Ingrid woke to the sound of sirens. She kicked the blankets off and reached down under her bed for her clothes. All around her in the other beds women in various states of undress were doing the same. Ingrid stripped naked and fished for fresh undergarments. The other women were doing the same. There wasn't a lot of privacy in this place even on a good day.

"AYARU ATTACK!" the Air Sergeant yelled from the doorway to the vast tent. That beast of a woman. Ingrid shivered. "All airmen prepare for battle immediately!"

A strange aircraft flew overhead as Ingrid ran out of the tent. It had a massive propeller at the end of each wing, and it was very loud. It was painted in a white and red livery decorated with the emblems of the Heylin Empire. It was escorted by no less than six fighter jets. They were flying north.

The airfield outside the tent was filled with countless fire elementals, shining like candles in the murky twilight. The sky looked mostly clear, and the horizon was a blood red color between the peaks to the east. Ingrid could see her breath. Men were streaming out of the tent for the men who had been recruited in town. They were being prodded along by soldiers towards the Air Sergeant, who was organizing everyone into groups of four airmen.

When it was Ingrid's turn, she ended up standing behind Boris, the shoemaker's son. The two other men looked familiar but she did not know their names. Boris turned slightly and whispered to her, "Ingrid, why do the soldiers look like they are going to shoot us?"

Ingrid had not noticed. A glance at the soldiers confirmed what Boris said. The soldiers held their rifles with a firm grip and their eyes darted about uneasily. An officer approached, a well-built man with a mustache wearing a dark blue cloak over one shoulder and many tiny medals pinned to his chest in a square.

"Lieutenant Cole, this group is ready," the Air Sergeant said as she pointed to the formation of airmen grouped into quads.

"Airmen! MARCH!" the Lieutenant bellowed with a voice that could be heard in a hurricane. Nobody had practiced any marching yet, and Ingrid tried her best to just stay with her little quad without being kicked in the shins or stepped-on by the group behind her. He led them, escorted by half a dozen armed soldiers, across the airfield to rows of fighter jets parked in groups of five. They all appeared to have their engines already running.

When the Lieutenant got to Ingrid's group, Boris asked "Are they going to make us fly today? We've only had two days flying in these things!" The Lieutenant drew his pistol and pointed it at Boris.

"Disobey a direct order and I will kill you now!" Cole screamed at Boris. The boy went pale. "Your gems are inside the cabin and the engines are already running. Cast the ladder away when you climb into the cabin, then wait for instructions from your Formation Commander. GO GO GO!"

When Ingrid climbed into the cabin of her fighter, there were two small glass boxes that she did not recognize nailed onto the dashboard. They each had glowing magenta spheres filled with lightning-like tendrils. One of the boxes started talking.

"This is your Formation Commander. You will follow my instructions exactly. Any deviation and I will shoot you out of the sky myself. Cast away your ladders and close your canopy."

After Ingrid had locked the canopy, she reached into her pocket and grabbed the two gems that Vaska had given her. She discreetly summoned the two elementals, fortifying her body and acquiring the two little eyeball helpers that crawled up onto the dashboard. "What is this thing?" Ingrid asked, pointing to the talking box.

That is a Colored Orb, a type of Thunder Elemental, the demon said with two female voices in harmony. It is linked to another and is capable of broadcasting sound.

"Does it work both ways?" Ingrid asked.

No

"What about this one?" she asked, pointing to the second box.

Likely a backup or maybe an officer with a higher rank.

The Formation Commander gave them instructions to taxi the craft and line up for takeoff. He took off first, and then gave them instructions to take off and hold varying airspeeds once airborne, with a specific heading. As Ingrid was pulling back on the stick during takeoff, her little demon said: Your elementals are not bound to you.

"Is that bad?"

They are receiving instructions from another.

"But the gems are right here," Ingrid said, pointing to a pouch inside a mesh at her side.

Ah, that must be the purpose of the second box. To give specific instructions to specific Elementals on specific aircraft. The Elementals cannot drift too far from the gems, you see, or they will be dismissed. However they can still follow instructions from the person who summoned them or nearby people.

"Can they follow my instructions?" She asked.

Yes but the other pilots won't know that.

"Oh gods..." Ingrid said. "We aren't soldiers, we're sacrifices!"

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That is likely. They will put you on the front to absorb missiles sent by the enemy.

"What can I do?"

Your first order of business is to dismiss all of your Elementals and then summon them again. This will not be a problem for most of them, however the Fire Elemental in the engine will be a problem if your commander notices that you have lost power. He will likely fall behind with the main force and send you ahead to die. After you are a little ways ahead you can do the swap.

"Do you think he will really shoot us down?"

Unlikely, he will want to save his missiles. He might command your Fire Elemental to explode. Other pilots will see the explosion and think he shot them down.

"That makes sense. That's why he went up into the sky first! He didn't need to be behind us to kill us. He only needs his voice."

The Formation Commander organized them into a line, the wings not too far apart, and commanded them to fly in a giant oval as the other jets took off to join them. They roamed around in the sky for a long time, and Ingrid wished she had been biologically correct before she left the tent.

"Does this thing have a toilet?"

