Afraid, Ferghall’s SOPHIIS whined.

Just a little while longer. Then he’d let it feel all the fear it wanted. He popped a nutritive supplement. It ought to provide a little bit of extra mass-energy when he would need it.

“Are you ready?” Piotr asked over his shoulder as he piloted the lungboat away from Acerbia.

Ferghall brought the scope to his eyes and sighted through the trees toward the nearest bunker. These external forts were just hardened-wood pillboxes in the ground, and the windows faced the wrong way: out toward the wilderness rather than in toward the city. In order to loose at the Nethress positions, all the Nxtlu soldiers had had to leave the safety of the bunker.

Like that one. Ferghall squeezed the trigger. “Like shooting deer in a thorn-trap,” he murmured. “Piotr.”

“Yes?”

“Your Dux send us along on this because he thought I’d have a harder time killing one Stigmatized than ten normals?”

“I suspect so.”

“Well, I ain’t gonna turn on you.”

“I suspect he was more concerned about the thing inside you turning on us. Do you see a landing spot?”

Ferghall picked off another of the Nxtlu soldiers. “No. Hold up.” Another one down. “Wait.” Another. “One more.” Another. “I’ve cleared the bunker. Drop me there. I’ll hoof it to the next.”

“Are you certain?”

“I look certain? Gehenn, I look like I even want to be here?”

“Yes.” The lungboat settled near the ground.

“Well.” Ferghall handed the rifle back to Piotr. “Here goes nothing.”

Ferghall leapt over the edge, fell ten feet, rolled, and took off in a sprint toward the nearest functional bunker. It was just past a thin line of trees; he could see the soldiers gathered outside it, shooting upwards and inward, toward the city. They even had some huge bomb-lobbing machine, some sort of artillery; Ferghall had never been much of a military man.

He was more of a hunter.

He charged out of the trees, straight for the distracted men. One of them, by chance, caught sight of him out of the corner of his eye, but before the soldier could bring his gun to bear, his head exploded.

Thanks, Piotr.

The other soldiers leapt back, shouted, and raised their guns.

All right, li’l missy, he thought to his SOPHIIS. Now you can be scared.

***

Piotr shot again and again, clearing a path for the wall of flailing tentacles, burning plasma, and noxious fumes on the ground. The Warlock was a monster.

But now he was Nethress’s monster.

Piotr drew the bolt and loosed. An explosion rocked the next bunker as a mine impacted it; body parts flew everywhere. Piotr glanced back down just in time to see Ferghall’s tentacles rip a man limb from limb.

Having cleared the area, the Warlock charged on. Piotr brought the lungboat after him, aiming the gun as he piloted past the ruined bunker.

But Ferghall cleared the next group before he could get a shot off.

Slowly but surely, Piotr and Ferghall proceeded around the perimeter of concrete bunkers, clearing each one in turn. If the Seeding Wars had gone like this…

They reached the edge of the line of bunkers at a steep cliff on the southwest side of the city. The rain of bone shards onto their heads slowed, then stopped. This arc was clear. Piotr urged the craft down toward the Warlock, who was a mass of uncontrollable STIGMOS writhing outside the structure.

A roar, deep and menacing rumbled out from the surrounding forest. What was that? Piotr peered into the woods.

There was motion. He could see…

He could see trees collapsing.

Dozens of chimeras burst out of the woods into Nxtlu’s now-ruined defensive line. Ferghall flew into motion, all flame and tentacles, and the first two to charge him fell burning to the ground.

The trees fell in a line, as if a gigantic sandworm burrowing beneath the earth was knocking them over by their roots.

That line of trees was approaching the perimeter…

Still Ferghall fought, ripping and slicing, burning and freezing as the Chimeras came on, and for a moment, Piotr thought he might win. Then the last of the trees fell, and an enormous chimera emerged into the clearing. It was larger than any Piotr had ever seen, three stories tall, all grotesque fat and muscle, scales and nonfunctional vestigial wings, quills and spines. Ferghall took one look at it and ran. The pack of chimeras charged after him.

