years old), with the patronage of his father – war hero Phillip Westhill – after the graduation with rank of the lieutenant, he got an assignment in the 54th Independent regiment “Blazing Rifles” that guarded the borders of the mainland itself.

Needless to say, it was a very boring and routine work – no one was brave (or suicidal stupid) to attack the mainland of the moist powerful nation in the Earth Empire and so, it was a living hell for an ambitious and exploit-hungry Paul, whose sole piece of happiness was a regular Trials of Iron, since he come to service two years after the conclusion of the Twilight War.

Unfortunately, the combination of his long-pent up frustration with his assignment, hunger for glory and small portion of the naivety led Paul to jump on the chance to investigate the undercover illegal equipment smuggling operations together with few close friends.

Their main suspect was Colonel Oliver Starshine – the commander of the Alcatraz base, since the San-Francisco was a believed to be the biggest center of smuggling operations on the West Coast. Carefully pulling the threads, investigation base’s activities and extracting the information, Paul and his comrades slowly move closer and closer to bringing the truth out…

But this all end up in a catastrophe. The smugglers, actually, discovered that they were watched long time ago and not only fed to brave but young soldiers completely false information, they also prepared a deadly trap. The short but fierce gunfight in the building complex, where Paul and his friend come to meet their informatory, result in the deaths of all Paul’s friends and heavy wound of the Westhill’ scion, there was a impressive amount of collateral damage and civilian casualties.

Grief-striking, ashamed and humiliated Paul’ s misfortunes didn’t end there - once he get out from the hospital was sent to a military court, for his actions caused the death of Britannia’s citizens and damage of property. To add insult into injury, he was cursed with a knowledge that Colonel Starshine, whom he always suspected, not only revealed to be innocent but nit just managed to decimate smuggler ring on his own, while Paul was rehabilitating, but also was Paul’s savior as it was his personal unit that saved unconscious Paul.

Wounded in body and soul, humiliated young soldier was sent, together with his wife to a recently subjugated former mainland of Japan Empire. To make it worse he end up not on one of the main garrison base, but backwater garrison near the constructions sites of the rebuilding Uminari city.

Usually, it would be a dead end for him – sine there is now way for soldier to prove himself and thus gain the promotion… but fate had other plans.

The soldiers of the Japanese army that managed to escape the hands of the Britannia hide in the numerous hidden installations across the territory of the Japan former dominion and even now their pirate raids continue to be constant (albeit, minor) thorn not only in Earth Empire’s side but even Belka and IAB suffered from their activities from time to time.

Japan’s former mainland, to everyone’s surprise, continue to host one of the most powerful and defiant terrorist cells (Japan Liberation Front, as those infidels liked to call themselves) and their attack in early years after the end of Twilight War could make you think that announcement about the conclusion of a conflict was a joke.

Britannia’ who also receive her share of a devastating blows during the war and still struggled with eradication of remaining forces of mages had a troubles to deal with this additional problem.

But those terrorist gave Paul Westhill opportunity to regain his honor.

He gain a fame in his very first deploy against JLF’s raiding party near Uminmari, when he and his forces performed a daring maneuver – knowing that Japanese use a better knowledge about the landscape and the map of the railroad tunnels which they used to initiate their surprise attacks on Britannia forces and settlements, he used this fact to his advantage.

One he and his men were sent to deal with JLF tanks and knightmares that suddenly rolled from the forest near the mountains twenty kilometers away from Uminatri, Paul Westhill initiated his own plan.

Using hit and run tactic he harassed their column until Japanese commander decided that he really wouldn’t tolerate Britannia’s presence even more. Knowing that Britannian regiment that was sent from the Uminary doesn’t have enough strength to take them head on, he carefully repelled Paul’s attack, while heralding him into a small valley near the mountain range.

Japanese commander knew very well, that Britannian army could put a fierce resistance in this valley, since the entrance was relatively narrow and pair of a well-places heavy weapon knightmare squads would force him to pay a price too high for a victory over such forces. Not to say, they could win enough time for reinforcement to come and turn the situation around.

And thus he sent majority of his knightmares through railway tunnels to sneak behind enemy’s back and caught Britannians in a pincer attack. It was made easier that Japanese know all about the access points into the tunnels, which made it even easier for the green knightmares to reach target. What they didn’t know that Paul, convincing his superior officer (not without a help of his father’s connections though) to hide an armored train into the tunnel.

When you rob knightmare of its mobility it’s even less survivable than APC; and massive train, moving at speed of 80 KPH crushed Gekkas like a bugs under his monstrous plow, whose rifles couldn’t penetrate locomotive’s frontal armor, while Japanese couldn’t use their rocket launchers in fear to accidentally collapse the tunnel.

And once train moved from the tunnel into the open ground above the valley (Britannian analytics suspected that it wasn’t a coincidence that railroad tunnels had the gaps in a places that was an ideal for a position of the artillery) and add his cannons into the firefight, the situation became very bleak for the terrorist.

They know, that any attempt to force their way into the valley would demand a huge payment in bodies and destroyed vehicles and they couldn’t expect to outshoot Britannian military detachment when they had an entire armored train at their dispose. And they not only didn’t have enough ammunition now, they didn’t have a time – soon Uminari garrison send their own armored column to join the fray and there was no way for them to survive this.

And with this information in the mind, Japan Liberation Front was forced to pull back.

Paul Westhill comes back to base as a hero. While he couldn’t say that he had zero casualties he still make sure that enemy loses was much larger than his own, but what truly made him famous, it was the fact that renowned Japanese knightmare frame ace – Kazuhiko Shigemitsu – was in one of the unfortunate machines that meet Britannian armored train and got flattened.

The fact that mere Lieutenant managed not only to win with such few losses, compare to his enemy, but also to bring demise on one of the enemy’s hard-hitters bring Paul an enormous fame. For his feat he was promoted to a captain and earned a respect of his peers together with animosity of the JLF.

This incident became a turning point in Paul’s carrier and was first stepping stone to his raise in Britannia military’s hierarchy.

Paul Westhill and his forces in operations against Japanese play a role of the “Hound”. Which mean they were tasked to intercept and destroy the groups of the Japan Liberation Front before they could either attack Britannia settlements, or damage infrastructure or, during the siege of the Japanese fortresses he and his men was ordered to protect flanks or rear echelon from the surprise attack.

Scion of house Westhill too his duties to a heart, as he was dead set to not fail like he did in his first assignment, and soon became a true bane of the JLF. Since his forces mostly consisted of a fast and mobile vehicles, that were great for a recon, flank attack or quick engagement but definitely not for a battle for attrition Paul wholeheartedly embrace the tactic of a bushwhackers.

In a midst of a fierce close quarter combat, groups of Japanese knightmares often find themselves moving into spider-mines fields; massive Chi-Ri tanks sank into the ground, previously softened by oscialltion-warherds (special type of self-propelled rounds, created on the base of the tools used in mining) and entire platoons was wiped out by the deadly gas.

While Paul’s tactic was far from chivalrous it was very effective against Japanese who couldn’t believe that someone would use guerrilla tactic against underground army like JLF. But considering that JLF was more than happy to target innocent bystanders, officers of Britannia army not only avoid any disgraceful comments, but actually encourage Paul Westhill to adapt even more brutal tactic against damned terrorist, and he was more than eager to comply, especially after seeing the result of the bombing of the rail station in Uminari.

Eventually, Paul reached his current rank of a lieutenant-general and earned the nickname “Grey Centipede”. Some could ask – why such famous man was a commander of a small garrison base even now. D-34’s garrison also though why their base, that dend’t even had a proper name was put under control of the man, who had access to the District’s HQ… Heck, they wondered why he eventually was forced to serve here, not, for example, on the post of Torrinson base.

There were rumors that there was a huge scandal, that involved general’s eldest son and heir – Arthur. But Arthur was good heir, son and excellent soldier, who show the very same cunningness and adaption skills of his father. Just what could happen there?

Albert ask this question inwardly numerous time and, seeing how his commanding officer performs a daring aerial maneuvers, avoiding the waves of rocks and metal pieces, sent at him by the persistent jinn, who continued to dash around with impressive swiftness, avoiding the attacks from the above, and bombarded him with streams of the hadron-particles, distracting enemy form the Britannian forces, major again cursed the stick up higher ups that dared to shun such talented man.

He almost lost it when he saw how enemy shot grazed Floating Unit of the General Westhill’s machine, but his commander managed to stabilize his machine in the air. Jinn, after his big attack, looked less energetic than he was in very beginning of his rampage, but still remained dangerous and they still didn’t know how many deadly tricks he have in his sleeve.

But they also couldn’t leave their commander to face the bastard alone – they can’t simply sit behind Halifax’ shield and hope for the better. Ironically, the place where they pushed was near the ruins of the facility, where all this trouble started.

Swallowing a mass of liquid in his mouth, Albert prepared himself to give order to restart the attack, when suddenly he was hailed. The computer told him that he was called by Captain Elisabeth Ching

“Can it wait, Ellie?” Hissed Albert seeing how blue and gray Vincent Commander just barely avoid another deadly blow. “I need to help General Westhill.”

“I want to do the same Al. And I have a interesting idea. One of our promising trines – namely Suzuka Tsukimura – give us the good idea how we can rob this slippery bastard of his mobility.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#46
The alarm almost made Suzuka and Yuuno to jump out of their skin in panic and terror, as they though they were too careless, and now were just a few minutes from being caught! Lavender haired girl quickly stands up and start to quickly removing evidences of their law-breaching activities – close the programs, delete the log (the data already was copied to her PSU anyway) and replacing it with a fabricated one, then quickly hiding Yuuno, who already put Raising heart on himself, in her bag.

But once she managed to calm down and listen carefully, daughter of a Tsukimura household finally noticed that people in and out of their hangar screams “attack!” and ”weird machine!”.

So, when her fellow cadets barge into her “chamber” they find mostly confused (rather than terrified), though with obvious traces of fear on the face, Suzuka, who glanced around frantically.

“Suzuka, don’t stand here and go with us, quickly!” Shouted Kathy O`Nouel – a raven haired, yellow, eyed girl from the Alaska, whose big nose resembled a potato. “We’re under attack!!”

Suzuka nodded automatically, still trying to warp her mind around the situation and figure out what she needs to do. Still, state of alarm was issued and this meant now she and her fellow classmates became the privates of a Britannia army and now should follow the orders from the military officers.

Quickly putting her bag one, blue haired girl swiftly followed her compatriots that hastily moved toward the gates, when a soldiers and full gear and even people in the blue uniforms of the officers could have been seen.

Suzuka and her fellow cadets, moved to form a row, just like they do in the beginning of their training curriculum, but now the atmosphere was radically different – oppressive, fearful, agitated. Taking her place in the line and, following the instruction, placing the bag in front of herself on the floor, Suzuka Tsukimura, with a mild surprise, found herself facing Captain Elisabeth Ching – a 37-th years old woman of Britannia-Asian mixed heritage.

If you wanted to describe her, Suzuka would call her “balanced”. She had pretty developed muscles, that could have been noticed through her uniform, yet remained pretty slender and had her own measure of the feminine charm. Her height and weight were nothing but standard for a woman of her age and work. The beauty of her long dark blue hairs and piercing jade-colored eyed were offset by her cleft lip and her big ears, though the latter were carefully hidden in the said hairs. But her skills as a mechanic and the leader were far above mediocre.

“Let’s get down to business, cadets…” The powerful voice of a blue haired captain boomed through air, firmly gluing the attention of the young engineers. “Our base is currently under the attack of the sole enemy’s war automaton! Yes, I know that this is sounds pretty silly in normal circumstances… Bu-u-u-t, since this incident simply reeks of magic, I think we all agree that such situation can be called anything but normal.”

She narrowed her gaze even further, making all young Britannian flinch under the pressure.

“I don’t know, what this bastard can do and, honestly, I hope he would be blasted apart ASAP, before he can pull any surprise our out his… behind. But I have no intention to rely o lady luck and first and foremost I need to ensure your safety, cadets. So, this is your orders - all of you, cadets are need to move into the 4th hangar, and hid there. It’s the order of the base commander, Lieutenant-General Westhill.”

The synchronized chorus of acknowledgments rumbled through the air, but before the young soldiers could move, jade-eyed captain raised her hand, demanding attention again.

“As I said – it was the orders from the base commander, but I have my own instructions and I expect you all to follow them.”

The last words were said simply to enchant her notion – every present person know too well the grave conscience of disobedience in the actual battle situation. Sensing that she sound more harsh than needed she flashed a small calm smile and continued.

“I think we all agree, that in collision with such dangerous and unpredictable mater as magic we and all comrades in arms need as much protection as we can muster. After all, you need to be alive, if you want to fight and this is why I need your cooperation, so you would fought together with us as our comrades, my young warriors of Britannia!”

