by Jun Eishima
“What do we do?” Biggs asked.
“Well, we’re not leaving them to fend for themselves.”
“Right, then. Time to do a few favors,” Biggs said. “Boy, are they gonna owe us once this is all over.”
“You two round up the people on the ground and see them to somewhere safe. Send the word out to the other units to give you a hand. I’ll take care of Tiny myself.”
They’d spent endless hours in Altissia cleaning up wreckage and recovering the dead. It had been devastating work, and she wasn’t eager to replay that scene. These residents were still alive. They needed help getting out of the city. It was work a hundred times more preferable, even if it came with more risk.
Aranea took a running start, fired up the Stoss’s engine, and was back on the chase, flinging herself toward Diamond Weapon. No sooner did her feet hit one surface than they were leaping toward the next. Then, finally, she was leaving the tops of buildings behind, this time jumping onto the elevated ring road that encircled Gralea.
Diamond Weapon was finally in range of the Stoss.
“Y’know, for a big fella, you sure do get around a lot,” she muttered.
The city had already suffered enough; it was critical to minimize further damage. A quick immobilization would be key, and the best way to do that would be a single clean shot to whatever component controlled the thing’s actions. So if I was a giant magitek armor, where would I keep my brain? she thought, scanning the massive form. The core on its head seemed as likely a target as any. Even if the core didn’t have a control function, taking it out would at least neutralize a major threat. The scorched remains of the imperial ground forces were a testament to that.
“All right, Tiny. Time for your spanking.” Aranea steadied the Stoss, ready to deliver a quick, sharp thrust to the core, when the roar of igniting thrusters drowned out every other sound. A wave of incredible heat washed over her, and she threw an arm over her face to shield it from the blast. Then the ground was sloping away beneath her, and she was sliding, tumbling downward along with a collapsing segment of the elevated roadway. In one corner of her lopsided, shaking, sliding view of the city, Diamond Weapon blasted off into the sky.
A second later, the sliding was replaced with the gut-twisting sensation of freefall. Aranea frantically angled the Stoss and engaged the retrofire, using the momentum it generated to right herself. A brief touch of boots to ground, and then she was flying upward again, and not a moment too soon. The beams of the sagging roadway split, and tons of concrete smashed into the spot she’d just leapt away from.
She scanned the city as she completed her arc through the air. Diamond Weapon was now atop Zegnautus Keep, right at the center of the capital. Infuriatingly, its flight had preempted her attack by seconds.
“You all right down there?” Biggs asked.
She recalled giving an incomprehensible yell as the road had begun to collapse. Oops. Biggs must have caught it over the comm. He was probably wondering what on Eos was going on.
“Don’t worry about it. I’m fine. How are things over there?”
“We’ve rounded up all the civilians we can find.”
“Any safe place around here you can put them?”
Even as she said that, she knew there wasn’t. Licks of flame danced in every quarter, and daemons stalked the streets like they owned the place. After such rapid deterioration, there didn’t seem to be a single safe place left in Gralea.
“We might have to fly them out of the capital altogether,” Biggs said.
“Sounds about right.”
Who knew how many dropships they had left or how many evacuees they’d be able to carry? Aranea ran a quick mental count. Even assuming the best-case scenario, the situation seemed dire, and she doubted it would get any better.
“What’s your current location?”
“Right up alongside Zegnautus.”
It was a smart move, as long as Tiny didn’t change its mind and head back down. Building codes in the areas adjacent to the Keep had always been strict. No high-rises nearby to interfere with takeoff and landing. Better visibility than the residential district, too. They wouldn’t have to worry about being caught off guard by daemons or rogue MTs. It was a good place to gather the evacuees until they figured out what to do with them.
“Got it. I’m heading your way,” she responded.
And Zegnautus Keep was exactly where Aranea wanted to be, too. Diamond Weapon was up there, and it was finally standing still.
She found Biggs and Wedge among the empty lots at the base of the Keep. With them, several other troops were gathered, one aboard an MA on daemon cleanup duty, and another attempting to soothe a wailing child.
Biggs had referred to them as just “civilians” over the comm. More precisely, they were all children. The oldest looked like she’d maybe just hit double digits at best. It might have seemed strange to find only children and no adults, but Aranea had experienced something similar before. The adults must have seen to the children’s safety, then gone to try to hold off the daemons and MTs. She felt sure of it, remembering voices from the distant past.
Daemons are coming! Get the kids into the shelter!
You wait here, understand? Be extra quiet.
Aranea bit her lip.
“How about Tiny? Still up on his perch?” she asked, forcing herself to sound cheerful. This wasn’t the time or place for melancholy.
“Seems ready to go to roost,” Biggs said.
For an enemy positioned like that, the standard tactic would be to approach from above. But she wanted the dropship ready for a swift withdrawal. They’d be better off keeping the ship prepped and ready down here, in case it was needed. She sighed. That meant she’d be hoofing it through the Keep’s tortuous hallways and dealing with its elaborate security measures, the kinds of things that made you want to throw your hands in the air and give up. But it was the only other way to get to Diamond Weapon.