Piotr dove toward the Warlock, pumping the lungs at full thrust so as to swing in front of him. The mass of chimeras were gaining on Ferghall, and there was that enormous abomination, so large that it didn’t even bother to step around the monsters in front of it but simply trampled them underfoot.

Piotr swooped in low, just in front of Ferghall. He leaned over the side of the boat. “To me!” he shouted.

Too high, Ferghall mouthed, or perhaps shouted. The pack was nipping at his heels, literally eating his dust as his enhanced legs kicked up enormous plumes of dirt.

Piotr brought it in lower. “Grab my hand!”

Ferghall flailed. Piotr’s hand was still outside reach of his arms.

But not of his tentacles.

The flailing limb wrapped around Piotr’s arm with impressive force, squeezing so hard that it cracked his armor of forgebone stigmata. He grimaced and gripped the tentacle, then tugged as he picked up altitude.

As they rose into the sky, Piotr muscled Ferghall in, hand over hand.

***

“Stay with me, Oralie. Stay with me.”

***

Senrii shielded her eyes against dust and amniotic fluid as the drop pod crashed to the ground in front of her and burst.

“What is it?” Tvorh asked.

“Winged swiftcycle.” Senrii approached the vehicle. “Never ridden one, I take it?”

Tvorh gave her a look that would have clearly meant, What do I look like, a not-street-rat? had he had eyes.

“Yeah, guess not.” Senrii looked up at the sky. “Perimeter bombardment has stopped. That’s good. Our guys should be coming down any second now. We’ll have to meet up with them.” She threw a leg over the cycle. “You ride shredder.”

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“Shredder?” he asked as he climbed behind her and wrapped his arms around her.

She held out her gun. “Well, pistol, in any case. You ever shot one?”

“No.”

A deep roar shook the ground. Chimeras emerged from the forest, many of them dropping dead from the aerial bombardment. That meant they were going from millions to hundreds of thousands. Still not great odds. “Well, here’s your chance,” Senrii muttered. “Hold on!” She kicked the cycle awake. It moaned at first; then the tires spun, squealed, and they tore off through the trees.

“How do we look?”

“Still gaining on us.” She heard Tvorh squeeze off a shot.

“Hit it?”

“I don’t know how to tell.”

“Blood, bones, and bile. Duck!” They zipped underneath a low-hanging branch. “Hang on!” Senrii leaned left. Spines split the air where they had been just a second before.

They sped over mounds and across streams as the horde gave chase. Wads of corrosive spittle split trees as they blasted past; blood spattered on their pristine armor as Tvorh took pot shots from a range so close he couldn’t possibly miss.

“We’re coming up on the beginning of the chasm,” Senrii shouted.

“We’re almost in the city?”

“Chasm starts a bit south of the city limits. Hold on. I have an idea.” Senrii steered left, then clockwise, prepping a miles-wide loop.

“Ouch!” Tvorh said.

“What?”

“Got spined.”

“Hold ‘em off, kid. We’re almost there.”

“Almost where?”

The chasm was coming up, a swiftly-approaching drop into oblivion. “Hang on!”

“You always say that!”

Senrii thumbed the controls. Wings deployed from the side of the cycle as it went over the edge of the cliff; it glided through the air as Chimeras tumbled by the score into the darkness.

Then they were on the other side. Senrii slowed the bike and grinned over her shoulder at Tvorh. “Not bad, huh?”

A roar split the forest, and the most massive Chimera Senrii had ever seen came leapt over the chasm, flattening the trees on the near side as it landed.

“Blood, bones, and bile,” Senrii whispered.

***

“It would seem, sister, that they are attacking.”

Eztli watched feeds on the screen as they filtered in across the city. “It would seem so, Ilhicamina.”

