“Hark thee, for ne’er before hast mine eyes laid upon such finer practise! All might tell so, Mountain-man, so goes your temptation with tall will; a dame as I able to see no coil! Thou art no caitiff, thus I cannot forgo the tempt of fantasy!”
- Madame Briaga Ravasco, ‘The Tale of Mountain Fools’ Page 26
[~]
Royal Halpine Army Aviation Service Defence Establishment Tuepoi Cliffs, Northern Dominion of Halpinia
3–9:61 Native / 8:17 AM JST
Spanning a hundred and fifty or so merrunds, the Tuepoi Cliffs were a stretch of the most geographically ostentatious coastal architecture to have graced the world. And on them, a military outpost that stole swathes of value from the scenery with obstructively brutalist acoustic mirrors.
Though the position was advantageous, being on a cliff with a nicely unobstructed view of the ocean for merrunds beyond the sea level horizon, it watched empty ocean none would dare try cross for express invasion. What was heard most often instead were the sounds of ships, ever so faint, headed for ports in the erroneously named Cirrunde Bay, really a gulf for any matter of fact. Never did anything come for Maytown, such a sleepy town, and when it did, the glory of detection was almost always given to Defence Establishment Huxley west of the port, rather than their tired position east of it. As such, there was little real value or importance to the site. Alas, it was built anyways, and so on the Northern Merrodenian coastline it stayed.
Such was reflected by all who were rotated to the site. There was a certain laziness to the base, a base that felt little in the way of any of the local or regional geopolitics with the political brawl that was local international relations. A place recognized in the ranks of the RHAAC as the place for menial punishment duty.
The establishment too, was only nominally an establishment, more a large field atop a tourist’s wonderland, with a tall radio mast between three small, white shacks that outcropped from the natural view and dozens of concrete acoustic mirrors listening out to the ocean. And of course, the flags of both Mu and her daughter Halpinia by an insignificant patch of grass that was the base’s entrance, as if its entirely open nature prevented anywhere else from being considered its entrance. Still, definitely a cliffside, and naturally a great vantage point isolated from the waves with a spectacularly stellar view of the ocean at sunrise and sunset.
The quiet that was traced only by seemingly distant waves was broken by a voice, one soothing to the ear with a near-standard Muse gentleman-type pronunciation. “Beautiful weather, isn’t it, Superior?” A man would ask—voice drawing from a somewhat tall man of ashen skin and hair—a near elve type of man not to the heights of a human on the hierarchy, but an almost equal.
A Second Grade Teriazo who’d asked his aide—a Superior Levy who stood faithfully to his side. The former roughly same as Lefttenant, the latter more to a Corporal.
Enter the Superior, who looked around in response. Indeed it was, the soft fabric of early-year snow having settled nicely against the grass, and the sun herself in all her glory and modesty beaming back down with a smile. “Aye, sir,” spoke the enlist, voice still tainted with the naivety of youth and a still rasp in a higher pitch than expected. Compared to his elven counterpart, he was a rather stubby man of black-dashed-brown furred hide with a face not of, but like a sort of bear-wolf hybrid.
Both stood just by the mirrors, one a pair of binoculars in hand and topped with an almost felt sidecap, the other with a hat similar to a poofed-up beret atop a stiff, wide brim. Their uniforms were neat as if arrived for a picnic rather than any duties or obligations—the feathered symbols adorning their shoulders were still white and wholly shiny, and their uniforms deep gray-orange fabric not yet bleached from exposure, 'nor spotted brown from dirt.
Both voices were left quiet, lest they disturb any of the listening equipment, and so their patrol along continued ‘till just one moment in time.
Toward the empty horizon, the Teriazo noted something. But what? His head jolted leftward, and even through a thorough scan, there was… nothing? Another, and… No, there was something! Some blackish dot far off, far away, but what? Just above the horizon, no ship could do such a thing, and no form of aircraft would ever take such a route! The Teriazo peered through his binoculars, out toward the non-empty horizon.
