Beyond?

by Andur

  “Unfortunately they are moving a little too fast and are hard to hit. We already tried it nonetheless and learned that their barriers are able to take a hit. We have to hit the same target repeatedly, which makes it impossible to reduce their numbers in a meaningful way.” Our strategic analyst raises his hand. “But it may not be as bad as it looks.” He instructs the light sculpture to show us another figure. The sculpture changes to display four different looking ships. “I analysed the high resolution pictures of our satellites and talked about them with our technological staff. It looks like the enemy fleet is composed of different types of ships.”

  He points at the first one, which seems to be the smallest. They are slim and seem to be the most seaworthy of the four types, being formed the closest to a working ship. “Those don't seem to armed very well. They are also moving much faster than the rest of the invasion fleet and have to wait from time to time for the others to catch up. I dubbed that class as scout for the time being. I don't think that they have much fighting potential on their own, since their crew is very likely limited to fifty to seventy people. There are five hundred sixty seven ships of this type in the enemy fleet.”

  Moving on to the next ship, which seems to be a scaled up version of to scout, his expression turns a little grimmer. “Those seem to be a bigger version, carrying up to five hundred people. We are calling them warriors for now. I think they are the main fighting force since there are definitely cannons deployed on those ships. The good news is that we counted only five thousand three hundred of them.”

  “Oooh... that makes it much better. So we are just facing a little less than six thousand dedicated warships. What are the rest?” Stella's sarcastic voice stops the analyst's enthusiasm.

  “Ahem...” He points at the third ship, which is just a bulky oval with a few sails. Putting those in water might end up with them floating around, but they certainly won't move anywhere on their own. “Those don't seem to be armoured very well and there are no recognizable weapons on them. They are also very slow, which strongly suggests that they are just some kind of troop transports. They make up most of the fleet with approximately fourteen thousand ships.”

  Helen nods her head at the last ship, which is also a very bulky, round leviathan. It's U-shaped and while it may float, I am certain that those things won't sail anywhere in water. “And those?”

  “Some kind of support and repair vessel, also completely unarmed. It's shape is perfect to use it as a dock for the other three types and those cranes back up this theory.” The analyst answers with confidence.

  Lucas scratches his forehead. “That just means that they are coming with the intention to stay. Having those docks with them means that they can repair their ships on the battlefield.”

  I smile at him, forming an idea in my head, and gesture at the ships. “That's true, but those ships have a weakness.”

  The military analyst nods to confirm that his department also thought about something. “Azir is right and our department already thought of a way to take them down.” He recalls the tactical map from earlier and points at a small group of islands between the main continent and the approaching fleet. “We have to be fast and intercept them here at all costs! This may work only once and we have to get them before they split their forces. Once they reach the main continent we can't be certain of their movements, but from their direct route so far we are certain that they'll pass those islands very closely.”

  King Novak nods. “Yes? And?”

  “We'll mine those islands. All we have to do is to give them a proper reason to change the course of their fleet just a little.” The analyst grins broadly, having reached the exact same conclusion as me.

  I smile. “King Novak. Quinn doesn't happen to have a spare magic inhibitor? And I am not talking about the small ones. I am talking about city size?” Their big inhibitors can cover several dozens of kilometres. Their capital is huge and if it were covered by a network of inhibitors I would have found it during my tour through the city.

  Leon forms an 'O' with his mouth and starts smiling. “Of course we do. If we place three of the bigger ones in a triangle we could cover the whole group of islands. But what could we offer those bastards to encourage them to change the course of their whole fleet?”

  The analyst drops his head. “That's the weak point of our strategy. We are intending to teleport to those islands, a stepper disc is already in place. Our department took the freedom to create a network of them wherever we could place them. Just in case something happens to the only one who can teleport around as he wishes.” He takes a guilty look at me, but I don't feel insulted by it. In fact I am happy that the military does some smart things on its own.

  “We intend to place as many facilities as possible on those islands. If we move all available assets there we could raise about twenty improvised fortresses out of the ground. But without something that really draws their attention, they might just send a part of their dedicated fighting vessels while moving on with the rest of their fleet.” The analyst shrugs his shoulders, not being able to offer more.

  Taking out a big part of the invasion fleet will help a lot, But I see in everyone's faces that they know that it isn't enough. If a sizeable amount of those troop transporters reaches the main land we have a big problem and the enemy surely won't send all his transports to attack a small group of islands. Even sending two hundred of them would be overkill.

  What would be big and important enough to make them change the course of their whole fleet? I honestly have no idea.

  The silence in the room stretches out for several seconds until Chuck drops his totem onto the table. “Dwem might have what we need.”

  His advisor gasps. “We can't reveal-”

  The Great Shaman shuts him up with an angry gesture. “If those ships reach the main continent Dwem's biggest secrets won't help much in the long run.”

  Chuck takes off his mask, revealing his face like it wasn't a big deal. The silence in the room is even more profound now. Chuck's face belongs to a man in his thirties, which means that Chuck must be a lot older when you take into account that he is a very strong mage. He's clean-shaven and has and has clearly defined cheekbones which underline his independent personality. His whole face is covered in strange tattoos which merge with each other.