“Biggs, you keep leading the evacuation. Wedge, I need you down here running support. Keep the dropship hot in case we need it. Copy?”
A child’s wail preempted either man’s response. Aranea turned and spotted the crying boy. She walked over and placed a hand on his head. He was depressingly young. Young enough to be clinging to his mother’s legs. No comforting words came to mind―to offer them now and stay his tears might only prove more cruel once the day was done. Based on the city’s current state, there seemed little chance his parents were still breathing.
Still, little chance was a world of difference from none. Aranea ruffled his hair, then crouched down to look him in the eye.
“Listen up, little man. Right now, we’ve gotta concentrate on getting away. Don’t cry just yet.”
The child’s nose ran. He sniffled and wiped tears away with the back of one hand. Aranea’s chest burned. It was unforgivable, making a child of such tender years sob like this. She hated the military for leaving him in this situation―and she hated herself for being part of the organization. She gritted her teeth and turned back to her men.
“Let’s get this show on the road already. We need to transport these kids out of the capital. And there might still be other survivors roaming the streets. Pick up whoever you can on the way out.”
“Roger,” Biggs replied. “Be careful, Lady A. No telling what you’ll be up against in there.”
She nodded. She was no stranger to the Keep, but her visits had been restricted to only certain sections. Many had been off-limits, their purpose and contents classified, and the details of the structure’s layout had been barred to her. Rank notwithstanding, the clearance her mercenary status gave her was about as useful as spit in a rainstorm.
“I’ll be counting on you, Wedge.”
With her beloved Stoss holstered securely at her back, Aranea set off to brave the Keep.
Inside the elevator, Aranea�
�s battle against exhaustion raged on. If the lift had gone from the ground level all the way to the top, it would’ve been a safe bet that she’d be sound asleep by the time the doors opened again. But even on this relatively short trip to one of the intermediate levels, she found herself slumped on the floor, the doors at her back, when the elevator dinged its arrival.
Thus, after the doors slid open, her dramatic entry into the Keep was a moment spent splayed out on the floor, admiring the ceiling.
“Damn . . . I really need to get some sleep.”
At this rate, she was worried about nodding off during the confrontation with Diamond Weapon. Aranea raised both palms and gave her cheeks a hard slap.
“Wish I could find a place to splash some cold water on my face.”
The Keep did her one better: over the hallway speakers came the unsettling voice of Chancellor Ardyn Izunia.
“Citizens of the empire,” Izunia said. “I thank you for the great kindness you have shown me. And thus it is with deep sympathy and regret that I make this announcement. For today, you see, the illustrious history of your beloved homeland comes to an end.”
Sleep’s tenacious tendrils were instantly gone. It seemed the chancellor was speaking not only to the occupants of the Keep, but to the entire capital below.
“My, how unfortunate that His Radiance never managed to produce another heir.”
What was that supposed to mean? An entire nation had to end because the throne sat vacant?
“That creep could use a good smack in the face.”
Irritation lent Aranea’s legs an unexpected new burst of strength. Her heels slammed against the corridor floor faster than ever.
All things considered, Emperor Iedolas Aldercapt was a man of little fortune in terms of family. Thirty-five years ago, his empress bore him a son, only to lose her own life shortly thereafter. From what Aranea had heard, the woman’s constitution wasn’t up to the strain of childbirth, and the delivery took a toll from which she never recovered.
The emperor might have been loath to spark a debate about succession, or maybe it was simply out of love for his departed wife, but in any case, Niflheim hadn’t had another empress. It was a decision that would haunt Iedolas years later, when his sole heir perished on the field of battle.
Izunia carried on over the PA. “In truth, your dear emperor desired life everlasting. He would have liked to reign over his domain for all eternity.”
Hmph, Aranea thought. No heir, so instead just eliminate the need for one. What a ridiculous notion. To be human was to await death. With a fool that blind at the helm, it was little wonder their nation had drifted so far astray.
“Being the magnanimous individual that I am, I offered to help,” Izunia continued in his singsong way. “I cast a little spell on him.”
A spell? That didn’t sound good―not least of all if it came from hands as sinister as the chancellor’s. What was Izunia implying?
“But I’m afraid he’ll soon learn that immortality carries a price.”
Whatever this spell was, it was clearly something better left undone.
From what Aranea had heard, Ardyn Izunia had shown up in the empire thirty-four years ago, and rumor said the man’s appearance was all but simultaneous with a shift in the emperor’s character, from selfless statesman to selfish despot in a few years flat. Some people had tried to give the emperor the benefit of the doubt, asserting that the tragic loss of his beloved empress had been hard for him. But Aranea wasn’t above pinning blame on the man they now called Chancellor.