Pass a byzh for his eyes to come to focus, pass another two for his eyes to find the thing. There it was, far off, with no good estimate for how many merrunds away it was, but it was there. To this, his body stiffened up—slouch to a straightened back. Eyes would’ve gone wide had he not been so focused. It grew—grew in size and grew in intensity—grew nearer. The only good estimate he had was its bearing: right for them if not a smidge off and along.
“Superior, uh…” The Teriazo spoke with a voice never yet heard before by his adjutant. It shook and shuddered, and most especially came unnecessarily loud. “Do head to and ask Tech Levy Cambden to… er…, ask if he’s got something on the mirrors.”
“Yes, sir.” Steadily, came the Levy’s reply, voice steadfast as could be. No further notice was needed for him to have dismissed himself, quick salute not left forgotten as a paw was thrown forward before gravitating back.
In a cabin nearby sat a conscript—shoulder ornamented by rank insignia of Second Grade Technical Levy. Similar in race to the Superior Levy outside, though more foxish if anything, and so to this point his eyes had been shut. They’d always been shut, a heel-shaped mark in the table right in front of him. With rifle and hat hung against a spare chair, he hadn’t all too many concerns. But hearing just one oddity? Maybe.
[~]
3–9:72 Native / 8:20 AM JST
For once, perhaps his first time in a few weeks, months even, the base shuddered. A low, distant drone, one barely picked up by the mirrors. One which very well could’ve been a ship bound for the Eastern ports. Yet it was distinct, too soft and high pitched to be a propeller craft, yet simultaneously too similar, the same oscillations in noise that were expected per those weeks in that technical course. The shudder naturally did not go unnoticed, so much so that even the watching Technical felt one run through and down his spine.
Switching simply to another channel—from the second to the fourth mirror’s receiver—the blasted sound remained. Why so? The results were the same for all with every turn of the channel knob—the first, third, and fifth all giving away the same terrific answer.
It sent him into no frenzy, more an awakening of suspicion, not unlike hearing sounds in the middle of the night. Between the choice of remaining and listening further, or leaving to inform his superior, the former was taken. There was plenty of time after all, right?
He pawed into a cabinet for one book kept amongst a series of others, more a set of binders than books really, with pages varying in use from soiled with yellow to pristine and untouched. A short flick through to the last pages, and… nothing? A short few tables with dotted maps and times revealed little. All the flights were scheduled for far later in the day, not then, and all far so enough that any being remotely early would’ve passed by midday at the earliest.
So maybe unrecorded flights?
A clicky-clack sound nearby sent out a spool of tape—one the young Technical held a newfound interest in as he ripped away a good part of a recent segment. Reading along, surely it was an aircraft—the magic of continually graphed audio samples showing little on any higher end. But… no, no airliners matched the audio signature of this new one, ‘nor did any common Parpaldic airframes from that. There were dips and dives all over the sheet in places they shouldn’t have been, all consistent for every last of the mirrors.
Far outside, the Teriazo came to a similar conclusion. A sound faint, nearly forgettable, but there. “The sound is distinct; like a low whir… an aircraft possibly? I only see one, and it can’t possibly be… no, it’s no wyvern…,” the Teriazo paused as he took another peer through his spyglass. In discussing with his inferior, slowly his words were brought back on track with a brand new rigidity. “Superior…, do get a coordinator on it then, would you?”
“Yes, Sir.”
Yet, as he was about to leave, the Levy felt a tug at his sleeve, and just as he’d bound himself to jolt into full sprint. It was the officer—the Teriazo who was still looking down his binoculars. Holding him back, his officer added on with an increasingly worried tone, “Report that it’s no flock…, a—nd it’s…,” A brief moment of thought, words failing him at such a time. Still, the spell was broken, and with the object terrific enough for frightened haste to have seeped into his voice. “It’s getting impossibly large! Call up Maytown direction now!”
It took only one glance out for him to see so. No longer a speck, more a blotch upon the horizon, the impossible flying object was certainly at speeds far more than any large craft he’d ever seen had managed, such speeds letting it grow at a probably exponential rate. Just how big was it truly?