“It would seem, sister, that I was correct.”

“About everything but one.”

“Oh? And what was that?”

“They’re winning.” Eztli pointed to the map. “Gens Nethress has silenced the Wildlands perimeter and the aerial defense line. They’re making straight for us.”

“You are correct, but I was not wrong. Never wrong.” Ilhicamina waved a hand dismissively. “Of course they have made it in. What else would we expect, when our enemies bring all their forces to bear against us?”

“How do you propose to defeat them?”

“There are other defenses in this city than the perimeter, dear sister. For example, did you know that in the Last Era, the holders of this city built an enormous superweapon beneath the ground?”

“I did not.”

“Did you know that it is right above our heads?”

“I did not.”

“Did you know that with access to the Libraratory, I gained access to this weapon?”

Eztli stared at Ilhicamina.

“That’s right, my loving sister. Extruding it, of course, will be somewhat… damaging. There was never supposed to be an Archive built on the ground directly above these hallowed halls. Come, sister.” He indicated a pustule on the console. “Do the honors.”

She pointed to a different pustule, marked “OVERRIDE.” “And that one?”

Ilhicamina smiled indulgently. “In case she decides not to cooperate. Now go on. Press it.”

Eztli pressed the release that her brother had indicated.

The earth rumbled and shook. “So unfortunate, the damage to the city, but some sacrifices are necessary”, Ilhicamina said. A high-pitched keening began to soak through the stone. Ilhicamina’s hands fell gently on Eztli’s shoulders. “Do you hear that, sister? That is the doom of our enemies, rising from the earth. It will henceforth be known as Xipe Totec.

“The Flayed One.”

***

Senrii swooped off the dirt paths and onto a well-built road. “Almost to the city, Tvorh.”

“So is that thing.”

“Keep shooting.”

“I don’t think it’s doing any good!”

They were almost to the black honeycomb buildings of Acerbia. Just a little further—

The ground rumbled beneath them. Far in the distance, in the center of the city, a plume of dust rose into the air. Senrii struggled to maintain her composure and keep the bike from sliding out.

The ground at the edge of the city split, and hexagonal towers, two stories high, rose out of the earth along the circumference and began to shoot.

Senrii swept the bike from side to side, dodging the bullets. Forest fell away, replaced by black buildings.

Bullets rained on them from above as they charged the deserted streets. Then, though the guns kept cracking, they were no longer under fire.

“Why aren’t they shooting at us?”

“Because they’re shooting at it!” Tvorh shouted back.

Senrii pulled a hard right, driving straight toward a Nxtlu roadblock. The soldiers lifted their guns. Senrii flared the wings, and the bike bucked, picking up enough height to sail up and over their heads.

“We clear yet?” she asked as they crunched back to the street beyond the roadblock.

Bullets zipped by. “Nope!”

Senrii gritted her teeth and hunkered over the bike. She pulled a right, charging back toward the center of the city.

The center — where an enormous gray cannon loomed over even the tallest of the skyscrapers.

***

“Launch all landing vehicles now. I do not care if we are too far out. We’ll last longer against their point defenses than we will against that cannon.”

“Yes, Erus.”

Dorsin shifted his wife in his arms and nodded toward the enormous metal frame that had emerged out of the earth in the center of the city. “Concentrate all firepower on that weapon.”

“Yes, Erus.”

Dorsin’s conscience whispered to him. This was hasty, indirect. Many innocents would likely die as a result of the bombardment.

Oralie moaned slightly and shifted in Dorsin’s arms.

Let them die. “Loose!”

The plosive mines lanced toward the center of the city. The whole fleet shot, concentrating its power on the enormous cannon. The air rumbled around the weapon, shattering glass and cracking the black stone of the surrounding buildings.

It was no use; Dorsin watched helplessly as the weapon slowly swiveled, undeterred by the bombardment.

The cannon began to shoot, ejecting globs of purple fluid into the air at breakneck speed. The shower of globules swept across the vanguard of the fleet.