The only talk that circulated about Izunia suggested that he was up to no good. If someone got on his bad side, they were gone, with no explanation and no clues. All the while, the taxpayers’ hard-earned money was constantly funneled into his unsettling projects. Perhaps that alone wouldn’t have made for much of a story―such decisions were the prerogative of any ruler―but what really bothered Aranea about the man was one particular rumor she’d heard. Apparently, Izunia held some sort of sway over the daemons, or worse, he might be capable of spawning the things himself. The soldier who told her as much swore up and down that he’d watched it happen with his own eyes. Even if that wasn’t true, it was an indisputable fact that the empire’s understanding of the daemons had improved by leaps and bounds since Izunia’s arrival.
However, she couldn’t deny that research on the creatures and their uses had already been going on for some time previous to Izunia’s appearance. The man spearheading Niflheim’s daemonic research, Chief Verstael Besithia, had been secure in his position for years before Izunia showed up.
That left her with slim evidence at best, but still the suspicion lingered. Izunia carried on, traipsing through imperial affairs in his disarmingly carefree way. And Aranea could never shake the feeling there was something else lurking behind that ever-present smile. She was sure the man had other intentions, and he was damn careful never to give any hint of what they might be.
Aranea continued her sprint, hoping to leave the foreboding thoughts behind. To the end of the corridor, up the elevator to the highest floor it would go. Down the next corridor and up again. And again. There was a rhythm to it, along with a constant frustration about why whoever designed the place couldn’t have built one damn shaft all the way to the top.
“Well, don’t keep them all waiting,” the disturbing voice sang again over the speakers. “Don’t you have any last words for your beloved subjects?”
Last words?
An image formed in her mind of what Izunia was up to and who he was with.
Next came a different voice. It trembled as it spoke.
“Sol . . . heim . . . ”
It was a voice Aranea knew well. She wished it had been another.
“The sun of Solheim . . . will rise once more . . . ”
This final, hoarse whisper trailed off, replaced by an anguished groan. Aranea stopped cold. Then the groan faded away, too, and there was nothing but silence.
After a moment, a sad murmur sounded over the comm.
“Lady A? Was that . . . who I think it was?”
She hadn’t heard Wedge speak full sentences over the comm in days or more. It seemed a fitting sign of how disquieting the broadcast had been.
“Seems like it.” Her reply was brief, almost curt.
What the hell had happened? And what exactly was this “spell” Izunia had mentioned?
She was making her way toward the last elevator―the one that would finally see her to the top of the Keep―when she felt compelled to take a slight detour. The current floor would have a surveillance room. The Keep’s security cameras might shed some light on what had occurred.
She was retracing her steps down the corridor when another thought struck her: why the hell was security so light? She’d crossed paths with a few rogue MTs, but they’d been random encounters. It had been easy to lurk in the shadows and wait while they passed, or to run up behind them for a surprise takedown. The things used to be stationed at every door and hallway. If they’d all gone rogue, the Keep should have been crawling with malfunctioning troops. What had happened to them all?
Based on numbers alone, one explanation seemed logical: the Keep was the source of the rogue MTs rampaging in the city streets below. But given the structure’s winding layout, how had unprogrammed MTs made their way down to the city in unison? It would take far too much coordination for a bunch of malfunctioning machines.
She spoke the conclusion out loud. “Someone must have led them out.”
It was the only way the puzzle pieces fit together. And based on what she had just heard, it seemed obvious enough who the prime suspect was. It didn’t take a detective to figure out what had happened.
“Not a soul in sight,” she said with a sigh on entering the surveillance room. It should have been manned by several MT control officers. Instead, it was eerily quiet. Cle
arly, the human officers charged with monitoring and managing the Keep had been run out―or worse.
Aranea flipped the switches for every camera in the Keep. The room’s monitors flickered to life, filling with square after square of footage as the security cameras came online. She couldn’t see a single human officer across the entire display.
She found the camera for the throne room on the top floor and selected its feed to enlarge on the main screen. Her fears had been spot-on.
“By the Six . . . ”
Any further words eluded her. Sprawled across the rich, leather-upholstered seat was a body, bent backward as if snapped at the spine. Its skin was black as ink, its eyes wide open, with trails of ebony tears still glistening on its cheeks. But despite the discoloration and disfigurement, there was no mistaking His Imperial Majesty Iedolas Aldercapt dead upon his throne.
That he was dead was quick enough to ascertain, but the means of death was less so. Whatever had happened to the man, it wasn’t anything within the normal bounds of human experience. His robes hung in shreds from his shoulders. That the emperor himself seemed to have clawed at them with enough force enough to rip them apart hinted at the extent of his agony. It looked like Ardyn Izunia’s spell was as poisonous as the man himself.
Aranea bowed her head in a brief moment of silence, then flipped the surveillance system off. It had cost her a bit of time, but at least she knew the truth. Now she needed to focus. A certain weapon of mass destruction awaited her. Time for a charming rooftop date.
“The only good daemon is a dead one,” she muttered, dashing back to the end of the corridor and into the elevator.
This time, no trace of sleep haunted her. The moment the elevator reached the top and a crack appeared between the doors, she jammed her way through. She was already halfway down the final short corridor when she heard them fully open. She vaulted up the stairway and positioned herself in front of the door leading outside.
“Hope you’re ready to die,” she growled.