He only managed a short remark under his breath, “Mercy and by the gods, did I think this would be a normal rotation degrumble!” Enough so did it alarm him that all the bound energy held down by the officer’s hand sprung out as soon as the weight left his arm. Disaster may strike, dammit!
Run, boy, run!
The Levy’s lower paws bounced from the ground with all the grace the gods could grant him, even with the clumsily fitted Army-issued boots he’d had. And with grace came a second wind, wholly in tune with not simply the ground, but nature itself—harmony within his biomechanical state pushing at the very boundaries of what efficiency even was. New records in speed would be set for his species, set to the tune of double, triple, nay, tenfold increases in the rate that which he went from usual—close the gap boy, from two Miernosts to none.
He wasn’t to disappoint, not now!
Two miernosts, then one-and-a-half. Soon only one, then less than. Every part closer he came to, time passed even faster than it had before, and all until…
It took a short slide across the ground for friction to catch up to him, perfectly sliding so in such a way that he could lean through the door to a shabby little shack. All it took was a single push, and away a door went.
The energy, all sent to his legs, redirected then to his voice in ordering, “Cambden, Cambden, get Maytown direction now, something’s coming!”
The young boy in the cabin, another beast, identified with the last name of Cambden, though more wolf and no more than twenty, spun about in his chair. He was bandaged with tapes, bondaged like a fly in a cobweb. At that point, the young Levy’s heart stopped as the cabin’s door came crashing down, and with it, the Superior Levy who’d been sent by. Given that the veins on Technical’s neck were on the verge of tearing themselves away, he should’ve died at that very moment. Instead, he clumsily shot up from his seat, still entangled by recordings.
The only urgency in him, it seemed, came from being startled by his superior’s yelling. “Y–yes, I know! What the bloody hell is it?” He part slurred, slipping into a far jumpier state as he carried along in speaking.
Like a barking dog, quite in fact so, the most senior of the present enlisted spewed orally. Words that confounded, stuck to themselves, and repeated endlessly were what came out, and all neatly set to the tune of the pair rushing to get their jobs done. “By—by the air, yes! And it’s— hold on…” Stood by the door, the Superior had become enamored with whatever it was—gaze unable to be averted from something in the sky, and to the sea.
The little rat of a technical shot forward as his senses kicked in, ear twitching and fluttering. He kicked and fumbled, fighting the outsized wooden box of a telephone. Against a rotary dial or two, a line of a dozen switches, and several knobs, his larger-than-average paws were no help in the matter with precious byzh ticking by.
Whatever it was that his superior had caught must’ve been contagious—the technical too experienced difficulty and symptoms of the same type: hallucinated spots at the corner of both his eyes, and a pounding drumbeat heartbeat that beckoned to be let loose from its internal chamber. A contagion of worry and unease, perhaps. All was the same as he came to ask one question in a disinterested tone—there were far more important things to worry over, “Hold on for what?”
Quickly, however, it became apparent. Ever so louder had the drone from before become, something so clear as to have taken peace from nigh every avian nearby by the approaching silent flaps and caws, something so recognizable both could point it out as a propeller's spinning song in a heartbeat.
“Do you hear that?” Of course he could; why ask?
Unceremoniously came a response; and not from the Technical. “It’s headed right for Maytown! It’s going practically diagonal to us, so it won’t pass over us, but it’s going right for them!” Shouted their Terizao with all the energy of rampant enthusiasm, but without the joyous eagerness. His voice was muffled and jumbled partly by both distance and the wall between, but the gist of his message got through. He’d nearly caught up, dashing at full sprint, far slower than what his inferiors ever would call full sprint. Unusual, having decided to run along shortly after sending off the Levy.
Quickly so was their target dialed in by the young boy, progress much quicker as soon as the Teriazo’s voice had gotten involved. All that was left was to beg for a quick response. “Air Director…, Air Director!?”
