Chapter 9 - Drafted
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Glo was rarely happy, he had no reason to be joyous
about much. Considering he knew pretty much everything that could happen in the
past and the future, he knew about all the abhorrent things that could befall
the universe. But at the moment, he was relatively contempt, been thoroughly trounced simply
Even after the injury that would have killed most
humans, Cat was up and raring to go again. Novans were renowned around the
universe for having nigh-superhuman healing abilities, something the Abstracts
were well aware
Glo was waiting alongside a group
of other Nobles in one of the military bases on Nova, the compound Glo was
sitting in was close to the breath-taking Glass Coast, untouched by the rapid technological
development that had scarred the rest of the planet. The Nobles couldn’t see
the jewelled beach from the windows of the room they were in, but that didn’t
stop Glo from imagining the days he and his brother used to spend on the sand
searching for the small gems that would be hidden and
“Glo. Glo!”
Izzy said, still poking the other Noble, “Glo it’s your turn.”
The Noble woman nodded and casually kicked off the
floor before taking her time floating out of the door, grinning at Glo as she
went. Glo swallowed the memories of his brother and their brief childhood
before walking past the other Nobles and through the automatic door before him.
He was now standing in the office of one of the most prestigious military
commanders in the Novan army, Eaphoras as most people could be bothered
The military commander sat with an air of authority
that made Glo want to stand up straighter simply by principle although he
didn’t because he simply didn’t want to, Phor wore the dark grey uniform and stripes
that denoted his rank of high-general as if it were barely anything. Glo waited
a moment before sliding into the seat across from the Novan commander who was
sifting through a few sheets of paper, the man sitting at the desk glanced up
for a brief second.
“Prizmatica.” Phor growled, his voice denoted the
amount of conflict this man had seen in it’s deep , rumbling undertone. It was
like distant artillery fire echoing across a deep gorge.
“Yes,” Glo replied, not really knowing anything
else to say in reply.
“Noble of Time, not sure where I can put that.” The
man continued as if Glo hadn’t replied to him. “Anything else that should mean
you should be in a specific division of my army?”
“I’m a good pilot, Phor,” Glo replied, receiving a raised eyebrow from the other man in response.
“We need better than ‘good.’ Glo.” The commander
growled, he obviously wasn’t used to being referred to as Phor by the Novans he
was commanding, something he should get accustomed to if he was to be
commanding Nobles. “We need the best.”
“Anyway. You’ll be piloting for Nova in the war, I’ll
get a co-pilot for you.” Eaphoras told Glo, typing on the glowing monitor to
his side. “You, go to the Morooe and pick a vehicle. Don’t fight against over
which ship is given to you.”
Glo nodded and stood up, pointedly ignoring Phor’s
request to push the chair back to where he had left it and made to exit the
room. Achro asked him to send in another Noble by the name of Checkers, another
request that Glo casually avoided by reminding the military commander that he
had legs of his own and had just demonstrated that he could speak quite
eloquently.
Glo turned back to the door to hide his smile at
the horrified, dumbstruck look on Phor’s face. It was as if the man hadn’t ever
been told anything other than “Yes sir, right away.” since the dawn of time and
now he was being treated like any other fool. Glo couldn’t help but find his own
mal humour amusing.
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The white badge gleamed on the lapel of the proud
Novan, it denoted his position within the planet’s prestigious space and air
force. Below the badge was his name, Roema Cristsen, emblazoned right next to
where his heart was beating furiously.
Roe was nervous, he’d never knowingly met a Noble
in person before. Sure, he’d probably seen them out in public but they hadn’t
been displaying their supernatural abilities so he wouldn’t have known. But
today he’d be meeting one in person and that noble was to fly alongside him for
Nova, Roe would be lying if he said he wasn’t at least a little bit excited to
meet his co-pilot.
He stood up straight, looking out the door of the
barracks on the Morooe airfield. He’d been told to look out for and show around
a blue-haired man with ashen-white skin, he could see someone matching that
description slowly picking his way across the airfield towards the wrong
building.