Elisabeth’s choice of words proven to be correct when she, and other present members of the garrison, saw how nervousness in the teenagers’ eyes quickly was replaced by the small flames of the pride. After all, the true member of military –and officer – called THEM a warriors… they were recognized as a hunters, not as a kettle.

Yuuno couldn’t help but sense how even Suzuka’s sense of pride rise after those words; how the exchange of a pride-filled glances established a much firmer connection between all present student of a Seishou High School – as they relished in their newfound bonds as the soldiers of the Empire. They were taught that from the very childhood after all.

“After you all would be escorted into the hangar I would need your help to activate and control our Rumbling Todd – our Halifax. Usually, I would avoid putting the inexperienced ones in the battle, even if they not at the front-line, but, unfortunately, majority of our base engineering corps were sent to build fortifications at the north-east edge of the city and thus I need your assistance today.”

Older woman’s eyes flared with annoyance at those words – she understood that their commander and regional HQ didn’t have a choice, the reinforcement still didn’t come and city’s defense needed to be bolstered, she was angry that their base was caught with its, figurative, pants down.

“Separate into seven groups – 8 people in each – and leave this hangar only when the soldiers, who would be attached to your group, say so. I’ll go with first group, and begin the preparations. Now, let’s move!”

“Ma`am, yes ma`am!” Roared 56 throats and the younger Britannians quickly split their linear formation to quickly move and gather into a several groups. Soon the first group, lead by Captain Ching darted from the gates, dashing toward the larger hangar, colored in the dark gray color. Thirty seconds later, the second group moved, and another half minute later, the third group that included Suzuka leaved the relative safety of the hangar 27.

At first glance Suzuka didn’t looked like a sport-loving person, but Yuuno knew that Suzuka had trained muscles that didn’t look as inferiors to those on the Arisa or Nanoha’s strong (yet slender) and trained bodies. Though he blushed again, remembering WHEN and WHERE he saw them.

The sound of explosions in the background was the good enough doping for young engineers to quickly pass through the distance that separated two buildings. The culture of the Britannia demanded to took a military training VERY seriously and when teenagers entered the hangar they immediately proceed to move to the posts they were ordered to, without asking a question or gasping for breath – Yuuno could feel their determination even through all fear and anxiety they felt.

Massive sixteen wheeled monstrosity of a vehicle towered among other machines in the hangar like a mountain among the hills. The distance from the front bumper to rear bumper was almost 45 meters, while the edges of left wheels to edges of right wheels were 11 meters apart from each other. Halifax was a 10 meters in height and cabin were equipped with the ejection mechanism akin to a knightmare frames’ cockpit, as the jumping from the damaged vessel in the middle of the battle was really dangerous for crew’s health.

Halifax, since his place was in advancing forces of the vanguard of the Britannian Army, was equipped with one of the most powerful Blaze Luminous Defensive Systems available for a land vehicle – the hulking, pyramid-shaped emitter, right behind the cabin was directly connected to the nuclear power plant of the automobile and could not only protect Halifax itself, but create the dome of green light 60 meters in radius that could protect entire formation from enemy’s fire.

Maybe not for too long, but long enough for the mighty knight orders to barrel into enemy’s ranks and then any opponent had much more problems to worry about to concentrate on the re-charging machine that could now concentrate on his other tasks.

The four powerful cranes could easily lift entire knightmare frames to put them in a massive cargo bay that occupied all left space of the upper frame of the machine. Right beneath the cargo bay was a spacious medical bay, where wounded soldiers could receive a first aid right in the middle of the combat, for the ones, whose condition were critical Halifax had a numbers of the cryo-capsules to give them chance to receive a proper treatment.

When Suzuka and her team burst in the building massive vehicle’s engine already shook the air with low powerful growl. The headlight shone through the open armored shutters and cranes starts to move with quiet screeches – the operators tested their equipment. Massive dozer blade’s edges glimmered ominously, threatening to crush even a light tank if it wouldn’t be swift enough to get out of the way.

“You all, get into the infantry bay – we would have need to extracts our comrades from the wreckage of their machines.” Ordered the soldier, who escorted Suzuka’s group and, once he confirmed, that they comply, run toward the small arsenal, which was built on the right side of the hall. Very soon, he come back, holding a rocket launcher in his arms – there is no such thing as too many heavy weapon, when you deal with magical constructs.

Group of young maintain soldiers quickly reached the small armored door in the side of the hulking machine, using the code they received through their PSU a minute ago. With a soft hiss, the slab of metal slide sideward, letting them to enter very enlarged version of the standard APC’s infantry’s bay. Though, unlike APC, this chamber mostly supported units of a combat engineers, like Suzuka Tsukimura and her comrades.

Quickly occupying free seats and putting their bags with tools (and in Suzuka’s case with additional magic-using ferret) between their legs, teenagers finally take a breath and prepared themselves for the awaiting for the rest of their comrades to come… and then, for their sortie. Their first baptism by the flames of the battle.

Needless to say, the face of the many present people was covered in sweat, their breath was heavy and swift and their pupils were dilated. Suzuka was ashamed to admit, but she couldn’t help but clasp her palms together, bury her face in this “construction” and try to calm her wild heartbeat even for a bit.

The other students continue to come, filling the chamber, and the moment of their launch come closer and closer, increasing the anxiety. Their heart jumped, when the piercing howl of the charging Blaze Luminous’ shield projector suddenly filled the air.

The soldiers, who escorted their groups (Private Leonard Kellan, private Simon Ferro, Private Oscar Bookstore, Private Carol Suntree, Private Carla Tuffatorre, Sergeant Jessie Cooling, Private Egon Autumson) come to join them at the end, closing the door behind them.

Then the engine roar even louder and entire frame shook when the massive vehicle trundled forward. Leaving a cloud of dust behind, looming frame of the Halifax burst out of the hangar’s gate to join the battle.

Roaring steel giant rumbled toward the eastern part of the base, where the garrison tried his best to overwhelm the intruder. The sight of explosions and the dark silhouettes of the fighting machines could have been seen even with bare eyes through the glass.

Elisabeth Ching gritted her teethes, when the window, with magnified view on the battle, appears on the main screen, revealing a wreckages of a Britannian vehicles. She knew too well how downright small the possibility of the casualties-free battle in their universe when you deal with hostile magic, but she still so wanted to believe that no son of daughter of Britannia died today. Too bad – reality was a harsh teacher to let this happen.

Woman of a mixed heritage sneered, once she saw their enemy in all its twisted glory. Resembling a parody of the Arabic jinn, this automaton still was a deadly enemy that already claimed the lives of her compatriots. And it was her duty to prevent him from claiming new victims.

The fact that garrison forces launched an offensive was a pleasant side and dark blue haired officer took a dark pleasure seeing how desperate their enemy’s movements was when it tried to avoid being rain-pummeled by sustained fire. Seems that things aren’t going too smoothly for you, eh, jinn-bastard?!

But she also knew that cornered beast fight the hardest and they need to be prepared.

“Prepare the Blaze Luminous Defense System for activation, begin the warm-up sequence!” Ordered blue eyed woman, without turning around, and still carefully observing the ongoing battle. The long rumbling sound of the telescopic mast moving upward with the main emitter together with clattering of the fingers dancing over the keyboards made her smile a bit.

“Warm up sequence completed, begin the charging process of the Blaze Luminous!” Come the staunch reply from the behind. The young girl, who took the seat behind the control console of the Defense System, trembled a bit, but her gaze was serious and didn’t waver, even though her face was covered in sweat. Elisabeth mused inwardly, how adorable those children looked, yet she also admired their courage and determination.

“Don’t worry little ones. We’re fighting together and not only we have many comrades to protect us from the enemy’s assault, we held a numerical superiority there. Don’t be so stiff, I’ll make sure to guide you all though this mess.”

Captain Ching allow a more relaxed and a bit mischievous smile to appear on her lips.

“Just think about all the fame you’ll achieve among your peers after this day! You will be battle-hardened soldiers among your green horn schoolmates!” She know that she use their pride (Britannia had such prideful beast as lion on their banners for a very good reason) to rise their spirit, but Elisabeth Ching was willing to use any method to bolster the morale of a young soldiers under her control now. It was their very first battle deploy – totally out of the blue! – and she couldn’t afford to let them succumb to the fear – army that lost it morale cease to be a battle force at all…

The bright aquamarine flash of light on the monitor rudely interrupted her thoughts.

“Powerful energy fluctuation around the enemy detected!!” Shrieked sensor operator – Mayuka Inoki – in obvious panic. “The energy reading already rising with insane speed!!”

Even without the reading of sensors, by sheer brightness, Elisabeth realized that enemy really threw gloves off. And if she don’t do anything NOW – she wouldn’t have any opportunity to do anything ever again.

“Deploy shield this instant!!!” Captain Ching couldn’t believe that her throat can emit such powerful roar – her ears even responded with pain over the sheer volume of her voice. But thankfully, it also forced Janine Longnight, who now inputting her commands with such vigor that dark blue haired captain started to worry about the state of her fingers.

They all couldn’t help but gasp in terror when jinn released a massive wave of destruction in their direction. Now they could only pray to God that their machinery would work in time and work properly.

The long sizzling sound that filled the bridge sound so wonderful for Elisabeth (and other present denizens of Britannia) as the green wall of light started to descend on the ground around the mighty Halifax and his fellow Britannian vehicles. The shining wall of a green light completed its formation a moment before enemy’s attack rammed into barrier with all its might.

Halifax's entire frame shook violently, as the ground beneath him trembled, cadets and soldiers alike cried and cursed, while trying to hold in their places and not fly face first into the floor or wall. Lights went off for a moment and monitors blinked few times but then everything calmed down as cataclysm lost all of its power.

“Report!” ordered Elisabeth to force her young soldiers into work and not let them dwell on what happened.

“S-s-seems that enemy’s attacked us with some type of a directed gravity wave!: Reported Mayuke with a shaking voice, though it gradually become less shacked with each word. ”Our shield withstands the kinetic energy of the strike but the seismic wave went under the barrier.”

“Indeed.” Added Victor Voinich – their helmsman – checking the readings on the window that show them the schematic view of the Halifax. “But as I can see, reinforced frame of out giant was sturdy enough – the numbers of loosened screws and few exploded lamps are all damage we sustained.”

Unknown for everyone, Elisabeth took a breath inwardly, she feared to imagine what could happen to all of them if Halifax wasn’t such staunch machine. But then she quickly ordered to show her the state of their allies.

The new windows that appear on the main monitor show a mixed result. Terriers, despite being light tanks still didn’t sustained much damage – many of them was obviously pushed from their positions and some tanks even was turned around their axis by the power of the mini-earthquake but still there was no visible damage to the frame and as they eyes told them all tanks already starts to move back into formation.

Knightmares, on other hand, being much lighter vehicle, took the wave much less easily. Thanks lord, many Vincent Ward simply was thrown on the ground and currently their staggered back on their feet. But there was a machines that didn’t have a successful landings and other KMFs now was busy helping their comrades. The chat in comm.line confirmed that there were injures, but, thankfully, not a serious ones.

But there was a pilots who went silent after their fall – Elisabeth Ching, with rising fear looked at four Vincent Wards that were sent by violent tremor into crash-landing among the wreckage of the storage, from where all this trouble begun.

“Maintain the shield and drive us closer – we need to help our compatriots!” Commanded blue eyed captain and the engine of the sixteen wheeled machine roared louder as Victor moved steered their landship toward the zone of disaster.

The combat engineers teams were on their feet already, when their carrier came to stop and armored doors opened at the command from the bridge. The soldiers move out first to check the surroundings and then young soldiers followed the lead to enter the battlefield.

The air was filled with smell of a cinder, burnt rubber and fabric, oil and liquid Sakuradite. Green cadets and veterans alike were thankful to headphones they wore, for the roar of cannons, knightmare frames’ auto rifles and rocket launchers could rip their eardrums apart otherwise.

As she raced toward the remnants of the building to help her brothers-in-arms, Suzuka could feel how her fasts steps resonate with her heartbeat as she couldn’t help but notice the valiant effort of sole Vincent Commander, equipped with Floating Unit to keep the magical machine from concentrating on his fellow Britannians until they reform their ranks and create a new strategy.

Even from the far away she could see that attack from the air reach enemy position but could hit the jinn himself due to his speed and agility.

But then she moved under the shadow of the twisted metallic wall and concentrated on her task. Carefully moving among the rubble, twisted metal, remnants of various machinery she and her group reached the nearest Vincent Ward that lay on his right side.

Once powerful machine now missed its right leg – the knee joint didn’t withstand the blow – and its right arm was nothing more but broken mosaic of the pieces of a metal; the head of the humanoid machine now had a pretty deformed shape after the impact and, obviously, the fact-sphere was broken. And that was only a quick inspection.

All in – it was nothing more but a undead parody of once glorious war engine.

But they still could and will help the devicer. Quickly closing the gap between her and the fallen machine, Suzuka Tsukimura swiftly start to climb – the frame of the machine had a slots for arms and legs for occasions like that. Once she was on top of the KMF she put her bag down, pleaded Yuuno to bear with it a bit more, pull the special mask, protective gloves and plasma cutter.

