by P. S. Power
“Gah!” Then, quickly enough, he started to go for a weapon. From the look of what he was doing that was going to be a PC. A power conduit. It took a certain amount of skill as well as magical power, to even make one of the things work. That told her a lot about who she was facing.
Gwen smiled and waved at him.
“General Alstop? I’m Gwen Farris. We’ve met before?” She waited, in case the name was wrong. The man was in a green uniform however, with enough shiny and colorful ribbons to be both military and important.
“Miss Farris? This is most irregular. Are… you all right?” It was a slightly strange thing to ask, but he didn’t start out by trying to grab her behind, which meant he had to go the other direction, being very concerned for her. There were only so many things that politeness allowed him to do in the moment. Plus, she wasn’t giving him a lot of time to consider his responses. It was a bit rude of her, no doubt.
Looking around the room, clearly his office, she noticed that on his desk, a very grand wooden thing, there was a brass name plate. It said General Harold Alstop, which made for a good point of confirmation.
It was possible that he could have known she was coming, then set things up like that, but she really had to doubt that it would be the case. That level of skill in precognition was as rare as teletransport on the level she was using it.
“Stand by for Duke Morten? If this area is secure?”
The man nodded, looking puzzled.
“It is. I can lock the door, or…”
She nodded, left, grabbed Groundling, then returned, so fast that she ended up having to sit on the ground, gasping for air. It was her least favorite part of using her new skills. The heavy breathing portion of events. It hurt, almost as much as doing heavy sprints did.
Both men seemed concerned by that part, so she waved at them to do their thing. Groundling got it first, his face a bit dark.
“We got the documents requested. Right now we’re being pursued out of Eng. Miss Farris suggested that we get them to you now, in case we don’t make it. We should be able to, but it isn’t the wrong idea, just to hedge the wager. I don’t know if we can go back from here…” He looked at Gwen, who nodded, and made herself stand up.
“Yeah… Just a… Just a minute.” It was hard enough that the man, who was rather solid around the middle, she’d noticed, seemed to get the idea. They weren’t leaving their ship two people down if it came to a fight. Especially since she was the one that could fly over and take care of things.
The General glanced at the files, then set them on his desk. It was tidy, nearly to the point of being bare.
“Very good. I was unaware that we had access to anyone that could do that sort of thing. Miss Farris… The name is familiar, but…” He looked at Duke Morten, as if he just didn’t get it.
Groundling glanced at the door.
“Special Service. Civilian side. Temporarily working on the Peregrine to fill a crew gap. I’ll get you a number, in case you need to beg her help. She’s the one that invented the dot-aimers?”
The man went wide eyed then. He smiled in fact and brought his hands together happily.
“Ah! I do recall you then. Amazing magic that. Wonderful. I will be in touch soon, if that’s acceptable? There are some things… Well, I won’t speak of them now. No offense, Duke Morten. Compartmentalization.” He glanced at Gwen, as if she might not understand the word.
That was only because he didn’t know that she’d watched as much television as she had. It made sense to her on a level that probably would have shocked the fellow if he learned about it.
“Understood. Let’s get back now? I should be back at Park Street in… Well, we’re making pretty good time on the Peregrine at the moment, so I don’t know? We won’t have to unload on the far side either.”
Groundling, seeming more like Duke Morten suddenly, regardless of how he was dressed, filled her in. Both of them, actually. It was apparent that he was addressing Henry, too.
“Eight days. Clearly, that’s if we can fight off or disrupt the following craft. Miss Farris can be around earlier. Handy talent, teletransport.” The words were a bit impressed sounding, for some reason.
The other man nodded.
“Rare. Special Service already? Brilliant catch on their part. I’ll be in touch as soon as possible. Nice to meet you again, Miss. Duke Morten.” He bowed then, but not too far.
Gwen nodded, then grabbed Groundling in a way that probably looked like she was going to pick him up from behind and moved back to the airship. That gave her another five minutes of gasping to get past. It kind of sucked, to be honest. Not in the fun way either.
Gwen considered that as her new catch phrase, since she had a perfectly good boyfriend to practice on right there. Not that they’d been doing anything that interesting on the ship. Not even holding hands. Tom had been keeping to his act incredibly well. Nearly like a spy from a movie. Then, he was a super hero. It probably followed that he had mad skills in keeping things separated like that.
Then, having done all the teletransport for the day, she got to go and clean things, even if they were being chased by insane Europans. In a strange way it made sense for two reasons. The first was just keeping everyone busy. They had energy to burn, after all, so might as well use it. The second, well, they might have guests soon. Which wasn’t really true, since there was no good way to force a boarding of an airship.
You just took them out of the air, if you needed to do anything. You could couple ships. One of them would have to be much larger than the other to start with. Then the people on the smaller craft would need to be willing to close with them. After that both sides would be needed to help tie things down. It took incredible coordination between pilots at the same time.
So it wasn’t really happening that night.