“Keep loosing!” Dorsin said. “Is that the best they can do? A rain of purple water? Keep loosing!”

“Erus! Look!” Dorsin looked to where the crewman was pointing. A ship a quarter of a mile away, the Thunderhammer, was beginning to lurch. Whole swathes of its podding and a quarter of its exterior wall were no more; great gaping holes were left where they once had been. The viscous purple fluid simmered on the edges of those holes.

Then the rain fell on Jormungandr. Immediately, the engines began to stutter. Jormungandr began to drift to starboard.

“Damage report.”

“We don’t know, Erus!”

But Dorsin didn’t need a damage report. As the ship drifted, the greater part of the vanguard came into view. Up above, a vessel was sinking rapidly, its multisectioned helium podding utterly destroyed by the fluid. A dozen skywhales, all corroded and eaten away, were falling to the ground.

Jormungandr was next.

Dorsin slammed on the shortsphere. “Abandon ship. All Nethress vessels, this is Jormungandr Actual. Do not, I repeat, do not approach the city while the unknown weapon is operational. We have taken heavy damage and are abandoning. I repeat, wait until the cannon is inoperative before approaching!

He released the button. “Everyone off!” The bridge began to empty. Dorsin shoved his wife into the arms of an aide. “Quickly. Take her and go. I must see to the rest of the crew.”

“No, Dorsin,” she murmured. “I will not go without you.”

“I command it. Take my wife and keep her safe.”

Oralie looked up at her husband, her great blue eyes piercing his soul, and spoke an ancient Adonist invocation. “Where you die, I will die, my heart, and there will my bones be buried.”

The aide glanced at Dorsin; he grimaced and took her back in his arms. “We do not leave until everyone is off.” Dorsin’s voice became a bellow. “So, for the sake of my wife, move!”

The aide rushed out. Dorsin turned back to the central membrane and watched the lifepod and lungboat readings turn, one by one, from green to red. The ship creaked around him, its structural integrity giving way as the ooze ate away at its substance. Panels shattered and structural supports gave way as the bridge began to collapse.

The second to last indicator turned red. Dorsin hefted his wife and kissed her cheek. “Time to go, love.” He rushed out from the bridge, down the stairs, down toward the hangar, where his personal lungboat awaited him. He charged down landing after landing, racing the ooze that was eating away his flagship.

And nearly stepped out into open sky. He grabbed for the railing; Oralie swung into a one-armed hold as he barely kept himself from charging into empty space.

There were the pieces of the ship, tumbling down into the distance. There was the hangar. There was his personal lungboat falling through the air below him.

He clutched Oralie to his chest, leaned back, stared hopelessly into her eyes. She gazed sleepily back at him.

“We are lost,” he said.

“We are not,” she replied. “I am.”

If he were not holding her, his wings would be able to bear him down. But even if she had weighed nothing, he would not be able to flap his arms while they were wrapped around her. “I cannot get us down.”

“I know.” She strained to raise a hand and touched his cheek. “But you can get yourself down.” She glanced down over the edge. “I have lived a long life.”

“My love!”

“And what is life, if not a loan? The fear of its end is the interest we all pay for having lived.”

“I will not let you go, Oralie.”

“I am already gone, Dorsin. If not from the fall, then the genophage; if not from the genophage, then the cancer. You are the only thing in the world that is holding me back.” She leaned against him and gazed up into his eyes. “This is enough for me,” she whispered.

Their lips met, and all they had ever had came flooding back to Dorsin in a single starburst of memory. Oralie coughed a laugh and rested her forehead against his. “Go now,” she whispered. “Fly. Let me go, and fly, and save our children.”

Dorsin gazed into the eyes of the wife of his youth, the mother of his children, the sun of his world, and shook his head. “I will only ever fly with you, my darling.”

He held her close, spun, and fell backward into the sky.