Putting on protective gear, blue eyed maiden starts to work. The loud sizzling and hiss of a metal filled the air as Mortimer Caneworth, joined her on top of a fallen knightamre and starts to melt the cockpit’s frame with his own cutter, while their teammates do the same job on other sides of the machine.

Soon they make the gash big enough to plunge the pair of hydraulic jacks into the gap and starts to forcefully open the cockpit. The slab of a metal gives up with ear-rending sound (thankfully, it didn’t reach the cadets’ ears, since screech was blocked by headphones), giving them access to the important filling.

The Suzuka and other cadets couldn’t help but release a small yelp of the triumph when they heard the faint moan from the wreckage of the Vincent Ward – the devicer was alive!

Vincent Swang – the bulky teen with a short-cut red hairs reached out and push a small button on the backside of the seat, forcing it to move out. The teenagers were prepared and once the devicer – the young black skin woman barely older than twenty two years – whose forehead was covered with bruises, gore and flashed a pretty huge lump, was outside of her machine the two pairs of arms quickly moved to open her safe belts and carefully carry her away.

The medical teams – members of a garrison – immediately moved to join them and took the injured comrade to put her on stretchers. All around them, their schoolmates perform the similar tasks – cut the cockpit apart and help the devicer (if he/she conscious) or help the medical team to extract the injured ones.

Blue eyed member of a Tsukimura household moved to help one of the groups which currently waited for the crane from the Halifax to bring down the hook and move away the price of the destroyed walls that blocked the cockpit’s hatch.

Quickly she jumped on another pile of rabble… and screamed in surprise when the ground under her feet suddenly moved, which followed by a loud rumble when nearby pieces of junk starts to fall. Despite her shock, her trainings in martial arts helped her to maintain her balance and, after few seconds of a frantic dance, she managed to gain a more reliable footing.

The chorus of a gasps made her freeze in the place – just what could the other Britannians saw? She carefully leaned forward to look down and almost fall when she was the source of the mass shock.

The piece of a twisted metal, she stood on actually floated in air. To be specific, it was held in the air by a familiar ripple in the air – gravity field – generated by a weird mechanism that laid under the pile of junk that fall apart when Suzuka jumped on top of it. Putting yourself on top of unknown working device wasn’t the safest thing to do and lavender haired schoolgirl quickly steps down on the ground.

But once shock fade away she and other young technicians couldn’t help but move closer to study the unknown device. As they continue to inspect all its features they slowly started to understand the nature of unknown mechanism.

The core of this device was a still recognizable Gravity Emitter – its egg-like frame that laid on its side, had a numerous metal rods, attached to the bottom half, connecting the sophisticated machine to a unknown ring – shaped mechanism. There also were a many thick cables, attached to the Gravity Emitter, they went through the ring connecting the gravity control machine to something that laid under the pile of junk.

When curios teenagers moved the various pieces of a crushed walls, destroyed shelves and unfortunate mechanisms away they find a grotesque power source – the mass of the Energy Fillers melted together.

“Hmm…” Trailed one of the boys. “As we know – the enemy’s machine is a basically construct, created by the magic from the equipment, that was stored in this building. This Gravity Emitter was created too. But for some reason, it wasn’t attached to this… uh… jinn’s body.”

“It’s not only that!” Suddenly shouted another teen, quickly moving to remnants of one of shelves, pointing at something. “There is something else there too…”

After the short pause, punctured by the sound of work of the teams that still were busy, saving their comrades (all this weird crap can wait until they do the job!), sound of the working crane’s engines and the other machines, and the explosions in the distance.

“Seems it’s a reshaped ECM system we use in our machines!” Came a report. “It’s also have a new attachments, whose nature I can’t describe right now…”

“Hmm… but why they used their magic on those devices if he didn’t want to use them?” Come a question from another girl.

“Suzuka, I think I know the reason!” Yuuno’s voice that suddenly shoot in the Suzuka’s head was filled with excitement and urgency. “The Jewel Seed used all machinery, stored in this warehouse, as cubes in the construction kit – first was created a simple devices and then JS starts to construct a more sophisticated machine from them…”

“…While cutting off the parts that would disturb the overall work of the entire complex!!” Finished Suzuka with a gasp. “Which mean – all the misshaped devices that were left – a possible treat for this jinn-machine. But I think this Gravity Emitter- THE biggest treat...”

The flash of the realization in her head was a bright as the light, emitted by a stream of particles that surged from hadron-cannon in another attempt to hit the enemy’s mechanism. The Britannian forces reformed their battle formation and engines of many tanks and knightmares growled in anticipation, as they prepared to move out from the shield’s protection zone and join the battle. But now Suzuka know how to help her compatriots.

Without spending any more seconds, Suzuka Tsukimura hastily open the channel to the Captain Ching.
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#47
If someone proposed this plan few hours ago, Private David Poolswing would call him/her mad. Inwardly though – since the creator of the plan was a superior officer. But there was no weird, but deadly magical construct rampaging thought the interior of his base, killing his comrades and blasting powerful war machines apart, so now Dave responded to Captain Chign’s order with a grim determinate smile.

“I’ll do that ma’ma.” Snarled dark skinned man, lifting the weird device that was found under the pile of rubble in the devastated warehouse, he inspected just recently, with the manipulators of his Lumberjack. “Just cover me please, and I show this baby in this bastard’s throat!”

“Don’t get so fired up, private.” Older woman voice in the dynamics betrayed hints of the stern worry. “We don’t need you dead, we need you to complete your task and get back in one piece!”

“Roger!” Muttered Dave, using the control joysticks and the movement of his body to turn his exoskeleton around and face the view of the continuous battle. The blazing flowers of the explosions continue to blood around the crater-ridden field, where the jinn-shaped machine danced around the shoots of the advancing Britannia formation of knightmares and tanks. In respond earth itself burst forth like a tidal wave., clashing against the shield of the mighty Halifax that move to in the second line to support his smaller comrades.

The surreal and eerie glimmer of the unknown energy that give the construct his simulacrum of the life, washed over the entire vicinity, as the force field continued to deflect the barrage of the garrison’s cannons.

Thunderous roar of explosions and howl of the working guns filled the air of the surreal battlefield where one unholy beats face the army of the humanity. Yet, the deformed remains of the Terriers and Vincent Wards, whose twisted chunks of the armor and the pieces of the crushed equipment looked so much like the inwards of the eviscerated warriors, while the oil stained the grass akin to the blood, were a grim reminder of the reality of the events.

There was no more time for the doubts. Another click and the wheels of the pair of landspinners of the exoskeleton touch the ground in the first time for the many years of service. The raising growls of the engine reverberate through the entire frame and the body of the red eyed soldier, who bit his cheek slightly to force the anxiety away with pain.

Without the word, a pair of the tall Knightmare Frames – the same dutiful Vincent Wards – took a place on the in front of the Lumberjack, and activating their Blaze Luminous shields.

Time has come. Time for the decisive charge, and the winner take all, while the loser lose everything. Like always in the war, just like they all were taught from the childhood. The spirit of the Britannia Empire.

“Go!” Commanded Captain Ching through the comm. line. The voice of the dark blue haired woman was so uncharacteristically filled with emotions – anger, fear, agitation, hope, determination. Just like him, and many of their comrades, she put all on this stake.

The landspinners shrieked to live, sending the dust flying as trip of anthropomorphic machines zipped forward. Both Vincents and solo Lumberjack even bend forward like a runners, aiming to reach the point of destination on the maximum speed.

The looming frame of the Halifax quickly grew to encompass entire left half of the vision field of the David, as his escort and his machine swiftly shorten the distance between the wreckage, where they started their desperate run, and the advancing battle formation.

Leaving the lumbering behemoth behind, the desperate group, keeping their pace, catch up to the advancing forces of the base garrison. The rocket launcher armed Kingtmares and the light tanks didn’t react to their brethrens’ actions, other but the cheers through the communicators, as they didn’t change nor their speed, nor the direction, they didn’t even adjust the time of fire, leaving the suicidal squad to maneuver around the slick knightmares and blocky armored vehicles.

The timing, calculated by the computers and Captain Ching’s crew was perfect and the dashing trio reached the edge of the barrier exactly at the time when it was raised to let the Terriers and Vincents to unleash another volley.

The headphones protected Private Poolswing’s ears from the stunning roar but still his exoskeleton shook under the shockwave, generated by simultaneous fire of such number of cannons.

Now there was nothing between them and the murderous mechanism, outside the Colonel Paul’s valiant efforts. Seeing their approach, Paul Westhill immediately sent his machine into the quick spiral-like pattern of flight, bombarding his enemy with the short burst of the black and crimson energy, forcing the jinn to concentrate on his elusive aerial adversary.

The adrenaline rush heighten his senses and flow of time shifted in the eyes of the dark skinned private as his anticipation and anxiety skyrocketed before the face of deadly machine. His bloodshot eyes now were glued to an grotesque form of the construct, that danced around the explosions, the aquamarine light, emitted by the pair of the hovering objects above him drilled into his eyeballs painfully and yet David Poolswing continued to glare at the enemy.

A moment later, the taller humanoid machines broke their formation, and started to move in opposite directions, attempting to initiate a pincer attack on the enemy. Jinn noticed this and, now concentrating on the dodging from the attacks from above, he started to fire at his new assailants.

The sounds of booming roar filled the air as the ground itself shake furiously under the colliding might of the magic and the Britannian ordnance. Consumed by this maelstrom of destruction, the jinn-like construct forgot about the insignificant little exoskeleton that continued to move closer and closer.

The powerful heartbeats now reverberate through his entire body, while the skin on Dave’s head almost shone from the all sweat that also flooded his eyes. The frame of the mysterious machine grew larger and larger in his eyes and soon the time of the critical decision had come.

With almost shaking hands, he moved his left manipulator to the misshaped piece of equipment he held in his right manipulator. As he was told – it was a crude gravity emitter, connected to the accumulator. It was supposed to work under the control of the eldritch forces that created the automaton, but the quickly working team of the young technicians installed the switch in the cord, so now Dave could activate the mechanism when he was near enough to complete his task.

The touch of the metal claw emitted a low click and then the high-pitched noise ripped through the air. The energy flow into the circuit of the emitter, awakening the gravity controlling forces within.

And this instant jinn pretty much jumped in his place, quickly turning around his axis to meet the upcoming exoskeleton. All other foes were forgotten before the face of the one, who held the dangerous entity in his arms. Now the newborn automaton didn’t care about Vincent Ward or Vincent Commander or Terriers – he had more important enemy to take care of.

The Dave released a vicious battle cry as the jinn raised both of his hands, aiming to tear the impudent attacker with the wave of gravity force. It wasn’t a calculated, long-honed movement, in the desperate attempt to avoid the blow, the red eyed soldier, activated the purging protocol of his machine’s left leg beneath the knee.

The sudden change of mass, tossed the Lumberjack into the maddened spiral across the field. The explosion tore the earth just few meters aside, sending the exoskeleton flying though the air helplessly, but the few seconds of a free float was more than enough for the Dave to aim and toss the gravity emitter right into his enemy.

The gravity shield immediately snapped to life in the face of an attack from the distance, pushing the unorthodox projective down. The distance between exoskeleton and the magical construct wasn’t too small for the thrown emitter to his the jinn in normal circumstances, but the prolonged battle put a toll on the mechanical monster’s energy reserves. Yet the misshape machinery fall a meter away from the enemy’s frame.

But this was close enough for the emitter’s generating gravity distortion field to overlap with the jinn’s anti-gravity field. The two energy waves collided, erode and tear each other apart. Making once elusive automata to fall, losing its ability to hover with a shriek-like sound.

Colonel Westhill didn’t miss the opportunity, nor would he allow the bastard to hurt his men more. The hadron cannon he used as a harassing weapon all this time, sizzled as he super-charged the dreadful weapon to the brim. The crosshairs already was on the enemy’s downed frame that now tried to stand up, shaking lubberly.

Once the icon “full charge” appears on the monitor, and he saw how damaged Lumberjack now quickly was carried away from the battlefield by one of the Vincent Wards that escorted him earlier, Paul pulls the trigger. Now the nozzle of the cannon released a vicious storm of black and red energy, compressed into the beam. The all-destructive wave of energy hungrily descends on the helpless enemy, bringing all hatred and pain of the base’ garrison over their lost comrades.

The explosion that occurred once beam rammed into the ground, was no less than spectacular, ground trembled violently, grass on many scare meters was scorched into the ash, as the wave of the hot air and dirt flow everywhere.

“Sir, the bastard managed to get away!” The desperate shout of the Major Albert Dains blasted through the channel, followed by the unknown object rocketing from the cloud of smoke. The enraged Paul, quickly turned his machine to follow the persistent enemy, which still refused to gown down. Seems that jinn released the majority of his energy in one directed explosion that propelled him away from the blast zone of his, Paul’s, cannon.