After debating with himself internally for a
moment, Roe walked through the automatic sliding door and began running
across the airfield towards the man like a gazelle. Getting to the man, Roe addressed
him and asked if he was the Noble pilot.
“Depends on who’s asking.” The noble muttered,
looking at Roe like he’d just stabbed someone. “If you’re my co-pilot, then
yes. If you’re not, piss off.”
“Well, I am your co-pilot, Noble. Roema Cristsen.”
Roe said, rather curtly offering his hand to shake. Glo refused the gesture
with an abrupt shake of his head.
“Show me what I’ll be flying.” Glo requested, keeping
his path straight towards the large building that housed several spacecraft,
one of which Glo was to be piloting alongside this mildly irritating man.
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Imagination
was in turmoil; the Guardians had taken a hit during the attack on Surie. One
of their number had been killed by a Novan soldier, a dishonourable strike from
behind but very effective. Vee was dealing with the fallout, her teacher was in
no condition to continue with her training at the moment and she was looking
forward to Quizzical being back to instruct her.
It was day two of the hunt with her two companions;
they had yet to find any traplions and were preparing to put their camp
together for the second night. They’d been paid a little ahead of the hunt,
enough to keep themselves for a few weeks but not the money they had hoped for.
She walked back to the campsite carrying a bundle
of sticks with a surprisingly dry log tucked under her arm; she dropped them on
the ground next to the dugout hole in the ground.
“Thanks for that Vee,” Latro said patiently,
delving into his bag to find the tinderbox he kept in there. “Where’s the
fairie?”
Vee shrugged and sat down on the cold ground, “Said
he was going fishing.” She answered as she got herself comfortable.
“I do wish we had that Poltergeist here; we’d have
found those traplions by now if he were here,” Latro growled under his breath,
he knew that the other Abstract had more important things to take care of, no
less than it was better paid. That didn’t stop him from being frustrated that
the eyepatch-toting man wasn’t here helping them find their quarry.
“It’s not his fault, he’s off doing Poltegeist
stuff on Nova, fighting the good fight ya know.” Vee said, “Although he
shouldn’t be too long back.”
“I’d rather he were here,” Latro said again as he
fiddled with his tinderbox to get a pile of sawdust to set alight. “Damn this
infernal box!” He shouted after a few more moments of the flint refusing to
give him a spark.
“May I?” Vee politely asked, “Quizzical showed me something
cool we can do with our swords and our armour.”
Latro nodded and Vee retrieved her sword, extending
the blade out, Vee’s was a longsword made for battle, unlike Quizzical’s more
covert shortsword . Vee crossed it over her chest and raised her wrist to the
flat of the blade. strung under her wrist was a small piece of black stone, it
was called sparkstone and did just that when it was struck against metal. She
brought it around fast and ground the piece of stone down the length of the
blade, showering the clearing with hot sparks of gunpowder from the stone on
her wrist. Latro yelped and scrambled out of the way of her overzealous
spark-making, thankfully they had done as needed and intermingled with the
sawdust on the ground. It started a quick fire in the dust Latro hastily
dropped a few sticks on the flame and they soon had a happily crackling fire
between them.
The Guardian sighed happily, warming herself on the
flames while Latro knelt beside her and tended to crackling wood.
“How
is your friend?” Latro asked Vee a few minutes later, sitting back to get
comfortable by the warmth, “Still depressed?”
“For
someone who’s scared to walk out of the door daily, Ratchet’s pretty
good.” Vee replied solemnly, the friend she was talking about had been the
unfortunate victim of an accident on Earth, one involving a skirmish on the human
planet some years ago. Ratchet (formerly James) had been caught up in
the Candelaum when the Abstract sweeping a gate open had been struck with some
malachite, he’d been thrust mostly into Imagination, but part of him was left
trapped in the Candelaum. This meant he was unable to go back to his own home
and therefore was trapped in Imagination, unfortunately for him, most Abstracts
are very wary of other species and tend to lash out.
“So
he’s fine.” Latro asked, a sceptical tone in his voice, “Not that I much care,
but have you spoken to him recently?”