There were a tense few byzh in which the call was patched right on through, a jittery low-pitched sound all there was against the now deafening sound of the craft approaching.
<<“Yes, yes…?”>>
Finally, it was picked up, though with the other side speaking as though annoyed by his call—had they no idea for just how serious it all was? Topping things off, the other side of the line left an additional comment in a sarcastic tone, <<“Any ships to report in?”>> His responding superior asked with a chortle, the sound of presumably others also chuckling faintly resonated by light crackles and fizzles from their end of the line.
If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.
“Why, you’ve no idea how quite serious this is! Aircraft from along…” Pausing, the operator looked over to his superior—the Teriazo laden with sweat, who mouthed to him a bearing of thirty-five; some strangle angle to the coast. “...bearing three-five, approaching unknown speed, projected course puts intercept directly over Maytown!”
<<“Three-five? How so, there’s nothing for hundreds, no, thousands of merrun— …what?” A crackle, fizz, and a pop came through as though the phone had been dropped, the director cutting himself off (lest it was someone else speaking to him) then and there.>> Had the director just left? As a matter of fact, for the following byee came nothing.
All dragged on, rolling tingles across the skin and fur of those at the outpost.
The silence was only broken by a then more urgent-sounding colleague being picked up by their end’s receiver. A hushed <<“Really?”>> that came past a short growl, and slightly more acoustically intrusive <<“That’s the—Poling report it’s another one as well—call up Loxmouth, and the er…, th– the colonial bureau, now!”>> Past this, those at Huxley were posed one question: <<“Er…, which direction is it coming from?”>>
While those at the outpost, amidst the flurry of sweat and panic and worry, may have been forgiven for not catching on initially, there was some back corner of the Inferior’s mind that asked the damndest of questions. Whether he was consciously aware or not that he’d known such a question could be asked, let alone had one creeping in the back of his head, he never would be able to shake this strange new feeling crawling right under his skin. All from one question unanswered: what between the heavens must they have been talking about, for the craft to be another?
[+]
RHAAS Aviation Defense Base Loxmouth
3—9:80 Native / 8:24 AM JST
With tanned bitumen runways built to a partial trident surrounded by dozens of sheet metal hangars and littered with networked thatched-and-mortared huts and buildings, Loxmouth slacked in few important departments. And for those it did lack in, it was still an airbase, and an expansive one at that with plenty more room all around to expand; only empty fields in all directions.
It was at precisely nine-eighty, native time, that Air Directory Command, Maytown, relayed by wire a dual-script red-tick message to ADB Loxmouth; twenty or so merrunds to the west from. At precisely this time in Loxmouth, within a deep yet rather lame-in-feature command hut, one young Technical with certification for telegraphy had received a rather simple message as follows,
[=]
UN#AC#APRCH#MAYTOWN
34DF#UN#UN#UN### I # I
[=]
And despite its simplicity, it was seemingly important enough so that a lever was tripped.
[+]
To the blaring of a siren and sudden announcement by Loxmouth’s air command, Captain (Second Grade) Ine initially only jumped to its suddenness. such jumpiness was par for the course for her. To her credit, Ine found herself without all too much shock or resentment—the same unable to be said for those more nocturnal or sleep-heavy species present on the base.
Rarely did it ever ring, but when it did, one would most certainly know. It sounded off as the high pitch of an olazalerro’s song, much like the sound of sonar to a diver, before cycling into an unrelenting cacophonous applause of a ringing bell—all followed up on by the hurried speaking of some poor sod ranked something ending with Rutoficire.
<<”Second Wyvern Squadron; immediate air scramble.”>>
Unlike those simply peering out into the hallway from the dozens of offices, wherein both Ine and two such alarms were, the Captain quickly turned herself about on one foot toward the nearest exit. Latched briefly to a wall for just a sense of stability, she found herself in full-sprint within far less than a quarter of a byzh. Though she did hesitate to ask herself what in the hell an alert was issued over, any non-urgency swatted itself away as she witnessed another three pilots nearby do the same as she’d just done. And so instead, she thought to herself only one thing, ‘I need to be up there now.’