Yet, his frustration died significantly, once he saw the shape his enemy was in. The entire torso, which was already pretty ugly in first place, now was even more hideous because of the numerous streaks of the molten metal, gashes and dents. The sparkling remnants of electrical cords and wires falling out form the breaches in the frame like the innards, bit most important, now jinn missed his left arm and both floating spheres.

The movements of the automaton also get slower and more erratic and now he didn’t even tried to fight back as the other knightmares and tanks get aim at him. And it was easily to see why – the shells and rockets wasn’t grinded down by the unknown force anymore. With the destruction of the floating devices the jinn lost his gravity field and ability to shoot the destructive waves of energy.

Now he was noting more but a prey.

In desperate attempt to preserve it twisted existence, the jinn dashed forward, hoping to lost his pursuers in the forest.

“Don’t let the bastard to get away!” Commanded Paul, gunning the throttle of his machine. “Time to finish the beast off!!”

The Terriers roar their cannon one last times, before moving backward to return to their base guarding duty and let the fast and agile knightmares to follow their commander in the hunt – their bulky machines wouldn’t be a help in forest anyway. Now the battle was pretty much concluded with their victory.

For today, at least.

~***~

“Thank you, mr. Westhill.” Smiled Nanoha, inputting a command that made her knightmare frame to swap the magazine with paint-filled round for actual AT-rounds. The blue eyed boy, whose machine gave said magazine to her Sutherland just a moment ago, return the smile with a small nod.

Arisa Bannings’ knightmare frame, which already changed its ammunition, sporadically moved back and forth, clearly showing the devicer’s impatience and worry. Usually, such behavior would bring only a reprimand from the instructor, but now there were too many small but noticeable hints of anxiety, displayed by the many young warriors present here.

The instructors decided to refrain from the application of penalties since this could give a blow to morality of the forces, considering the age of the majority of the devicers. And instead used a boastful jeers to alleviate the tension even for a bit. After all – even if youngsters would laugh at your boasts they would have less room for fear in their souls. And seems that it’s worked – the students of the Seishous High School was indeed nervous, but still there was no fear.

Ohgi Kaname fritted his teethes slightly – he received a message that unknown enemy currently on the run from the forced, led by Colonel Westhill himself and the Grey Centipede himself was sure that they would chase the intruder before the end of hour. But the problem was that the trajectory of the enemy escape route went through the region he and his student were currently in.

The Ohgi’s first thought was to immediately issue the order to all his student to advance – as far as they could from dangerous area, of course. But his second thought and the word of the base commander were against it. There was no guaranty that enemy wouldn’t follow him and his group and moreover, they currently held a fortified position near the Emergency Military Storage, which give them a good additional protection.

And thus they were had an order to held their position, until the new orders and open fire once something unknown appears in the sights. Considering that in this situation unknown, mean – hostile, there was no hesitation in the eyes of his students when he said them about the “open the fire” part of order.

Right now currently the 26 knightmares (24 student and pair their instructors) hid beside the thick steel walls that surrounded the purple building of the 6 meters in height. Said building and the walls normally were hid under the ground - in the cavern, covered by a massive hatch, masked as a small hill. Only recently, by the special encrypt command from the base HQ, this “hill” reveal its true face.

The cameras in the walls send their signal both to the base and the group that took a shelter there, which allow them to observe the surroundings without revealing their machines to the enemy. Also, there were a many small hatches on the surface of the walls that would open once they receive the order from the nearest ally knighmare, giving them – knightmares - chances for the alpha-strike against upcoming hostiles.

Nanoha and Arisa were placed beside the “south-west” wall, together with Arthur and three another of their comrades (Aika Hirome, Oswald Watts and Orlando Andersen) and nervously glanced at the any suspicious activity on their screens. The sudden movements of a trees’ branches under the gusts of wind, the unexpected arrival of a bird – all this usually innocent things scratched the nerves of the anxious young devicers. The danger come closer, the real danger and even the fact that they had a numerical superiority, good position and the information that enemy was already severe damaged and weakened couldn’t totally beat the fear.

There were people of the base – older and much more experienced warriors – that would never come back to their homes anymore. Can they avoid this fate? Or will their blood soil the ground of a Britannia… No-no-no!! They were bad thoughts, thoughts that no warrior has luxury or right to have on the battlefield.

She needs to stay cool – is she starts to panic when enemy appears it would spell a disaster on her comrades-in arms. The fail of morale always was a huge danger to any army in the history of a humankind – if you allow it spread you lose. No matter how splendid the equipment and weaponry of you soldiers if they give in to fear. Warriors cease to be a warriors once they succumb to panic – they’re a pray they would be consumed and nothing more.

Nanoha take a deep breath – what she wanted to do wasn’t some part of a carefully crafted plan. It was just a small idea she liked – she was sure that it would help her to keep her head cool.

“Truth and hope in our Fatherland…!” It was a strange idea, even for her own standard, and yet Nanoha Takamachi stars to utter the words of a Britannia national anthem. Yes, despite her origin Nanoha really considered Britannia Empire as her home, which often leads to clash with scions of the diehard nationalistic Japanese families – and anthem of Britannia was the very first song she ever heard in her life. And with each word she sang, she felt how icy grip on her soul lost its power and knots that threaten to take a place in her stomach quickly disappears.

On a spur of a moment she raised her voice, allowing each of her fellow combatants to hear her singing. Maybe she would be reprimanded for it later – she didn’t care. She wanted to help to easen the tension for all people that were forced into this situation.

“Our soldiers shall not pause to rest…” Added her voice Arisa, tighten the grip on joysticks. She was a daughter of the long lasted line of proud Britannia nobility, she wouldn’t humiliate her family by quivering in fear, when her dear friends need her help and her comrades need the aid in combat. She will fight, she will protect her comrades and she will come back alive!!

“Our traditions they will abide…” Arthur’s reiteration of their nations anthem wasn’t as loud as Aria Bannings, yet held the same power in each word. He was trained with his siblings and father for years and he didn’t succumb to same anxiety as his comrades, but still he silently complimented the daughter of the Takamachi household for her way to boost the morality of her schoolmates.

More and more voices joined them creating an combined chorus of all present twenty four students of a Seishou High School. Initially, many voices trembled slightly with uncertainty but soon the singing gain more power as the devicers of the Sutherland starts to gain the resolve from the bond they established on this moment. They weren’t a group of teenagers on training anymore – they were warriors of Holy Brintannia Empire.

Ohgi Kaname listen to his pupils’ song with mixed feelings. On one hand – he was glad that they find their own way to keep their resolve firm in the situation when they need to face a dangerous and deadly opponent first time in their life. He was proud and happy that Nanoha Takamachi managed to find a way to prevent her comrades from slipping into brooding mood.

And yet, as a Japanese, he was saddened by the fact that all youngsters that carry a blood of Yamato in their veins, increase their spirit by reminding themselves that they are soldiers of Britannia. Yes, the Japan Empire was a horrible place to live under the rule of a deranged Emperor Genbu and there were a numerous crimes that were committed against both people of empire and the victim of aggression, but still this was a solid proof that Japan truly died at the end of a Twilight War. Now those children wanted to fight to protect the Land of a Serpent and the Lion, not a Land of Raising Sun.

Though, Ohgi also admitted that he REALLY didn’t want for Empire of Japan to come back from the grave either. Considering what happen to his own family because of the empire officials, he felt bad only because the traditions of his ancestors were mostly replaced with those of a Briutannia after the assimilation of the lands of former metropolis, he was pretty happy to be citizen of Britannia than old Japan. Well, and there was mrs. Viletta…

The beeping of the radar quickly dragged him down into the real world to see the red dot on the screen, marked as unknown object. He quickly step on a pedal, moving his knighmare frame toward the south west wall, prompting Minami to do the same and barked the order.

“Hostile target incoming! All units, prepare for the battle!!”

His words fell into the completely silent channel, since the young devicers saw the same picture on their own sensors too and abruptly break their chorus. The song of their country was replaced with growling “Sir, yes sir!!” as the Sutherlands raised their auto rifles and prepares to open fire.

The beeping grew louder, as the dot grew closer and closer, chewing on the nerves of the instructors and trainees alike. Ohgi input a command on hic console, releasing a lock on the hatches in the wall, giving the six knighmares the open line of fire.

The air leaved the nostrils with a whistle, as the heart thumps like a pump, but thumb on the trigger didn’t shake. Nanoha, Arisa, Aryhur and others now felt the sense of a fellowship once they joined their voices into one chorus. And through this wordless link Nanoha could felt their gratitude for what she did and willing to fight should to shoulder with her, and this small joy completely dominate all negative feelings in her soul.

“Here he come.” Declared Arisa in stone cold tone, pressing all of her feelings together so she can covey them all tpo enemy once she push the trigger.

The time seemed to flew much slower once the grotesque silhouette appears in front of them from the passage between the trees. The spark zipped through the six human beings nerves instantly as they sent the order to their thumbs to drew the button into the joystick and thus releasing the flaming destruction.

“Lila Blitz!!” Nanoha couldn’t tell how she managed to hear those words. Those words didn’t come from the comm.line that was deathly silent at this very moment – yes, she was sure that barely fraction of a second passed after she sent the synapses from her brain to the nerves in her arm – so logically put, there was NOT a way for her to hear those outerwordly words. But then how…

Yet, her knightmare frame, just like his five of his comrades, already had his rifle to bellow like a beast, sending the round after the round toward the enemy. The jinn managed to notice the upcoming danger and jump upward, over the first wave of fire. And thus leaving himself vulnerable for the another barrage, that another twenty knightmares prepared to unleash.

But they were too late to claim the prey – the fierce snake with the body constructed from a blazing fire darted through the air, to hit the magical construct square in the chest, tearing his body apart.

The explosion shake the area as the all remaining energy in the core of enemy machine were released instantly. But shocked Britannian warriors barely paid any attention to the flaming flower that bloomed in the air for a moment, nor they paid major attention to a small shimmering jewel, which still emitted a noticeable energy wave, that fall on the ground a moment after.

All those youngsters and adults couldn’t avert their gazes from the sight of a chain-whip – the true form of a snake that kills the jinn – that swiftly flew from the field of their sight. Just to present them even more shocking view.

A massive knightmare frame – a head taller than Sutherlands – roared above the fortification, where Britannian group took their stance, circled over the glade so he can face his adversaries and then simply deactivate his floater system, so his landing send a powerful shockwave through the vicinity. He attempt of the intimidation wasn’t eternally unsuccessful – even Ohgi couldn’t help but gulp nervously under the gaze of the pair of the flaring green eye-cameras of the newcomer.

The edgy armor of a machine was painted in crimson and gray colors, which combined with KMF’s bat wing-shaped thrusters a pretty demonic look, which wasn’t break even by a familiar sight of the ejecting cockpit. The right hand of the unknown knightmare frame held a single-edged gray sword with a purple circle on the hilt, together with the small metal plate of the same purple color that was attached to the hilt on the dull side of blade. On the right hip everyone present could seen the sheath of the sword that also were connected to the hilt of the sword with the red energy cord.

The left hand was hidden beside the shield that had a whip of a same gray color attached to its bottom part. There were no more seen weaponry on this machine and yet every devicer, regardless of their age and experience fell that this knightmare frame a much more dangerous enemy that jinn, whom he slew as if he wanted to prove this point.

For a moment there was nothing but eerie, oppressive silence, before all Sutherlands receive the same message.

The beautiful woman, no older than twenty years appears on a newly created communication windows on their main screens. Her sky blue eyes had the authority and power in them that could suit a member of the royal family, her pink hairs were tied in the single ponytail that lay on her left shoulder of her crimson and gray pilot suit. And her voice, they all heard when she addressed them, was powerful enough to make them gulp in unison.

“Greeting, Britannians. I, Signum van Wolken, claim this battlefield!”






Author note: Wow, that was a long chapter. I never could imagine it would grew this huge.

Well, it was a mixed chapter: first, I wrote it to show the life of a Britannia to both Yuuno and readers. And second, of course, to have another big battle against Jewel Seeds-created monster (of the week XD) which culminated with appearance of a Signum – our beloved Knight of Sword. Seems that she’ll stole Fate’s role as a first magical girl enemy (though she a knightmare device/mage here) XD.

Her machine is a pretty much knightmarised Gundam Epyon with armament to math her appearance in MGLN A’s.

Thank you very much, my patient readers for your attention. Until the next stage
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#48
Stage 4. Sparks of feelings.​

Ohgi and all other instructors could be proud of their students – without any hesitation or confusion, once they recognized the new machine as enemy (any non-Earth Empire machine without proper authorization and with activated weaponry automatically counted as enemy) the young Britannian devicers pulled the triggers on their joysticks.