“I
talked to him a few weeks ago, maybe a month.” Vee replied, suddenly sullen,
“He prefers to be left alone, so I don’t bother him much.”
“I’ll
believe that.” Latro grumbled before looking over his shoulder. “Where is that
damn fae?”
Finn
had been a long time, fish were common enough in the river for him to have
caught at least one by now. Vee stood up and gently rolled her sword around the
back of her hand to extend it out again.
“I’ll
go look for him, I’ll shout if I need a hand.” The Guardian said patiently as
she began to walk towards the treeline towards the river. “Don’t go wandering.”
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“Finn?”
Vee called again as she walked down the river, she hadn’t found the fae but had
found one of his daggers still stuck in a fish. Something had happened to the
man and Vee was determined to find out what, hopefully, he’d just seen something
shiny in the forest and had gone to find investigate it; although he wouldn’t
have done that without something sharp to protect himself with.
She
repeated her call, a little louder but not too much for fear of disturbing something
in the forest she couldn’t deal with on her own. Creeping through the forest
like a lithe cat, Vee scanned her surroundings for even a glimpse of her friend.
Through the trees on the other side of the river, she caught a brief spot of
light flashing through the trees, followed by a muffled cracking sound like a
dry branch being cracked in a blanket. She glanced around for a second sound
before deciding to investigate, she forced herself into the Candelaum before jumping
and flickering across the quietly flowing river. Still remaining in the thin
membrane between the dimensions, Vee leapt up into a tree a few meters away
from where she saw the flash of light.
Immediately
she wished that she hadn’t, hidden in the thick undergrowth was a small
clearing. The cleared area was full of Novan soldiers, off at the back of the clearing
was the completely still body of Finn, a small hole where his heart used to be.
Vee grit her teeth to stop herself from snarling in anger, the Novans were
speaking in their own language but Vee could recognise the names of some places
in Imagination. The hospital city of Khuuka and some landmarks in Perception
were being mentioned from time to time, Vee hadn’t noticed before how similar
her own tongue of Abstraki was to Novan as she understood some of the words
they were using.
She settled down in the tree and listened a while as
they made their camp, the Guardian had to consciously keep herself from looking
at the broken body of the Fae on the other side of the clearing. The Novan
soldiers were speaking about sneaking and visiting, then discussing in words
she couldn’t understand. She knew that they were up to something though, something
dangerous that she couldn’t allow to happen, not while she knew about it.
She quietly listened for a while longer as the Novans
milled about in the clearing before bowing her head to the Fae in respect and
jumping as quietly as possible down from the tree. Vee grit her teeth and wiped
the tears from her eyes, stifling a small sob in her throat. She didn’t want to
deal with one of her friends dying today, it was just meant to be a quick and
simple traplion hunt… not a hunt for a bunch of Novan soldiers.
Vee flickered back across the river, biting back more
tears over the spilled blood. Latro was quite shocked when she stormed into
their camp, sword in hand, and swung to carve a chunk of wood from one tree.
“Vee, Vee!” Latro scolded, “Veezra .”
“He’s bloody dead!” Vee shouted at him, her words
flaring up angrily, “They killed him, animals.”
“What? Who’s killed who?” Latro asked, warily
watching how Vee was holding her sword, “You’re making no sense, where’s Finn?”
Vee threw her sword into the trunk of the tree, the
blade vibrating as it struck home, then sat down heavily next to the fire, she
mumbled quietly between her tears, “Finn’s dead Latro.”
It stunned the old Abstract, Finn was
an exceptionally skilled fighter, someone who he’d seen take down charging beasts
on his own. How something in the woods could have killed him was beyond his
realm of thinking, but his worries were lain to rest as Vee told him what
exactly had killed the Fae.
Latro
sat down next to Vee, his hand gently rested on her back to comfort her. Whispering
gentle things to her as the fire began to die down, he was just as shocked as
she was, but not as emotional. The murder had just reignited his hatred of the
Novans, but right now his priority was to calm down the sobbing Guardian
sitting beside him, her head in her hands. He knew that he couldn’t do anything
on his Chapter 10 - Duelist to the end↦
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