  Taking a flat crystal, which was attached to the inside of his mask, he places it on the table and presses his thumb onto it. A light sculpture appears and Chuck gives a series of commands until a ship appears. It's a broad, flat design, which sharpens at the edges and gets pointier towards the prow. “Three point six kilometres long, two point two kilometres wide. Ten layers of barriers and packed with weapons. This leviathan is Dwem's biggest secret and most powerful technological artefact. Once those bastards see it, they'll swing their whole fleet around to face it. Given that the so called Master is really the second Draco brother, he'll recognize it.”

  The analyst squints his eyebrows, inspecting the monster of a battleship with sceptical eyes. “What makes you so sure of that? Isn't it just another fortress to them?”

  Chuck crosses his arms in front of his chest. “Because that's the Emperor's Shield! It went down in Dwem during the great war. We secured it and repaired everything to the best of our knowledge. That's why we kept so much of our technological knowledge. The database of this ship was very helpful.” Chuck tilts his head in dismay. “The only problem is that we can't control it, even though everything seems to work properly.” His eyes wander to me. “But maybe our techno-mage genius can push the right button?”

  “Oh, yes. We have time pressure and your three point six kilometres long, two point two kilometres wide cell phone died! Now I have to find the problem in a few days? Aren't you a little too confident in me, Chuck?” I gesture at the 'thing', which really looks like a shield upon a second glance.

  Chuck shrugs with his shoulders. “Surprise me.”

  104. ~Interlude.~

  “Parents can only give advic
e, but a person's character lies in their own hands.”

  -Knowledge.

  Dwem, Secret Research Facility I, The Shield of the Emperor

  Azir

  “Dad, I want to go home and play!” Sariel complains in my arms. “Playing with Ghost in the garden is much more fun.”

  “Just a little longer my little princess. This is a very important task and you are very helpful in solving it. Without you I wouldn't have been able to do this.” Carrying my daughter to another bit of strange machinery, I place her in front of me and point at a set of tubes. “Now look there.” She sighs and does as told.

  Having a magical X-ray device is very convenient and helped a great deal in revealing the secrets of this ship. I softly connect to her consciousness and take a look at the machine through Sariel's eyes.

  To Sariel it's just a set of nonsensical magical circuits and mechanical devices, but to me it's a piece of art. Having her with me spared me the effort of taking everything apart.

  “Do you remember that night when we had a storm and the lights went out?” Sariel grumbles while I adjust where she is looking. Taking her head with both hands to guide her proved to be the best way of doing it.

  “Yes, a lightning bolt fried the safety fuse of our house's power generator. I had to switch it.” Studying the machine, my attention wanders to the control console at its side, so I orient Sariel's head to look at it.

  “You made something with your multi-tool which you called a flashlight.” She closes her eyes in protest and covers them with her hands. “Right now I feel like I am nothing more than a flash-light to you.”

  I ignore her closed eyelids and hands, using her ability to look through them, right at the magical circuit. After a few moments of studying it I pick her up again.

  “Fine. We've been working for five hours, so you deserve a break. Do you want to ride on my shoulders as an apology?” I smile at her.

  “Only if you promise to slow down in front of doors.” She rubs her forehead, looking accusingly at me. I already carried her through the ship while we did our first assessment of the ship's situation. Unfortunately my attention got diverted several times, which resulted in a few incidents.

  Forgetting about Sariel, who was riding on my shoulders, I walked through a bulkhead with a low doorframe and got rewarded with the rather hollow sounding noise of my daughter's head impacting the doorframe. Of course her head isn't really hollow. But like it's always with children, her interests are everywhere else, except of where they should be. She was too busy with watching all the blinking lights instead of taking care of her head.

  “I promise to be careful.” So I pick her up and place her on my shoulders. There are no problems on our way back and when we reach the bridge, we are greeted by Chuck, Stella, Helen and Leon.

  The bridge is a big, round room with a generous frontal screen. The screen shows the huge hangar doors of the dry dock, which is hidden inside a mountain.

  Dwem poured a lot of resources into hiding their treasure. I don't want to imagine how much it must have cost to move this ship into this hollow mountain. But on the other hand... how did they move the ship if they can't control it? Does that mean they built the mountain around the ship?

  “So, did you find the mistake?” Chuck places his hands in a praying position, looking forward to my results.

  “The ship works perfectly fine, even the parts which you guys had to repair. The engineers did a really good job despite not understanding the technology completely.” I praise his staff.

  “So why is it not working?” Chuck jumps out of the chair in the middle of the room, which he chose as his personal throne.

  Shrugging my shoulders I inspect the command chair closer. “It's like I assumed it to be, the ship is obviously in a lock-down mode. We need a person with the proper rights to issue orders. I suggest to pull Jeremiah out of his cell. Luckily he should be exactly what we need.”

  “If you assumed that from the start, then why did you wander through the whole ship for over five hours!?” Chuck shakes his fist at me.

  I furrow my eyebrows and try to tilt my head, but since Sariel is holding onto my horns it doesn't work. “Obviously I wanted to take a good look at the technology. It doesn't happen often that you get to see a ship that's capable of space flight.”