Booming roar of many knightmare’s auto rifles firing simultaneously shook the air as hundred of projectiles filled the air, aiming to rip the red and gray machine apart. Still, enemy predicted such course of action (and, frankly, who wouldn’t?) – even as pinkette said her greeting words she turned her knightmare frame in such way so her shield-equipped arm would face enemy formation and once Sutherlands raised their weapon the circles on the edges of shield are flared brightly, creating a familiar wall of pink light between the machine and incoming fire.

The storm of fire and smoke obscured the newly arrived knightmare from the cameras, but the more advanced sensors quickly revealed that enemy is still here and more than prepared to fight.

The gust of wind blows the smoke away, presenting the sight of enemy machine raising it sword in air. The loud sharp sound pierced the air and purple hatch of the sword’s hilt spew out a pair of cartridges. The eyes of the demonic knightmare flared as the large belkan magic triangle of purple color appeared beneath machine’s legs.

The wave of light burst upward bathing entire machine in glimmering pink aura, while explosion of flame engulfed the blade of the sword. The temperature sensors were quick to show that this flame’s heat already measured in four digit numbers and continue to increase with alarming rate.

The intensity of fire increased as both old and young devicers now set their rifles at maximum rate of fire. Ohgi Kaname and Yoshida Toru prepared their KMF’s rocket launchers, aiming at the enemy machine too: even if enemy shield was strong it definitely didn’t mean its unpenetrateble, every Blaze Luminous eventually would need to be recharged and can’t be activated in this period. The more energy it forced to absorb the faster it ran out of gas – simple!

Loud roar pierced the space together with self-propelled munitions, preparing to inflict even more damage at the enemy of the training group. But few moments before the rockets and the HEAT rounds could either further depletes the power of the energy shield or even dig into the frame if the said shield would finally give in under the barrage, metallic humanoid swing his fire-embraced melee weapon in wide arch.

Chain of explosions ripped the air, but now factspheres show that no round even reached the blazing field of pink light.

“What the…” Exclaimed Yoshida, which were accompanied by loud gasp of his friend and superior but then curly-haired man realized what’s happened once his glance fall on the temperature gauge. “Yoshida! That woman overheated the air by the flames of her sword to such extend it caused the explosives in the rockets and HEAT rounds to explode!!”

To further prove his right, the enemy machine now, confirming it can use another form of protection from the fire, deactivated its shield and now simply swing it sword again and again, destroying the rounds from the Sutherlands’ auto rifles right in the air – the sturdy frame of the unknown KMF was tough enough to withstand the shockwaves without any (visible at least) damage.

“Should we move and flank her, Ohgi?” Inquired Yoshida, observing how enemy’s machine continued to destroy upcoming rounds with mocking ease.

“No, as long as we continue to fire this Knightmare can’t go to attack us and thus we can pin her down before reinforcement arrive.” Japanese officer understood that his plan far for being perfect – the fact he leaved the initiative in enemy’s hands speck volumes – but he also couldn’t make any rash decision. Those children entrusted their lives to him and he would do his best to keep them safe. He can live with title coward if no of those young teens would be harmed today.

“Then, maybe we can switch to At-rounds at least?” Asked brown haired man with bandana, looking with increasing nervousness as enemy machine started to slowly move closer, sensing that her opponents give initiative to her.

“Good idea.” Agreed Ohgi, before switching to a broadband again. “All squads, switch your ammo alternately from HEAT round to AT rounds! Squad 3 – you’re first!!”

The trio if knightmares cease their fire and quickly moved to eject the magazines from their auto rifles and change them for the new ones with red marking (instead of orange). Once their added their fire in the combined barrage the effect immediately took the place. Without the explosive inside the round didn’t detonate from the intense heat and even manage to leave a gashes on the armor of the demonic machine.

“It’s working, Yoshida!” Exclaimed gray eyed Japanese man happily, seeing how enemy machine was forced to deploy her energy shield again. “Now we can pin her do…”

His word died in his throat once crimson vehicle starts to use a different tactic. The air howled when rampaging whirl of flame around the blade began to expand and glow brighter. Once flame reached the light blue color enemy lowered the sword in the path of upcoming round – now all of them were AT-shells as devicers took their chance to switch their ammo when enemy hid behind Blaze Luminious again.

The monitors quickly adjusted the lucidity of the image to save the eyes of the users, while Britannians increased the intensity of their fire, worrying that enemy tried to blind them and charge in. But enemy machine didn’t move from its place, only moving her hand and thus tip of the blade, which was a stark contrast with previous wide swings.

Yet still, just like some time ago, the nefarious machine stood impervious to upcoming fire again. The dutiful factspheres carefully show that unknown force now threw the round out of their trajectories once they come new the blazing blade.

Well, Ohgi, being also a teacher, slowly started to understand the true nature of this “unknown force”.

“Just what the heck she is doing?” Snarled Yoshids, squeezing his joysticks in his fists with more and more evident agitation in his voice, as if the bullets of sweat and his greeted teeth wasn’t a dead giveaway already. “Magic?”

“In some way yes.” Agreed Japanese captain, checking the reading of the many gauges on his main monitor. “There is a surges of the mana around the enemy KMF, but as far I can see it’s just a reinforce-type magic. Our adversary increase the resistance of her machine to the tremendous heat, generated by her own sword.”

“But why our rounds can’t reach her?” Inquired bandana-wearing devicer, looking nervously at how enemy machine slowly moved forward, closing the gap between herself and britannian position. The chatter in the comm.line clearly show that their pupils also struggle with fear.

“Leidenfrost effect.” Declared Ohgi, lowering his KMF’s rocket launcher and firing at enemy – as he predicted missile hit the ground few meters away from enemy before it can explode, but shower of the mud stalled their attacker. Not for long though.

Deadly machine, deploying her own land spinners, deftly circled around the upcoming wave of attack and raised her left hand, making her shield facing the Britannian fortification. With a click the pieces of shield’s outer armor moved in opposite direction, revealing pair of muzzles beneath.

A low thump shook the air and two massive projectiles flew toward the second squad position. The following explosion – thankfully, the rounds explode in the air before they could reach the fortification – was barely less than spectacular, the rampaging storm of plasma filled the air faster than you could blink an eye.

The howl of alarm claxons filled the cockpits together with the roar of cooling fans, while the monitors blacked out since the flash was too bright. The knightmares that were protected from the flash by the walls still were forced to back away, since the heat, emitted by the explosion was too intense.

Scorching wind licked the metallic bodies of Britannian war machines and the protective walls. Said walls – the one which took the majority of the heat wave to be specific - now looked like the ice cream that was forgotten in the broad daylight in the summer – shapeless, deformed mass that treated to fall on the ground any moment.

The knightmares that were the closest to explosion looked pretty bad too – their armor melted in some places and now the frames of the war machines were cowered in ugly streaks of molten metal and their weapons looked even worse – every auto rifle in the hands of the damaged Sutherlands now were definitely in inoperable state.

“Squad 3! What are you doing?!!” Hollered panicking Ohgi, whose bloodshot eyes now were prepared to fall out if their sockets at the sight of a damaged machine moving feebly and aimlessly as their devices clearly were in the state of shock. “Run away, now!! We’ll cover for you!”

The trio of dazed Sutherlands tried to move, showing that despite their daze the trainees still were conscious enough to obey their orders, but the snake, made of fire and still darted out of dying inferno and struck their legs.

Even if this decision was born out of panic, Ohgi kaname was glad that no teenager tried to play a hero and each legless knightmare activates the ejection system and tree cockpit blocks rocketed away from the battlefield.

But now there was a gap in their defensive line and enemy took the opportunity, using his magically-enchanted resistance to heat, crimson and black KMF, dashed through the blazing flames and swiftly skated toward the Sutherlands.

The flaming sword, once again, exploded into the spiraling whirlwind that lunged forth, aiming to strike another enemy. Sutherlands tried their best to avoid the strike but in their defensive tactics they used a tight formation beside the armored walls and this severely limited space for maneuver. The blazing snake hungrily tore off the arms, legs and even one head of unfortunate knightmares.

“Use the attack patter B-12-Orange – encircle her!!! Yoshida, I’m counting on you!” Commanded Ohgi, firing rocket after rocket at his enemy with reckless abandon, trying his best to glue enemy attention to himself. It worked – even though mysterious machine was quick to respond and intercepted the attack with an attack of her whip-sword that swept through the upcoming rounds with incredible precision the crimson and gray machine concentrated her efforts on the KMG of the Japanese captain.

The assailant darted toward the commanding Sutherland with lighting speed, raising flaming sword over the head for powerful chop, while keeping her shield with activated Blaze Luminous in front of herself. The distance between two machines grew smaller with astonishing rate and Ohgi could only… smile triumphantly.

His plan worked! The charging machine suddenly found herself surrounded by two group of knightmares. Attack patter B-12-Orange was a simple plan that could be described easily by “Lure enemy into the trap by presenting him with easy-to-catch prey”.

While enemy’s KMF had an enchanted armor it still wasn’t unpenetretable and even if the heat from hid sword or Blaze Luminous were effective enough to protect the machine their enemy couldn’t use them both due to energy consumption. And even if he’s wrong about enemy’s energy reserves, the enemy still would need to block the attack from 3 directions.

As a testament of his thoughts the pincer attack from the two directions was initiated by Toru yoshida’s order. The At-rounds hungrily drilled into the armor of the mysterious KMF and even though his reinforced frame still held it was just matter of time before he succumb.

“Blitz Sturm!” Snarled enemy machine suddenly, as her sword spew another empty cartridge. Another flash of purple light was quickly replaced with the binding wave of light and thunderous roar emitted by the activation of rocket boosters on the eldritch machine. Few moments later crimson and gray knightmare frame was right in the striking distance away from Ohgi’s Sutherland.

“Wha…??!!” Gasped Japanese man before vicious vertical slash destroyed his machine’s left arm and then followed roundhouse kick not only smashed Sutherland’s head but also sent him stumbling backward. The power of impact was enough to damage cockpit’s frame, though, thankfully, the brown haired man didn’t received any lasting injures. Unfortunately, those injures were enough to render him unconscious.

“Ohgi!! Captain Kaname!!!” Mixed cries of horror and concern from fallen devicer’s comrade/pupils filled the comm.line as the blue KMF laid motionlessly on the ground right before his attacker. Said attacker was quick to turn his back to the fallen KMF, enforcing the point that gray eyed Japanese officer is out of action before raising his shield up and firing another plasma rounds at crowd of Britannia knightmares.

This time all machines were quick enough to leave the kill zone unscratched, while relentlessly batching the crimson machine in the waves of fire. Said waves of fire were intercepted by timely deployed Blaze Luminous as gray and red machine again charged forward.

Using his boosters and speed-enchanting magic enemy machine barreled into the Britannian formation which greatly reduced their rate of fire as now all trainees were afraid of hurting their comrades and how hunted the Sutherlands in the Britannia’s formation one by one, using her own much higher specs and the lack of actual combat experience of her enemies.

Her first victim was Yoshida Toru – a single left actual soldier in the KMF platoon. Japanese devicer, despite his shock over his friend loss, still managed to avoid few attacks of the flaming sword-whip and even shoot a few times, but then enemy revealed a nasty surprise of having another melee weapon. The small whip, attached to the shield, didn’t look dangerous because he was pretty short to be actual treat, but Earthling were either too arrogant or to careless (or, which was a most possible variant – too consumed by panic) to forget that their adversary can use a magic.

The destructive charge of the demonic machine was broken by the careful throw of Chaos Grenade and the devicer with turquoise eyes managed to land a devastating blow from his rocket launcher on the enemy chest that leaved a deep dent on his armor. The assailant responded with another long slashing attack, making the flames around the whip blazing like inferno. Yoshida quickly ducked, while his main monitor blacked out for few moment to save his eyes. This was opponent aim, as enemy machine was temporary blinded, the demonic vehicle swung her shield and, as the loud boom declared his awakening, another flaming serpent, sprung from his nest in the shield and darted forward at the same speed as his brother in sword.

The aim and execution of attack were perfect – the blazing line, pierced the air and with deadly precision cut both of blue Sutherland’s legs in half. Toru’s was cockpit automatically ejected once the second attack with the sword destroyed his machine’s head. A moment before he was catapulted he shouted “Everyone, RUN!!” through the broadband, desperately hoping that their assailant wouldn’t pursue a scared teens.

The defeat of both of their instructors sent a powerful shockwave of panic through Britannian ranks. They were still a schoolboys and girls after all, and the idea of being locked in combat with deadly warrior without any help hit them REALLY hard.

Some immediately turned around and run, while there was a people who were so consumed by adrenaline rush and battle rage that they decided to stay and fight no matter how hopeless it seems.

Orlando Andersen almost suffocated on his own war cry as he sent his KMF into a charge with berserker abandon, as the auto rifle in his Sutherland’s arm spray rounds wildly. The crimson intruder repelled the wave of bullets with his blazing sword, simultaneously blocking the barrages from the flans, unleashed by Aika Hirome and Osawld Watts’ machines, with the two quickly created purple magical triangle-shaped barriers.