Of course, per usual she was stopped for a briefing—it was unusual in that it was held practically right in front of the barracks building, but Ine cared not for this fact. Indeed, the briefing seemed to fly by so quickly that it was almost barely worth mentioning—unidentified craft from unidentified origin and from an unidentified location. Little else was given besides a rough vector to head along, and so the moment her superior had the squadron dismissed, they all sprung right along.
With all four moving at a rabbit’s pace, they were quick to board and commandeer the nearest motor car—Ine vaulting in the back. All four knew each other only somewhat save for Ine and one other, all of whom bore the Pilot’s Wyvern badge and the same unit patch. Damned unit transfers. Unfortunately for all four of them, there was no time for any talk—not now, but maybe later. Immediately as they were underway, out poured dozens of men from seemingly every crevice of the base. Motor cars and tanker trucks ran up and down the apron—figures of all types in both brown and orange RHAAS uniforms held onto the sides and dismounted where they could. Already, they could see this was a scramble type of scramble. Chocks were nabbed out from under their planes, as were the propellers manually and laboriously spun into action, all accompanied by dozens of jumpsuits and uniforms clambering over into cockpits to strike at every smallest detail.
Their location wasn’t so far, so close that it took a matter of mere byee to arrive, though it felt more like a single byzh went by with how long it took. And by the time they did arrive, the crews were practically done with all their hasty pre-flight preparations.
There were about two lines in the open, a dozen per, of his Majesty’s finest on offer—Ĉasisto De.B.36 Buteos. A perfect blend of magic on technic, with a delightfully shaped sliding canopy for a pressurized cockpit, an elegant yet curvy exterior bearing retractable gear, and an all-metal body, it was such a sight! First of its kind, practically as modern as could be having taken such revolutionary strides. Though she would much have preferred a Fuzilist 38, the Ĉasisto had and could do. It would have to.
She was in a definite scramble to her own the moment she’d dismounted and boots hit the ground, a matter of very few lehnds to be ran. Number three-oh-two was her flight, four technicians already swarming over it as they rushed things into order. The dual-bladed propellers all idled with such profound roars, as did the beckoning of the aircrews and associated tear through any unprotected ears. She wasn’t giddy as usual to be flying, such a deep frown forming as she clambered onto the wing and then into the cockpit. A seat, perfectly shaped, with controls perfectly built, and an assistant strapping her in and throwing on a vest and helmet to her. The canopy was pulled forward and over, and she was locked in.
Ine cranked back a lever to her left side, an indicator clicking from ‘broad’ to ‘fine,’ as with another that took twice the effort, some other indicator clicking from ‘Centered’ to ‘Takeoff.’ She looked out to her right, and the assistant gave a good two-fingers (similar to a modified show of rock fingers, albeit with the ring finger extended rather than the pinky) before running off. All was well on her part that all had happened in a matter of a single byzh, from dismount to taxi, similar commendation extended to her colleagues too.
To Ine, she looked down at all her controls, gauges, and indicators all present—every little detail right in line as expected. A short trip down and a quick rotation to face the final stretch, followed by what looked to be… no matter how Ine squinted, they all came as blurs in her mirror, but there were at least three others of her eskadro rolling onto the runway. A neat zig-zag formation they formed as they all meekly heeded their leader.
Down to her fuel gauge, she looked, already down one from four-hundred-and-twenty-three amzurs with how both dials ticked. Then down through her gunsight, the bluish-orange cross at the center shone right up against the clear near-baby-blue sky.
And finally, air control called in with them all, “Mandrel all, cleared to, course three-six along the coast. Unknown intercept well within thirty, approximate one-twenty merrunds last sighting, expect eighty.” the operator spoke, voice obscured in part by the fizz of their radio.
Three-six? Thirty? Ine lodged no complaint, ‘nor did any of her underlings in her eskadro, but it was genuinely ridiculous to fly such a course. Lest the Parpaldians had some sort of new, mystic frame, it was a task being done in vain.