Take your shirt off and pee on that.

"What!?"

The demon said nothing. It actually wasn't too bad of an idea.

When she was finished, she slid her sopping wet shirt down beside the seat and resumed her flight wearing just her bra. The cabin smelled like urine. She plugged her nose.

Seeming to have noticed her discomfort, the demon said: You can have the wind elemental filter out the smell you know.

All the other Formation Commanders must have left the ground already, because they were all organized into one giant line, three dozen fighters long. Then they changed heading to the south, and flew at full throttle. Meanwhile, Ingrid carefully dismissed and then resummoned all her Elementals with the exception of the one in the engine.

They were far over the snowfields of the highlands when the Formation Commander ordered them to maintain their current speed and then fell back into a massive formation of fighters in the rear. She took the opportunity to dismiss the engine Elemental and resummon it. She lost speed rapidly, but was able to maintain some semblance of her former formation. They flew straight for a long time. Ingrid was somewhat bored.

The enemy is just ahead, the demon said. They have launched missiles at your companions but none have targeted you yet.

"I don't see them!" Ingrid protested.

Be prepared to defend.

"What does that mean?!"

They didn't teach you how to defend? Oh, that actually makes sense... By defend, I mean you will need to roll inverted and then pull the nose up hard. Point the nose at the ground, fly down and drag the missile down into denser air. They are powered by chemical propellants which will eventually run out and they start to lose energy. They lose energy faster in dense air.

"So what do I just smash into the ground then?"

Before hitting the ground pull up hard and skim over the ground, less than a hundred feet above the ground at most. Try not to hit anything. Fly fast and make sharp, sudden changes in direction. The missile will likely overshoot and hit the ground instead of you.

The maneuver made perfect sense to Ingrid. She imagined the motions she would make at each step of the process. She made mock motions with the stick.

Boris suddenly exploded, instantly and without knowledge of his doom. She didn't see the missile, but she saw the flash of his exploding airplane. The craft immediately lost all sense, and pitched about violently, like a paper tube thrown into a strong wind. The nose seemed to point in every possible direction in just a few fractions of a second, painting a trail of flames as it did so.

A second fighter jet in her formation also exploded, with an identical result.

"Dark-Three missile Elementals," the Formation Commander said, "pick souls to hunt and launch! Ice-Two missile Elementals, launch at the enemy and track their Fire Elementals!"

All across the long line of fighter jets the missiles on the wings launched forward. All except for Ingrid.

A Dark-Three has locked on to your soul. Defend now!

Ingrid's hands were shaking. Tears were welling up in her eyes.

Defend now!

She gritted her teeth and screamed through the gap, a guttural hiss. Then she repeated the motions she had imagined and mocked.

Ingrid flipped upside down and made a very hard turn towards the ground. Pointing the nose straight down, her airspeed increased very rapidly as her altitude plummeted.

It's still tracking, keep going, the demon said.

"Ingrid what are you doing!?" the Formation Commander screamed at her from the second box. "Fire Elemental, destroy the airplane! Destroy the airplane!"

Nothing happened. Ingrid continued her descent.

"If you survive this Ingrid I am going to make an example of you myself," the box said fruitlessly. As if he could intimidate her with the prospect of being killed while defending against a missile.

It ran out of fuel and is flying using only its fins. It's working, you should survive.

She pulled the nose up and just barely skimmed the treetops of the snowfield. She lost all sense of direction and thought only of her next turn. Her fighter flew out across a frozen shore over a lake completely covered in a layer of snow.

Turn now!

She smashed the stick, causing the craft to tip over, and then yanked it back in the sharpest turn she could do. Nothing happened as she made a long arc above the lake.

Then the surface of the lake behind her exploded. She could see the explosion in the mirrors above her head, and it sent a voracious crack across the frozen lake, tossing the snow and black water.

She was alive, and still flying. She breathed heavily, hissing through her teeth with anger and fear. The lake gave way to hills and she was forced to gain altitude in order to avoid the snowy treetops.

Sense returned to her, and she rotated her nose to point north, far away from the battle, towards her hometown.

Leaving already? You have not fired your missiles yet. Your allies might try and shoot you down.

"Then I will defend against those too," Ingrid said.

Her hands were still shaking. She noticed for the first time that beads of a yellowish liquid were spattered on the inside of the canopy. Even her skirt was wet. She rolled her eyes.

"I'm going home, and then I'll desert. This is fun, but it's not worth it. The banks will eventually summon these gems away and I won't be able to fly anymore. So I might as well run away while I am still alive."

Suddenly a massive turquoise flash consumed the horizon in front of her. She had to cover her eyes because it was so bright.

Enemies in front of us, behind the main force! That... impossible! That's a portal to the Elemental Plane of Wind! That should break the contract!

"A portal?" Ingrid asked. "To another plane?"

NO MOTHER NOOOOO!!!!!! the demon screamed.

Ingrid was astonished.

I DON'T WANT TO GO MOTHER!!! NOOOOOO!!!!!

Then both eyes vanished. The plane was still flying fine, and the other Elementals had not abandoned her. She reached into her pocket and grabbed the large shadow crystal again.

Except it was no longer a shadow crystal.