Quick slash - and the overheated plasma cut turn reinforced alloy into the yellow and red droplets of, leaving Orlando’s Sutherland without legs, forcing him to left the battle field by ejecting his cockpit. Aiko and Oswals tried their best to maneuver around the magical barriers and land a shot on the enemy using a series of quick erratic movements and bursts of fire but there always were new shimmering purple force fields to prevent a successful hit.

The demon-knight slowly turning around, facing his remained attackers, almost relishing in his newfound invulnerability and raise his shield again, taking an aim with his grenade-launcher. Another surge of magic, validated by appearance of the same magical triangle beneath machine was expectedly followed by a low thump of shot.

The grenades propelled from the barrels now were engulfed in the same purple aura, showing that now enemy use some new trick. This trick was quickly displayed when both rounds explode in the air, but instead of quickly expanding wave of scorching flame, the vicinity was illuminated by the pair of plasma lances the stuck the ground right beneath two Sutherlands, sending both machines into the short-lived fly. The damaged machines remained silent and still after their harsh landing signaling that they followed the fate of Captain Kaname.

The sheer casualty, enemy displayed in the last bout made it clear just HOW hopeless their situation was until the reinforcement arrival. Once Signum van Wolken confirmed that enemy is short on skurahydrogen filled rounds she could use her magic as much as she wanted.

The revelation hit those brave (or foolish) one, who stand behind and fought, hard enough to put them in the state of shock for a moment, leaving them in perfect position to be attacked. But before pink-haired lady-knight could do so a new voice pierced the line.

“Um, I’m sorry, Signum-san… dame Signum… I’m sorry if I was rude due to my lack of knowledge of your culture but…” The voice of the speaker was a bit shy and almost cute, yet all the people, present on the glade turn the attention to the possible source of the signal, located by sensors. Near the abandoned warehouse stood trio of Sutherlands, that carefully eyed the intruder. Two of them were armed by the same set of weaponry as their comrades and only their fluid movement revealed their much superior skills. The third machine were equipped by rocket launcher she picked from the armory.

But the detail that glued ell sight on this last Sutherland was a small gem that lay on top of his right palm.

Nanoha Takamachi, Arisa Banning and Arthur Westhill decided to try another approach to their enemy. They put their faith in this plan as they needed to lure their enemy away from their comrades ASAP.

“Can you please play a tag with us?”
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#49
The howl of rampaging flames, whizz of metal and roar of the cannons reverberate through the air as the insane dance among the trees continues.

The trio of blue knightmares desperately tried to lose their unstoppable pursuer in the woods, using the combination of carefully places throws of smoke grenades and the various combinations of swift, unpredictable maneuvers.

Using the direct laser channel Nanoha, Arisa and Arthur created a quick plan and now temporally broke their formation in order to prepare a trap. Arthur dived in his Sutherland into the forest, leaving Nanoha’s back in green eyed noble girl’s arms. He tried to argue, statijg that he must be a decoy but Nanoha she her trademark determination and stubbornness and blue eyed boy was forced to agree due to lack and direness of time.

As they expected, the demonic knightmare followed Nanoha without minding Arthur disappearance. Both girls were sure, that mrs.Signum understands that she was on the road into ambush but until Britannian reinforcement would arrive she had the upper hand in both specks of her machine and her magic. They also were sure that pink haired mage would notice the arrival of a Britannian army quicker than they.

The flaming snake lashed at the girls again and again, easily cleaving through rocks, trees and ground, mockingly piercing the air just few meters away from the frames. Nanoha Takamachi and Arisa Bannings could only grit their teethes and drench in their sweat as the reading on the monitor and the heat in the cockpit show them that outer armor now starts to melt. But there was another reason for their growing agitation and fear…

Even if this was their very first actual combat experience in KMFs they could easily tell that enemy didn’t hit them until now mostly because she didn’t want to end this quickly.

Barely evading another attack and preventing the serious damage to her right limb only in the nick of time Arisa snapped. Turning her machine around and switching the engines into the backward movement and navigating by the digital map, she throw two grenades with few seconds lag between each throw. The explosion of a smoke grenade obscure the approach of the chaos grenade from the enemy cameras, but the burst of the purple lighting that engulfed the armor of a crimson knightmare deflected the shower of shrapnel.    

“Didn’t work, huh?!” Snarled angered heiress of Bannings household, observing how their opponent almost lazily raised his shield and sent another grenade at them. Narrowing her green eyes, Arisa managed to intercept enemy’s round in the air by the quick burst of fire.  

Demonic knight sped through the occurred explosion at alarming speed, activating his boosters and raising his sword for another attack and somehow Arisa understood that enemy now wants her OUT of her way seriously! Shouting through the link at Nanoha to hurry up, blonde decided to try one idea.  

Recklessly jumping in the narrow space between two oaks (again, using noting more than a digital map!) Arisa tosses another smoke grenade in the back and then quickly executed a sharp turn, shooting the Slash Harken at another thick tree in the center of her intended curve, moving her knightmare frame in dangerous proximity to ground.      

Blond teen knew that standard tactics wouldn’t work against her enemy with such limited weaponry as she had at her dispose currently, which mean she need some unorthodox method to inflict a damage at her adversary. Well, how about to try some truly mad trick then?

Maneuvering around the truly huge oak tree Arisa Bannings’ Sutherland grabbed one of his left chaos grenades and, after switching said grenade into remote control mode, green eyed devicer charged at the enemy’s KMF moving in the wave-like pattern, trying to confuse pinkette.

Arisa’s erratic movement indeed allowed her to avoid the first slash of enemy flaming whip – Belkan woman was obviously trained and had excellent sense of her weapon but mages didn’t had hundred years of tradition and school of knightmare combat and could only try to mimic the methods of the Earth, combining them with their war traditions and thus she couldn’t realize the true mobility even of old Sutherland. The fact that Arisa used truly insane movements that endanger her machine gyroscopic system didn’t help.

The curve of the flaming snake body moved few inches away from blue humanoid vehicle’s head’s bathing it in heat but green eyed girl, much to her shock, saw the reading of gauges (and sensed by her own skin) which stated that heat now much less intense.

The Slash Harkens were intercepted by the deploy of shield; continuing the movement, that put the defensive device into the line of fire, her enemy send another flaming attack at her. Enemy may didn’t had the suitable teacher in knigtmare combat, but she definitely was a master of melee combat and Arisa escaped any serious damage to her machine only by sacrificing her rifle with was loaded with HEAT rounds (she swap the magazines right before her charge), which she throw into enemy attack, the detonation of munitions threw whip away from Sutherland.

Crimson and gray knightmare wasn’t fazed by Arisa desperate run and even though there was a slight gap in his defense as Arisa deflected her shield-whip and her sword still didn’t come back from her first slash both opponents knew that in direct close quarter battle Arisa have little chances of win.

Which made enemy really wary of Arisa’s possible actions – Signum wasn’t an idiot to think that attacking Sutherland didn’t have some sort of nasty surprise.

Thus, Arisa’s maneuver of turning her machine so her left side would face Signum and shot her knightmare arm at enemy as projectile wasn’t a surprise for cautious warrior. When unique “round” was about to hit her machine in Face, Signum Van Volken made sure that she strike it with her shield so ejected arm would fly back directly at sender, and once said arm landed on the ground on the right side of the blue knightmare frame, Signum sent her panzerritter Laevanteinn into thunderous charge.

Arisa grunted in admiration – her enemy was a good warrior and deuced her plan pretty well, but unfortunately, she lacked the information about Britannian vast arsenal and its capability. Chaos Grenades didn’t used for area attack but as a short living flanking turret.

At Arisa’s command, with an ear-piercing roar the stream of tungsten shrapnel tore through the fingers of the fallen hand, thrusting right into the center of the swiftly upcoming machine. Arisa was sure that her skilled adversary would be able to rise her shield in time to intercept the attack. But would this shield able to withstand the power of attack at point-blank range?

The green light of Blaze Luminous stand firm under the power of attack for first moments but then started to flicker and destructive wave grinded into the metal wi8th such force that demonic knight staggered as chinks of the tattered armor fly.

Not allowing enemy to recover from the initial attack, green eyed teen quickly puller her spare rifle from the holder and sent another barrage of AT-round in the direction of  her rattled enemy. Blond girl couldn’t help but smile triumphantly, looking how finally previously unstoppable knightmare started to show that he not so invulnerable. Just like she thought – the energy consumption from all those insane tricks and wanton usage of Blaze Luminous system finally started to eat through her Energy Filler capacity.

The appearance of a magical triangle that stop the bullets from hitting the machine was a good sight to start retreating – Arisa knew that sole teen without actual combat experience have a small chances of success where veterans of brutal fighting with JLF like instructor Ohgi of his assistant lieutenant Yoshida fall. Quickly turning her Sutherland around, daughter of Bannings family tossed another smoke grenade over her machine’s shoulder and sped out from the impromptu arena zigzagging across the road on her move and even using a quick jumps from time to time.

BOOOM!!

The vicious jolt almost slammed her head through the main screen as unknown tremendous power threw her machine upward. After completing a somersault in the air, her poor Sutherland finally got back down on earth with a loud crush. Arisa cried in pain and fear when the back of her seat come into contact with her skull with a force of a bat, the only reason why she wasn’t render unconscious because of advanced implants in her head and body.

But said implants couldn’t help to get rid of pain in her head and back, ringing in her ears, or merciless waves of nausea. Despite still clinging to the real world now blond maiden was nothing more but helpless prey.

Her stubbornly preserved consciousness allowed her to see on remaining working screen the advance of her tormentor. The blows of wind worked the branches of surrounding trees to shook like they’re applaud the demonic knight as he moved for killing blow. The flames dances   around his sword-whip, that now, under the power of magic (or her fading sight simply couldn’t catch the movements of enemy’s arm) angrily circled in the air like a snake.

The numerous gashes on his armor instead of making him look silly (as much as 5 meter tall engine of destruction can be) made him look even more nightmarish and his glowing green eyes in the dusk only enforced the comparison to angry demon god that come to slay his arrogant offender.

Her only saving grace was the utterly deformed look of his shield – through deep wound she could even see (with tremendous concentration of her wavering will) a sparking torn wires. At very least she left his Blaze Luminous system in shambles – she hoped it would help her friends and comrades to win.      

But what will happen to her? Arisa didn’t saw this Signum woman killing anyone in this raid – all her opponents were either render unconscious or forced to leave the area (either in knightmare of ejection pod), even Captain Ohgi and Lieutenant Yoshida didn’t lost their lives. But no one of them pissed crimson knightmare devicer of damaged her machine to this extent like Arisa Bannings did. There was no guarantee that her pink haired opponent couldn’t decide to cleave her machine and cockpit in half, turning her into a bloody smear.

She was a brave girl, but even a bravery has its limit, especially if the target a teenager. The crimson and gray knightmare grew to fill entire sight on the screen, driving a whimper from the lungs of green eyed maiden as growing terror gripped her innards.

It’s the end?! Will she die like that?! Here?!! NOW!!! N-NO!! NOOOO!!!

Gritting her teethes to preserve a some measure of self-respect and at least some honor, with teary eyes Arisa Bannings started to tell a farewell to all people she loved.

“Don’t worry…” The calm and stern voice with a metallic notes burrowed into her mind with a piercing power of a drill. “I have no intention to harm you... further than I already had.”

There was a small amount of mirth in pinkette’s voice but, thankfully, Arisa couldn’t find any malicious intend in her interlocutor’s voice. Wave of relief engulfed her, pushing a new dose of tears out of her eyes – this time, tears of relief.

“After all, one of your friends – my target – dashes to reach this location here at maximum speed.”

The short-lived relief was replaced my indignation and terror – Nanoha threw away all logic and now going to get herself into the fight with this head cracker!

Cursing herself, for weakness, Nanoha for her impulsiveness and. More than anything, this goddamned Belkan woman, who want to hurt her precious friend, Arisa Bannings snarled and moved her hands to re-boot her main computer and activate a diagnostic program, and then she grabbed joysticks with all her remaining strength. She would be damned if she let this pinky screwball to let whenever she want with Nanoha.    

“Arisa…!” If Arisa didn’t get used to this tingles in the back of her head, she could suspect that she hallucinating after the blow on her head, but she get used to Yuuno’s mental voice enough to understand that she indeed talk to her new friend from another nation. “Arisa are you hurt…?! There is a “noise” in our channel – which mean you’re not okay!!”

“Got slugged by mrs. Tin Woodman!” Chuckled Arisa, feeling how presence of her friend (even unseen one) helped her to fight back both fear and nausea. The enemy’s knightmare continued to stand still almost ten meters away from her, but now she put away the flames and returns a standard form to her blade. With a loud shriek her main monitor come back online and shows a result of diagnosis.