Ine rolled forward her left hand, engine throttling up as she did until the sputter smoothed and blurred out into a beautiful hum. Everything around her seemed to move back slowly at first, only then speeding up, ‘till they all dashed past—hangars, towers, and bunkers—so quickly. Moments after, a great downward force as she lurched in her seat as if the heavens themselves had fallen. The vertical speed dial and altimeter both shot all the way up, climbing one through five hundred, one through two-and-a-half respectively—the altitude ball showed away its lower side, as did the sky itself.
Ine felt her hands roll down by themselves, cupping her mask back over, but not entirely covering her mouth. As done before, as always done, Ine rotated a notch on the lower-right of her joystick, followed by a single button’s push right above, and she spoke, “Eskadro Mandrel, bear five-five, climb [to] one-dash-five.”
Three ‘roger’s came in reply, voices thick and grainy, and away the group went. Along all three axes, her Ĉasisto and those following rotated in the air to their right, barely a merrund out from the field. Wisps of condensation followed by their wingtips ever stronger. Through the air, they cut like a knife on butter, up ‘till they were about on the course given—give or take the smallest fraction of a degree. There was time to appreciate the beauty, and yet none of the four did.
A flight so boring all around, kept lively only by the frequent remarks relevant to the issue; reports back to base of their expected range to, first eighty merrunds into fifty, and then into twenty left. And between, filled by small talk with one another of little relevance or importance. All within the span of fifteen byee.
And yet, still, with five byee to spare—certainly well within, though far more so than she’d expected—something upon the horizon. Some black, inky splotch—no bird or avian, far too stiff to be so. Their contact, perhaps?
“Eskadro Mandrel, unknown, prepare pursuit,” Ine said into her mask, all according to procedure. Insofar, all was within the ordinary save for the strange angle. But they always had to be prepared. Forward went her left hand, throttle lever all the way out as both RPM and airspeed took their leaps of faith. The joystick shifted to one side by sheer will of her hands, top-mounted mirror revealing her eskadro as having done similar.
Several affirmations came back through, all clear as mud, and yet well within the span of the quarter-byee their whole procedure had taken, the craft had gotten larger. And significantly so. But still, plenty of time to reach it—about the same altitude, and their turns the finest in the world. The larger it got, the less a chance it had at evasion—if it ever did. Ine almost cackled so, held back only by a diminished respect for the circumstances she’d found herself in.
Yet, well within the byee that followed, the craft grew larger yet. It was suboptimal, but still, Ine had time. A perfect rotation, and already a fifth through. But by then, things only deteriorated—Ine’s eyes could only grow to the craft that approached, once a dot that grew, now shifting horizontally as well, and so close she could see the detailing.
Red discs, probable roundels, designed much like an airliner in all ways, and four propellers with two… off? At such speeds with such conditions, surely her eyes deceived her. Yet a well-called-for rubbing helped in no way, and worse yet, the unknown passed them by the time they’d already gotten back in parallel with it.
No further did her throttle lever go, and tears of sweat beaded down so heavily as she watched her airspeed stay flat at its very max, still nowhere to catching their flight. Such a large airframe was faster than them!? Passing four-sixty merrunds a temuo-su, their Ĉasisto’s absolute maximum, speeds that matched only with Central designs and in such a lardy design too.
Every part of Ine still asleep was awoken, every vein poked out with shocking new flow, and a tremor-filled voice as she clamped down hard on her joystick’s communications button. “Maytown, report, unknown cannot be pursued—unknown is in excess of four-sixty, excess of four-sixty!”
Without any doubt, she heard an “impossible!” and “outrageous!” be dropped over the air, by both her eskadro watching on with her and command listening in. Hell, Ine herself couldn’t resist the temptation of dropping one for herself once the others had done so. And yet it was possible, apparently so, the large frame of the craft getting smaller and smaller with each passing moment.
But it was impossible.