  “Sp... Space flight!?” Helen gasps. “Please don't tell me that the Emperor was some kind of alien!”

  I chuckle and take Sariel from my shoulders, placing her on the throne. “It's not like that. I just stated a fact. This ship is capable of space flight. Nothing more, nothing less. In addition it's capable of generating strong magnetic fields, to attract metal or to push it away. In fact the whole ship was built for that purpose. I suppose that those magnetic fields are a strong defence, which is why the ship is called the Shield of the Emperor.”

  I pause for a moment to think about the implications of having something like this ship, combining the new knowledge with the mana streams and the portal offers a few very interesting possibilities. A few of them are so horrible that I am tempted to eradicate the whole Draco breed on suspicion alone. “In any case. I think placing Jeremiah in the pilot's chair should do the trick. All the consoles on this ship seem to be locked onto a certain genetic code. We just have to shackle him properly until we can get the proper control rights.”

  “Mwahahaha! Blinking, beeping buttons! Let's play a song!” “Beep, ba, be, di, bub!”

  *Boom!*

  Suddenly the entire ship shudders and I turn to face the main screen which showed the big exit doors of the hidden dry dock. The doors are bent and curled outwards.

  My eyes wander back to Sariel, whom I placed in the pilot's chair just a moment ago. My cute little girl is dressed in a blue robe, which really suits her. Her hand is on a console at the chair's side, one finger hovers above a big, red button and her gaze is transfixed on the screen.

  Then she licks over her lips and removes her hand from the console. With overly careful movements she sits on top of her hands and puts on the innocent smile of a little child. “I didn't do it.”

  Stella appears at Sariel's side and jerks her out of the chair, pulling on one ear. “Didn't I tell you? Never push any buttons on Azir's artefacts!”

  I raise my hand and try to protect Sariel. “It's not her fault. I put her in that chair.” And who could have known that she has the right gene sequence?

  Stella lets go of Sariel and pushes her into my hands. “Like father, like- argh- I wanted to say son, but Sariel is a girl!”

  Helen sighs and shakes her head. “We should still get Jeremiah as a living key. I don't feel comfortable using my grandchildren to pilot this thing.”

  Free City States of Nict, Capital

  Stella

  It's late in the evening and the Shield of the Emperor is finally on its way to the battle grounds. I sigh in relief while sitting in my mansion's kitchen. Sariel, Zadkiel and Zana are on the ground, playing with some books.

  “Mama, how do you make babies?” Zadkiel's voice breaks the silence and I freeze.

  “Hahaha, you guys are too young for that.” I try to avert the question.

  “But I want to know too!” Zana calls out. “This book says that you get babies by having sex, but what's sex?”

  I jump up and take the book from Zana. It's some kind of romance novel! Luckily I got it before they got to read the dirty part! “Where did you get this.”

  Sariel starts fidgeting. “We found it in Ivy's room. It's just borrowed! We have to bring it back before she finds out! But still, what's sex?”

  Oh, gods! How can I explain that to little children like them? They are extraordinary little children, but still! “Y- y- you know. T- there are- f-f- flowers a- nd b-bees...”

  Just in that moment Azir enters the kitchen. He walks over to the fridge and grabs some fruits and meat from it, stashing it onto a plate. That's it! He is several hundred years old! Surely he knows how to explain that delicate issue to children! “Azi
r! Please explain to them how babies are made!”

  Azir looks up from his plate. “What's with that stupid question? Babies are made by having sex!”

  “Yes, but what's sex? Is it hard to do?” Zadkiel asks.

  Zana points at a game which is lying between the three of them. “Helen gave us this board game, but it says that it only gets really funny if you have four players.”

  Sariel nods. “So we thought about making a fourth sibling to play it with us.”

  Azir frowns. “Sex is when an adult man and a woman, who aren't directly related, love each other. The man stabs his penis into the woman's vagina, which may hurt the first time. Then they rub against each other until it feels so good that the man pees some white stuff into the woman. Afterwards she gets pregnant and has all sorts of mental issues, which may become really painful for the man. A few months later she lays one to two eggs, which hurts. Some time later the egg hatches and you get your baby.” He leaves with his food, mumbling. “Isn't she the biology student? Why do I have to explain it?”

  “Mom, your face is completely red. Are you okay?” Sariel asks me curiously.

  Zana is just sitting there with a pale face. “Pees... hurts... urgh... why would anyone want to do that?”

  “So that means that we don't get a sibling to play the game? Can you somehow speed up the whole process?” Zadkiel looks sorrowful at the board game.

  I get up to follow Azir. “Just a moment. I have to talk to your father.”

  Free City States of Nict, Capital

  Sariel

  I follow Mom with my eyes. When she is gone I turn back to my brother and sister. “Asking Daddy such questions is no fun. Though Mom's reactions are cute to watch.”

  “Do you think we overdid it?” Zadkiel asks, but his eyes stay glued to the board game. “It would be nice to have a fourth person. Do you think persuading Mom and Dad to make a child is hard?”