“Don’t worry, I was hit harder often in the past so I would live!”  Quickly answered Arisa so Yuuno (and she was sure that Suzuka pleaded so ferret-mage would let her listen to their conversation) wouldn’t get worry-sick. “My machine sustained damages, but still can fight… sort of. But this weed whacker wouldn’t let me stand until Nanoha will come to rescue me… Yuuno, this dummy charge right into a fight with vastly superior machine!!”

She could hear Suzuka squealing in horror in background – there was no way they didn’t get the news about the one-sided demolition of their unit and thus the very thought of her gently friend butting heads with monstrosity that took down entire platoon scare her out of her wits. Not that Arisa was less scared.

“I’ll help! I swear that I made my best to protect you and Nanoha!” Arisa even jolted under the sound of deadly determined voice of Yuuno Scrya. The power, the feelings, the conviction in those words made her heart beet faster. Pushing those idle feelings aside, green eyed noble girl quickly starts to inform her comrade.

“Yuuno, she called herself Signum Van Wolken and she control melee-oriented knightmare! Her prime armament is sword that can change it’s shape into a bladed whip and she can cover it in fire – a VERY hot fire!! She had the spare whip installed in her shield, together with grenade launcher! Color of her magic is purple and her magical crest is triangle!!”

“Belkan mage…” Yuuno stated this, he didn’t ask – even if such amateur as Arisa could understand origin of her enemy, such walking library as Yuuno would understand much more. “Van Wolken…?! Oh Goddess! Arisa! You and your friend fight with the currently sole knewn survivor of royal family of Wolkenreich!!”

“It’s bad?!” Panic in Yuuno voice open the pustule of fear in her soul as Arisa again started to count seconds before possible arrival of her auburn-haired friend. Damn, Nanoha, you’re smart girl – you should create a plan before you would charge head on into the trouble!! Pleaded blond Britannian, biting her lower lip in frustration and agitation.

“Belkans noble families are proud of their warrior heritage and thus they divert a good amount of their wealthy into improvement of their magic and fighting style. Thus, more wealthy mage have more better equipment, advanced training and sophisticated equipment. And she is a princess and thus have – or had – the access to the best weaponry her country could afford. So yes! She is VERY dangerous!!”

“Kek!” Half-snarled, half-whined Arisa, sweet already covered her face totally but she was afraid to let go of joysticks, fearing that her purple eyed friend would arrive in any moment. “B-but Belkans shouldn’t have a improved school of knightmare combat!» Almost screamed heiress of Bannings household as her sight almost drilled into looming form of demonic knight, trying to find additional weakness.

“She doesn’t seems to have an advanced training in control of her machine on level of ,master devicers of Earth Empire! She rely on specs of her machine, I’m sure! And… and this flaming sword of her not as hot as he was initially! I know – she grew weaker! I managed to damage her machine!!!” She honestly didn’t knew whom she tried convince harder, Yuuno or herself.

“Yes! This is it!” Newfound confidence and small amount of joy in mage’s words made Arisa almost slump in her seat in relief. “The mana consumption on upholding the Protection Field around her machine and the usage of high end flaming spell would eat through her reserves fast!! Law of Giors-Malier… sorry!”

Arisa (and, as she could heard, even a worry-wart Suzuka) couldn’t help but laugh, Ah, Yuuno – he was such lovely bookworm! No matter how dire the situation, he would find a time for a lection.

“You earthlings call it square-cube law. The upholding such Fiels would be easy task for such great mage as member of royalty but if knightmare frame is five time – and this is a very rough calculation - larger than person than his surface area that she need to cover in protecting field are twenty five times larger and this the consumption of mana!”

“It’s mean we CAN still win?” Green eyed maiden almost begged for positive answer and the suddenly appeared through the cover of clouds sun, shined down on the road, as if giving fallen blue knightmare an encouragement.

“Yes, we can!” Scrya-mage’s answer again was filled with the same determination and power that made her feel safe even wile being under watchful eye of her enemy and her deadly knightmare. – said vehicle suddenly turned around, sensing something. Arisa’s hear skipped a beat, but for long agonizing seconds nothing happen, a quick glance on tactical map show that there is only two markers in this area: one – Arisa’s Sutherland, and other – her jailer.


“I’m going to teleport right to you and Nanoha, Arisa. The are of base is currently filles with raw mana from the Jewel Seed activation and this I would be able to snuck under the mana-meters.” Stated archaeologist resolutely, diverting daughter of Bannings family’s attention from the crimson and gray machine. “I just need a some sort of bacon to find you two… Wait! Isn’t that Jewel Seed?!! But I thought that this jinn-machine escaped?!”

“Um, yeah…” Clarified Arisa almost reluctantly. “ It appeared before us and then was sacked by pinky princess. Then Nanoha pick it up from the wreckage to lure her away from the rest of our comrades and…”

“I’m going, Arisa! Just wait for me!!” Yuuno’s voice grew by one octave before suddenly disappearing. Arisa tossed another glance at Belkan vehicle and starts to pray silently to God for aid in upcoming battle. And then a new thought pierced her mind.

Wait! Just where is the hell Arthur Westhill?!
 

vic-vic

Well-Known Member
#50
“Arisa-chan, just hang on there! I definitely would save you!” Slipping between two massive trees, Nanoha’s Sutherland howled as his devicer again gunned the throttle. Nanoha Gritted her teethes, trying to put a tight leash on her desperate and passionate wish to save her dear friend – just charging in, trying to face a superior machine that trounced entire KMF platoon without a good plan wouldn’t do anything good.      

“Trying to charge into the glade through the open road” plan was tossed into the trashcan a split-second later it just started to appear in the corner of her head and thus her blue machine currently moved through the labyrinth of the forest using her knowledge of the surroundings.

Auburn haired teen was sure that her opponent would expect this and who know sensitive the sensors of such high-end machine was, but trying to close the gap of 50 meters of the road between the turn and the glade, while hoping that enemy would be too distracted by her arrogance would be an even worse alternative.

Almost as bad as trying to pull tiger’s whiskers through the gap between the bars and hope you would be fast enough to pull your arm back. Good thing that Kyoya-ni noticed this fast enough to stop her from… No-no, there is no time to remember her childhood!

What she need to keep in the mind that using the terrain can seriously help her in fighting against the more powerful knightmare. Or at least keep her locked into the battle long enough until the reinforcement will come.

Purple eyed devicer sighed, remembering how easily their very first attempts to goad the mechanical demon into the wild rabbit-chase (or does this old proverb sounds like wild duck chase?) were easily thwarted by the well-executed fire-whip slashes and area attacks with grenades that pushed the trio into the forest, away from the trajectory of the upcoming reinforcement, clearly showing that knight Signum had at least some knowledge about the area.

It wasn’t good news but Nanoha could deuce from the belkan mage’s behavior that her opponent didn’t have a detailed knowledge about the place of their game of hide and seek.

And she also has Yuuno and Arthur on her side to help in the battle, though she hoped that they wouldn’t meet each other or there would be another problem to deal with.  

The sun gently ruffled the frame of her machine with the light, making the edges of the armor to glister as the Sutherland jumped across a small pit. Convex surface of a factsphere flickered again as Nanoha activated infrared sensor, trying to pin the location of her enemy.

As she expected, even on such distance, through the mass of threes, such intense source of heat as demon-knight KMF betrayed his position. Rational part of her mind shouted on her to simply wait until Britannianm reinforcement would come – they wouldn’t miss this heat signature too – but Nanoha’s other part of brain couldn’t help but worry that enraged, by her failure to extract a Jewel Seed, knight would release all her anger of now defenseless Arisa.

But for some reason Nanoha Takamachi’s heart was sure that lady-knight wouldn’t hurt a downed enemy, she could easily unleash a massacre among the lines of the students of the Seishou, but pink-haired mage used her skills and might of her machine to simply disable the Sutherlands.  

There also was another reason – purple eyed maiden was sure that Signum-san wasn’t  murderer, she saw her eyes when she addressed them. There was no malice, bloodlust, wrath or sinister intentions. Instead, the pair of the pure sapphire orbs was filled with strength, resolve, determination and passion.

Nanoha couldn’t believe that owner of such eyes can sunk to the level of the wanton cruelty. She believed instead that she could talk with pink-haired warrior if she approach her with the utmost integrity.

But daughter of a Takamachi household also had a strong feeling that even if she could talk with her adversary it’s definitely didn’t mean they would reach a mutually pleasant conclusion. Without a proper display of strength at least.

In the age they lived, diplomacy demanded to have an iron fist under the soft glove or you wouldn’t het anywhere. She knew enough to understand the truth of those words no matter how unpleasant they sounded to her.    

The rapid increase of her and energy level around the enemy knightrmare were a good display that her opponent had the same idea of the diplomacy. Nanoha raised her Rocket Launcher and prepared to meet the upcoming attack. It didn’t take a long to occur.  

BOOOOOOMMM!!

The massive oak fifteen meters away from the Sutherland exploded into the storm of fire, splinters and scorched branches. Fire didn’t even started to fade away as the flame-wrapped snake shoot through the space, aiming to took Britannian KMF’s head.

Nanoha quickly took the aim and pushed the trigger sending the HEAT warhead into collision course with the upcoming blade. Explosion tore through the air as the two attacks collided bathing the surroundings in the flames and giving Nanoha’s Sutherland truly menacing outlook but covering the frame in the orange light.

But it couldn’t even hope to match outright demonic look of the enemy machine that stood in the center of the forest glade, towering above the downed Sutherland that currently crouched right behind the crimson and gray vehicle, which only increased the impression of the presence of a nightmarish knight of death.

Nanoha’s spirit wavered initially, once she get a visual confirmation of her friend’s pitiful state but she also get a piece of a important information – the bladed whip was tossed backward after the explosion and now, like a snake, sped back to the frame, so pink-haired mage could launch another attack. Just like Yuuno suggested – her enemy was low on mana and couldn’t, after it was blasted back, simply forced her whip to lash at the Sutherland again right in the air, now her depleted reserves of magical energy demanded Signum Van Wolken to wait until she could attack Nanoha using her machine’s proves rather than her magic.      

Hostile KMF indeed waited until the whip again transformed into the sword and then charged toward the upcoming Sutherland, clearly intending to meet her enemy in fair and square combat without resolving to a cowardly tactic of the human-shield, leaving Arisa alone.  

Nanoha smiled in gratitude and satisfaction: Signum-san indeed was a honorable warrior and she couldn’t help but admire her courage and determination and was thankful that pinkette intentionally wasted her chance to use Arisa as a hostage.

She also was thankful that she didn’t need to use a HEAT shell in fear to catch her blond friend’s machine in the blast and fire at upcoming machine without hesitation.  

The missile collided with the glimmering surface of a purple triangle that quickly appeared between two machines creating a screen of fire and smoke between Sugnum and Nanoha, breaking their charge as two teens moved their machines around the explosion.

Once they get a clear line of sight to each other again blue Sutherland and crimson knightmare exchanged the shots; their speed and skills were enough to avoid both attacks and the two resulted explosions only claimed another pair of unfortunate trees.

Purple eyed maiden shoot her chest-mounted Slash Harkens, hitting the ground right before the enemy’s vehicle on trajectory of his movement, creating a simple trap. It worked to an extent – demon knight tripped over the steel cable, breaking his elegant dash into drunken stumble, unfortunately, the sheer power behind the collision was so tremendous that it yanked Nanoha’s machine forward, almost making her Sutherland falling factsphere first onto the ground.

Both devicers regained the control over their machines and adjusted their stances on the same time. The flaming sword collided with another rocket, bathing the area in the flames again, vaporizing the unfortunate leafs, scorching the branches and trunks of the nearby trees. As well, as continuing to melt the metal of the frame of all present machines.

Arisa hissed, flinching in the pain as the wave of heat washed over her face, but especially eyes. She gritted her teethes, seeing the battle between the machines of a Nanoha and this woman called Signum. Her friend, as always, fought with all skills and tricks she had up her sleeves, but her opponent was very good too, not to mention – her machine was much more advanced unit.

To her small relief, diagnostic program revealed that legs of her Sutherland still operational, as well as her remaining arm. Unfortunately, her landspinners were out of commission, which mean she effectively can’t  help Nanoha in the real fight – her limp machine would make the situation only worse for auburn haired girl, as she would be forced to worry about her comrade’s safety, while Belkan KMF would easily circle around crippled machine, using her as a barrier from Nanoha, while moving closer and closer until she would be able to stuck her down.


Okay, this mean, Arisa should resort to a dirty tricks and she already had the idea, seeing that she still had two Chaos Grenades. She just need a little help… Very quickly! Green eyed girl hissed in terror and rage as she saw how crimson and gray machine used as combination of the two swift shots from her grenade launcher and combination of slashed to force Nanoha in the desperate series of maneuvers.

“Arisa, are you okay?!” Yuuno’s worried voice in her head made her almost squeal in joy loudly – Yuuno was here and now she… No - THEY!... could help Nanoha.