After that was dinner, which was beef steaks, gravy and fried potatoes, along with fresh rolls that the cook had made. She didn’t seem upset to see Darnell in particular, meaning that she’d probably not been in on the false story. It was probably just as well, really. There was a good chance that she didn’t know about the special work that the crew had been getting up to or anything like that. Which meant that for the story to really fly, Darnell would have had to actually bother her enough to be noticed by the others.
So, lies were the better plan that way.
Tomas sat right next to her, his leg brushing hers occasionally under the table. It wasn’t anything overt. At least she didn’t think it was. No one jumped up to thrash him at any rate. The food was good, but Gwen didn’t stuff herself. She had things to go and do. Being uncomfortable would just make that harder.
After the meal was done, a thing filled with tension and small talk, Gwen waved at Groundling.
“Can I borrow a crin? I can’t fly and blast power at the same time. I’ll leave half an hour after twilight. I need to be able to see, but don’t want to be noticed.”
The man didn’t respond for a few moments, but instead of telling her that a girl had no place killing fifty odd people, there was a single nod.
“Let’s get that done. It’s poor form on our part, but so is coming after us because they didn’t like the candy. That’s war for you though. It turns everyone into animals. Are you certain you can handle this?”
Gwen didn’t really know, but acted like it was a simple enough thing for her to do. Honestly, that could be the truth, if she was able to avoid being killed while she tried to fly over. Groundling didn’t make her wait, or ask twice for a weapon. That was gotten from a locked panel, which was inside the broom closet. Which was where everyone normally kept their weapons on civilian ships. Clearly.
She checked the crystal pack in the handle, making certain it was fully charged. It didn’t have a dot-aimer on it, which could actually come in handy. None of the weapons had one, so she’d have to make do. That probably wasn’t going to be a huge problem. The bag on the other airship was probably the size of several large warehouses put togethe
r. It looked pretty big to her anyway.
“Right. I’ll be back in about an hour. Save me some candy?” It wasn’t really dark yet, so she waited, going to the lowest deck, since it was the broadest one. When the ship was lit up fully in the distance, the red and white nearly glowing in the setting sun, she held the crin’s copper tube in her left hand, then rose from the deck. That meant using the game controller in her mind. It was how she made it all work for her. A thing which probably meant she was well and truly insane. It worked though, for a lot of things. She just pretended that she was holding a game controller. Then, knowing what it was supposed to do, holding the feeling of that part of the magic, it just worked. As long as she added power constantly at the same time.
In this case the hard part was going to be the distance and time involved.
Unless people started shooting at her. That would become the big problem, if she messed up, or was noticed doing what she was. The idea wasn’t that no one wouldn’t be looking at her, as much as it was that no one would be expecting a person to fly off into the night. Not from that far away. It took a while to get to the right spot, about a thousand feet over the top of the candy striped bag. It was hard to see, since it was getting darker out. There was no particular sound from the thing. Then, the wind was mild and the engines were largely various magical things. Corrections used steam rockets, which weren’t that loud. They hissed, but there was no roaring sound.
They also weren’t her concern. What was, at the moment, would be the idea that she didn’t want to be directly above a large explosion. Hydrogen gas would heat the air, which would go pretty much straight up. To that end, she moved over to the side, by about a quarter of a mile, huffing loudly enough already that she had to question how, exactly, she was going to get back.
Still, she fired and managed to hit the bag below and in front of her, on the third shot. The fourth missed again, but the fifth and sixth did their jobs, making the thing explode. It wasn’t like in the movies though, just making a whumping sound, the light showing that it was well and truly on fire. Going down suddenly too. If anyone noticed her there, flying away, they didn’t manage to hit her with anything.
Then, they were probably all a little bit busy at the moment.
Dying would do that to you. Not that it was an instant death sentence, going down over the ocean. It was, as likely as not, a choice between burning to death, or diving into the cold water below. Now that it was underway, she winced.
“Not… Cool… Gwen.” Her breath was hard enough that she wondered if she could make it back. It was tempting to let go, plunging toward the water, with the idea that she could teleport from there as she fell. The problem was that she was already a bit too tired to really do that. Maybe she could, or maybe she’d just end up in the drink, not swimming well at all, since she didn’t know how.
Being crippled as a child, no one had ever thought to teach her. Functionally she probably couldn’t have learned, since her mouth didn’t really close back then. Not until after a whole lot of surgery.
So, to avoid that and already knowing what real pain was from her training with the Westmorlands, she flew into the night, nearly missing the Peregrine, since they didn’t have any exterior lights on. That was normal enough, unless they were coming in for a night landing. Over the ocean, they weren’t going to hit anything.
Luckily there was a bit of light coming from the ocean behind her. The craft that had been chasing them not sinking at all it seemed. Not in any kind of quick or easy fashion.
Which she could kind of understand. The gondola under the bag was essentially a boat, after all. It was still on fire however, so watertight on the bottom or not, they were helping her out. Not a lot, but just enough she could make out the silver thing as it flew along. Just as she got to the deck, her power gave out, dumping her with a thud.
No one was around though, which was fine with her, since she had some heavy breathing to do.
No one wanted to listen to that. Well, someone might want to, but they were probably sick individuals that had too much time on their hands.