[+]
~332 Merrunds Southwest of Ĉefiona-Catoin, Southern Dominion of Halpinia
3—9:72 Native / 8:20 AM JST
Perhaps, and maybe for just this once, men of both Muse and Halpine races had found their unity. Past all distinctions amongst all races, all species, and all nations—none in the Rodenian continent knew of what to make of what had happened. Though the rush to find out was dominated by the handling powers—colonial leash especially kept short as those of the authority rushed for their promotions.
Amidst the scene was a wooden building whose top half had been smashed away, at least a merrund and a half of upturned soil across a wide plantation, and a queer little craft lodged into the soil—the cause of it all. All white was the craft, longer than it was wide with extrusions half down just as long. Orifices, entries, what they be called, popped wide open with strange tentacle-like extensions coming from to the ground. Tongues, perhaps? A great beast was dead, and by what they knew not. It was like some airplane, but far too large it was, and too heavy it must’ve been—no propellers or magical inductors to so much as have kept it up.
Men of all types scoured the scene—officers in sickly and faded pale yellow uniforms of the Royal Halpine Muse Authority whose proudly perked postures held piths that stood high between the swarms of practically nude local beast farm laborers, both amongst the far more conservative desaturated oranges of the local armed servicemen—they dared trample the season’s crop over and over ‘till a layer of at least a lought deep had been carved away by foot and hoof print filled by wet, well-squelched mud, and crumbled grain.
Strangest of all, the beast’s victims ran amok. As though it were an ancient dragon that held them in its maw for safekeeping, yet not one had seemed to have been grateful in any way for their saviors; clear distress at separation from their predator. Such an account was further concurred to by those locals who’d been first to witness the beast come tumbling down right before its captives were released. Severe mental maladjustment from prolonged captive-hood, perhaps?
Men, women, and children all funnily dressed in a mish-mash of clothing. Rugged, blue work pants alongside strangely-collared shirts. Some were even made of fabrics and linens that reached radical levels of smoothness and softness previously thought unattainable, and the darndest mix of shined shoes with boots. And racially, all of Northern Philadean features—small-ish noses and far rounder faces than any local. And even more curiously so, to every question pushed forward, as with every asking and even speaking to, nothing of use was given by any of the victims. To every request, the response was all the same in this most peculiar language of theirs.
Kicking and screaming, one shouted at two apprehending officers, “LÍ WǑ YUǍN DIǍN!” The two officers apprehending dared not approach,
“Omae dareda?” another asked, a repeat of what they’d said just moments before to the interviewing Teriazo.
“Wǒmen zài nǎlǐ?” one asked back, two Crown Enlists were simply dumbfounded with clipboards, papers, pens, and little notebooks in hand. What exactly were they to record the response as?
It was to hearing these exclamations that a more senior-looking office of the Colonial Authority’s side came to some sickening conclusion—aides, adjutants, and a Watchman Teriazo kept ready all beckoned to hear what he had to say. Only just before, he’d looked about aimlessly in confusion, before he’d come to present his thesis. The Supervisor could only proclaim loudly exactly what was on his mind, and without any hesitation in doing so, “It’s Ĉinojian speak, it must be!”
A moment of awkward silence, only amongst his group—nature as it did continued its song, and none around could care anymore for it—the amassed crowd of ten in varied emotional states.
“The fucking dead language?” an inferior of the Colonial Authority asked, who barely kept himself from snorting out his remark. He was the only one to have commented, and with such a snide tone that almost all attention was drawn to him for a Byzh before the Supervisor continued at his borderline institutionalization-worthy conclusion.
“It’s close; I–I know it off like Muse! Some variant of, but it’s practically the same to!” Down to his board, the Supervisor looked and hastily scrawled and scribbled, before tearing off a page with a tilted head, “Er, adjutant, get this…, get this note off to the Muse Office at Ĉefiona-Catoin, as soon as you may!”
One top-torn, raggedly dashed sheet was slapped down into a pair of softer human-like hands, and away that pair went running.