“Yes! More or less!” Quickly answered golden haired scion of Bannings household, as her face brightened with grateful smile – he was worried about her very much; she could hear this in his voice – before quickly making her request. “Yuuno, please, I need your assist to help Nanoha in this battle!! Can you please create a bright sphere of light in the center of the glade on my word!”

“Y-yes… but wh…” His voice suddenly changing, quickly gaining the resolve and the iron determination as he saw how blur machine almost lost her right arm under the might of the belkan assault, but even though quick spin allow Nanoha to preserve her machine’s arm, the ugly gash now marred her cockpit block and she lost one of her slash harkens. Nanoha and Arisa were in danger and he NEED to do something! “You only need to say! You want to create a distraction so Nanoha can launch an attack on her own?”

“No…” Arisa’s mental voice gained a additional solemn note. “This Signum just too good and her knightmare frame are much better than our old relics. We need to run and we WILL make an opportunity to escape for Nanoha!”

With those words she reached out and as her fingers danced over keyboard Arisa activated both of her remaining Chaos Grenades.

Arisa cursed herself for her previous succumbing to terror (even though she understood that she couldn’t help it considering her age and her actual combat experience being zero) and she know that she not perfect invincible heroine to think she would keep her cool in the future, but right now only thing that mattered was the Nanoha’s safety. And Arisa was prepared to fight to save her friend even if she would pay with her health for it!

~***~

Air roared like a wounded animal as the fire-engulfed blade moved in fast and deadly arc, aiming to slice her KMF’s head off. Gasping for breath and sweating heavily from both anxiety and the heat, Nanoha pulled both of her legs back and with them the pedals, as her legs were connected to them by belts. Following this order, her Sutherland dashed backward, barely avoiding the strike and then another one, and then another one.

The forest burn around her, the fire gleefully danced across the trees, greedily devouring the green live. The dust filled the air, lifted by a wind created by the deadly dance of two machines, as Nanoha continued to play a victim, trying to lure enemy away from Arisa’s damaged Sutherland.    

Purple eyed soldier smiled bitterly at the last thought – while she truly let her enemy had an upper hand in their last pursue to lead her away from defeated Arisa, as the battle grinds on she was forced to admit that her enemy could easily gain a vantage on her own without Nanoha’s “help”.

The old and reliable Sutherland was a good training machine but in the face of a cut edge machine he barely could poses a treat.

Moreover, her opponent was a sharp sense of battle and was able to create a counter to each strategy or trick Nanoha could muster. If it was just a sparring match she would greatly adore the skills and the fighting spirit of her adversary.  

But now she couldn’t help but fell how the tight spot on anxiety in her belly give a birth to a gripping fear as it became more and more apparent that she had very little chances to escape on her own. Of course the Britannian forces simply can’t miss this battlefield, but will they came fast enough?!

Nanoha bit her lower lips forcing her fear in the corner of her mind – succumbing to terror was akin to suicide in the battle and she HAD to hold mage enough for Arisa to escape no matter what. She couldn’t stand losing another of her friends…

Her rocket launcher jolted when another missile darted toward her opponent’s vehicle leaving a plume of smoke behind. As always Signum cut it in half with a fluid motion of her sword, but this time warhead was filled with highly combustive liquid that quickly covered entire frame of crimson and gray knightmare in a howling wave of blazing death. Of course combination of heat resistant materials and magical protection nullified the effect of the attack it still give Nanoha chance to create a wilder gap between their respective steed and temporally increased the mana consumption of her engine of battle, which already should have put a massive tool on a fighting mage.  

Signum’s response came in a form of a two blazing snakes that moved toward Nanoha in a helix-like pattern which forced her to abandon her attempt to attack and quickly move away by a wide arch on the very edge of the glade.

Pink haired knight seized the opportunity and charged straight through the ruined glade, preparing to engage her enemy in close quarter combat where she held a distinct edge. Nanoha tried to counter this with a pair of quick shots from her bazooka but they were intercepted by a old and reliable Panzerschild.

Gunning the throttle Signum send her Laevatein into a lightning-fast dash, raising her sword and aiming at the shoulder of the enemy machine as she, just like all previous times today, avoided to use any maneuvers that could endanger the life of the pilots. But now there was more than reasons to do so - the tenacity and fighting prove of her enemies, both of blonde and brunette, gain a deep respect from the Signum Van Wolken.

Both teen girls knew very well how outmatched they were and that there was no ways for them to win this bout. And thus they used every known tricks and tactic to stall her advance and forcing her to face eventual appearance of the massive Britannian forces. Battle that she couldn’t win not matter what.  

There also was this third knightmare that disappeared when she starts the chasing if the holder of the Jewel Seed. Her battle senses told her that skilled devicer didn’t run away in fear but rather hid to prepare a counterattack. He will appear soon or later.

And in worst case scenario he will guide the army of the Britannia Empire here.  

She barely restrain a curse when alarm claxons howled and the main screen revealed a new window – Alarm! The binding light burst from the sphere that suddenly appeared in the m idle of the glade – the unknown mage casted a powerful (or at least, mana-bloated) spell right into the glade without the care about all involved parties!

Signum hit the brakes (and almost smashed her face against the cockpit if not for the safety belts) and quickly casted triple Panzerschild, while shouting through loudspeaker at her previous enemies to run.

Her heart thumped with a strength of a steam sledgehammer as she braced for the explosion, continuing to using the scanners of her machine to pinpoint the location of the caster. But as seconds continue to pass nothing happened – the bright sphere of green light continued to glow, but nothing else happen.

Her bnright blue eyes shot wide open when she realized that she was tricked but it was too late. Arisa, using the last remaining arm of her Sutherland, managed to lift her vehicle up and then, once she get the lock on her target she activated both oh her waist-mounted Chaos Grenades.

Again, she used them in focus-fire pattern as the one-shot cannons, both in order to get the desirable effect and avoid being torn apart with the storm of the shrapnel. Her damaged machine staggered violently as pair of the dumbbell-shaped devices send a stream of metal at the demonic knight.

Daughter of Bannings family didn’t aim at the torso, as she expected that the armor around the cockpit was the thickest and sturdiest. Not to say that there must be some type of additional defensive mechanism and thus Arisa choose the legs of enemy KMF as her primary target.

And she also couldn’t bring herself to use a lethal force at someone who was so adamantly against taking the lives of her compatriots.

The storm of destruction slammed into the enemy’s machine with enough force to  almost throw it on the ground and even though the stabilizers, gyroscopes and the devicer’s skill allow the KMF to remain standing the pieces of the crushed armor flew everywhere little a water splashing.

“Panzergeist!”

The pink light engulfed the legs, stopping the onslaught but Arisa grinned triumphantly anyway – she achieved her objective already. The enemy vehicle now lost it landspinners! Now she lack mobility as much as Arisa, which give the long-range fighter like Nanoha the massive advantage.

Arisa didn’t dare to yell “we won!” as there could be much more tricks in their adversary’s sleeves, but now they increased their chances to prevent pink haired woman from getting what she want.

“Congratulation, my enemies.” The clam voice of the knight, come together with her appearance on the new communication window. Despite the unwanted setback there was no malice of anger in her voice or eyes, no! Instead, her lips were decorated by a small but charming smile and her bright blue eyes blazed with admiration, satisfaction and determination. “You’re truly an formidable opponents. Any noble of the realms of Belka could wish to have such warriors under his banners. Despite the fact that you stand in my way, I admit that I can’t help but admire such skills and your devotion to your shared bonds.”

Both Earth girls couldn’t help but being mesmerized by their opponent’s eyes. Signum Van Wolken eyes radiated with intelligence, power and will – it were true an eyes of the royalty and they drag Nanoha Takamachi and Arisa Bannings.  

“Um. Thanks, Signum-san. Oh, I’m sorry! I think dame Signum would be more appropriate way of address.” Stammered Nanoha, blushing slightly in embarrassment, hoping she didn’t aggravate the pink haired lady. Though now, as she could examine Belkan lady’s face more carefully she saw that she interlocutor not much older than she or Arisa, maybe 19 or 20 years old.

“Why are you doing this?!” Interrupted her too-nice-for-her-own-good-sometimes friend Arisa, glaring at the blekan woman (and tossing a side glances on radar from time to time). “What do you hope to achieve attacking us?!”

“If I recall the events of the recent past correctly, it was you and your comrades who open fire on my Laevantein without a warning first, earthling girl.” Retorted Signum with a hint of sarcasm in her voice as her eyes bore into the Arisa’s face. “Though I wouldn’t deny the fact that I’m the trespasser.”

“Indeed you are and you obviously want this dangerous relic, right?” Demanded blond girl, narrowing her eyes at the mage, whose face now was the passive mask illuminated by the numerous lights from the displays. “It’s already caused a tragedy and who know what are you want to do with this. We can’t let you have it.”

“Jewel Seeds indeed a dangerous objects.” Agreed belkan knight staring at green eyed Erath devcier. “If you don’t know how to control them. Like we, belkans do.”

“Dame Signum!” Nanoha, seeing how Arisa further narrowed her eyes, which was a signal that her temper starts to rise, decided to intervene until the situation can escalate. “Please just say what do you want to do with this Seed and maybe we can ask the true owner of these relics to help you.”

“You do understand that I’m a belkan, girl.” Signum’s expression and her voice grew a bit softer and there even was a hint of a smile on the pink haired woman’s lips. “And this mean I’m not on a good terms with your country, right?”

“Indeed I’m.” Nodded Nanoha resolutely, trying her bests to choose the words most carefully – she didn’t want to cause an incomprehension. “I know that there is a lot of bad blood between Earth Empire and the magic-using star nations but I also know that you’re a not a bad person, dame Signum.”

“What make you think so?” Pinkette gave Nanoha a smile where pity and sadness were missed in equal proportions. “Being merciful against inexperienced opponents who barely a treat to me now to manipulate their comrades in future not an uncommon tactic.”    

“Because if you truly wanted to resort to such method you would tell me about it..” Replied the daughter of Takamachi family, smiling sheepishly. “And you could attack this… machine… after he charged at our formation, which could break our formation before your arrival and thus helping you in achieving your object. Yet you strike him down before he could seriously harm anyone and you even didn’t use an opportunity to bombard our position from above.”

Arisa’s blood turned cold once she heard her friend statement. She was too concerned about saving her friends to think just how easily this warrior could turn their fortification into a mass grave by dropping just a pair of her plasma grenades on their heads.

Dear God, pilot of the crimson and gray knightmare really pulled the punches! No – she outright spared them!!

Arisa Bannings made a quick silent prayer to the Almighty and couldn’t help but looked with increased sympathy at the face of pink-haired mage on the screen. Seems, that Yuuno’s stories about the honor of the Belkan warriors weren’t a lie after all.

“Hah, you truly a nice person…” Chuckled Signum Van Wolken giving herself a leisure to feel a small amount of like toward this auburn haired girl from Earth. She had the skills and will of a true warrior, yet she was kind and somehow naive. “I admit that I enjoy your company earth girl..”

“Nanoha Takamachi.” Nanoha noticed the question in the tone of her interlocutor and quickly present herself. Somehow, purple eyed devicer know, that pink-haired mage wouldn’t try to use this against her.

“Well, since we end with pleasantries…” Pinkette’s voice suddenly gained the edge that made both Earth girls flinch – cold, stern and sharp, now the voice of the Signum Van Wolken reminded them about unsheathed sword and her eyes glimmered with fierce lights. It was obvious that blue eyed mage wasn’t in the mood the let them to hold her enough until the reinforcement arrive. “I give you a last choice, Nanoha Takamachi: surrender a Jewel Seeds this instant or face my blade!”

“I can’t do that, dame Signum.” Despite her shock Nanoha managed to reply with the same strength and conviction as her adversary (at least she hoped that this small squeak before word “I” wasn’t emitted by her throat).

“Well, THEN…!!” Signum’s cold retort was followed with roar of the jet engine as the pair of demonic wings on the back of her knightmare opened and the familiar green light of the Floating System appeared on the edges.

With the powerful gust of the wind demon knight leaved the ground of the mortals to charge forward with incredible speed. Arisa’s scream of terror and Nanoha’s desperate shriek mixed together as Nanoha tried to evade the blow.

Thunderous roar reverberate through the space together with the steam of the overheated air and shower of the sparks!

Nanoha’s Sutherland almost falls backward as the flames on the sword rampage across the magically protected blade just a meter away from the frame of the humanoid machine. Yet the circle woven out of the green light withstands the onslaught.

All three pairs of eyes widened in shock at this developments, but if Signum had the unpleasant surprise, Nanoha and Arisa shouted in joy at the same time: “Yuuno!!”

A time ferret stood at the edge of the previously beautiful glade in the center of the runic circle, surrounded by the same green light as the barrier he used to protect Nanoha. Tiny animal now had a very strong and intimidating aura: the discharges of the greenish light danced over his fur and his eyes shone as brightly as the sword of the Belkan KMF.

“I won’t let you hurt them!!”

And his mental declaration was no less loud then roar of the flames.
 
Top