Chapter fourteen
After a whole week, with an extra day tacked on like Groundling had mentioned, the Peregrine returned to its home hangar. It was nice to be there, but seemed strange, since there was no cargo to unload. It made the trip feel incomplete somehow. Like they were cheating the company, using their ship to travel around like they were.
Oddly, no one minded that part of things. After all, they’d finished the important mission part already. That Gwen hadn’t had much to do with that, on paper, meant that she apparently wasn’t going to be called in as soon as they got back to answer to government officials. It would be coming, she didn’t doubt. Probably by Ferdinand doing it himself. That wasn’t exactly the easiest thing for her to deal with, or the best way for it to be done, but she understood he meant well. To him, it was a kindness, since he knew that he was a great guy. That part was true.
Which was what made it harder for her than if it was some person she didn’t know calling her on the carpet to dress her down for getting involved where she wasn’t actually needed. Gwen was really good at ignoring jerkwads that wanted to harm her, after all. What she was less skilled at was having people that meant the best for her standing there looking sad about the risks she was taking.
Still, she managed to get Tomas back to his house after only about ten minutes. She didn’t love doing things like teletransport with multiple people at once, but it was clear that it was going to be coming up for a good long while. The war needed someone like her. At least now that it was a known thing that they could get prisoners back from the enemy like they could.
Gwen stretched as soon as her breathing became regular again, sitting on the nice sofa that Tom had in his living room. Back sitting room, to be more exact. His place wasn’t exactly Park Street, but Gwen didn’t mind that so much. It was a nice big house, with good things inside of it. Like her boyfriend.
That was a thing that she really expected to just vanish, of course.
Having a person to call her own. She had a few that were around though. Friends. Like Bethany and even Ethyl. Agatha, Ferdinand, Heather… The list went on past that even. Which was a good thing. A strange and nearly unbelievable one that made her smile. It was that expression that she was wearing as Tomas turned to her, his face lighting up.
“It was different than I thought it would be. We… Actually did something, didn’t we? True, I didn’t do as much as some, but…” He smiled anyway, his eyes happy seeming. “But it was real. Omegon actually managing to help, even if it was only by sweeping a floor or two. That’s enough, isn’t it? We, the world, the kingdom… We don’t need a masked hero to stand for us. Just people willing to try…”
He stopped then, his face twisting a bit.
Gwen just nodded though, still happy.
“Yep. In the end that’s really all we need. Not that training and hard work won’t help, too. Now, I need a good shower. Do you want to come with me?” It was incredibly forward of her, but for the first time in her life she wasn’t afraid that someone was going to reject her out of hand. Even if they ended up not being together eventually, they were together then, at that moment.
“Yes. I’d like that, Miss Farris. There is a good one over here, near the master bedroom?” He led the way, carrying his bag along with him. “Plenty of room in here, if you’d like to stay?”
He smiled at her, his face seeming peaceful for some reason. Content.
Like that was going to last for more than a few moments.
“Sounds fun. Of course we need to go and see to that training in the morning. With Pete and Manly? Plus, we should also make sure you get your next graphic novel out. It can be about how Omegon the hero fights the evil Europans? Not that they’re all bad. We just haven’t gotten to see the good ones yet, most likely. Well, except that one man.” She grinned then, realizing that her boyfriend hadn’t even heard that story. Not from her anyway. It was
possible that someone else had told him, but it wasn’t public knowledge.
“Oh? Was he nice?” There was something in his voice then, which she didn’t really recognize. Not at first.
Jealousy. It was a mild thing, but still there, if highly suppressed.
“After a fashion. He was a healer. From Europa. He started having visions of the world being destroyed by the Elder Gods, so worked to find a way to save everything from total annihilation. In the end all he had to do was help kidnap a woman from a different reality, killing her in the process. Sacrificing one life, to save millions. Billions, in the end. It was… Well, a good trade, don’t you think? I know that we all get to blame Kat for it all, but she wasn’t alone in getting it all done.”
That had been Jeffrey. A man that she barely knew, having only met him two or three times. He’d known her, however.
Tomas looked a bit hard then and frowned as they walked. The place was bigger inside than she’d originally thought, she realized.
“He died in the events in the cave?”
She blinked, smiled and shook her head.
“Um, no? He’s still alive, as far as I know. Not even in prison. After all, he saved the world. He offered to kill himself, after it was done, but that seemed a bit… I don’t know, like a bad ending. Besides, it isn’t like he’s going to keep doing that sort of thing. He can’t steal anyone from other realities himself and wouldn’t even if he could. So I asked Ferdinand to just let him go. You know, the whole pat on the back routine?”
Turning to walk through a rather nicely decorated door, which was white with gold paint on the trim, her boyfriend grumbled a bit.
“Still, you should be treated better than that. Everyone should. At least if we can.”
Dropping her own bag, Gwen looked around. The room was easily big enough for two. More than that if they wanted to get kinky. Not that it was her plan for the near future. Being close to someone was nice though, now that she’d done it a few times.
