Changing times

I own nothing

One shot

It was just another quiet day in the village of Kowan, the small elven community near Alnus hill. Unlike many of the civilized races, elves don't grow crops or domesticate animals. The lifestyle of an elf is that of a hunter-gatherer, in tune with nature, never taking more then what is needed for their humble numbers.

Beside a far more balanced diet than what the humans used, it also had the benefit of keeping the Empire away. Few things could escape an elf's sharp eyes or ears, and before the army could even reach them, they would disappear into the wilderness. After a dozen campaigns the Empire finally gave up on the idea of subjugating the illusive elves. The time and money wasted were simply not worth the effort.

So when Hodor Marceau on his hunt spotted an Imperial legionary lying unconscious in the forest he was rather conflicted with his options...

XXX

Tuka pulled the strings on her harp, humming softly as she watched the sun set behind the horizon...then her smiled faltered. Father was never this late before...though the elven girl as she scanned the horizon one more time.

Then her keen eyes spotted something...she looked more closely and saw her father carrying something on his back. Is that a person he's carrying? Mused the girl as she jumped down from the tree and ran towards him I hope he didn't shoot a human by accident...

"Father, what happened?!" she asked worriedly.

"I found this man lying in the woods. He seems to be only exhausted, but it felt wrong to simply leave him there in such a condition...the woods aren't the safest of places for a lone human."

Once they reached their cottage, they improvised a makeshift-bed and left the human to rest.

XXX

Pullus Valerii slowly opened his eyes, his mind was still foggy but he remembered running through a forest...and then darkness took him.

His eyes shifted to the side and spotted two elves siting around a table, eating some sort of stew.

The male elf noticed him and took another wooden bowl before passing it to him "Eat, it will help you recover faster."

Pullus nodded and took the offered bowl "Thank you..." as he ate his mind tried to sort things out "Where am I?"

"The village of Kowan, near Koda village" replied the male "My name is Hodor Marceau, I found you collapsed in the Coan forest."

"And I'm Tuka" replied the girl cheerfully.

Pullus nodded, normally he would have taken the time to ogle the girl, but not today...he was happy enough that the food he was eating wasn't meat.

"Pullus Valerii, a member of the Imperial legion" he answered somberly.

"I heard that a large army was dispatched to Alnus recently, are you with them?" inquired Hodor, his first impression was that the man is a deserter...but still, he couldn't allow himself to be too trusting. It could as easily be some trick to allow an enemy into the village.

The human opened his mouth to reply but words failed him...after a minute of thinking Pullus sighed "I was, the army was send to Alnus because the Gate appeared again."

"Gate?" inquired Tuka.

Hodor nodded in understanding "So the Emperor dispatched his army to subjugate the new world."

Pullus nodded in return "Yes, general Publius Quintilius Varus gave a grand speech about all the riches and glory we will bring with this campaign to the Empire...we found neither on the other side."

A frown crossed Hodor's face as he heard that. Humans were the last race that arrived through the Gate and little good came out of it. He dreaded the though what new problems could come through it...

"Our army marched through the Gate and entered into the abyss..." explained the soldier "the land was dead, there was nothing there. There were no traces of vegetation, nor insects or animals...only ruins. According to the dragon riders the city stretched for hundreds of miles in all directions. Countless towers, many made out of glass, stretched almost all the way to the clouds...in the past it must have been a city beyond imagination."

"Do you know what happened to it?" inquired Tuka.

Pullus shuddered "It's the green crystals, I'm sure of it...those things are the reason the world beyond the Gate is dead, or so the Siren claimed" seeing how the two elves didn't seem to understand he continued "like grass the crystal grows from the ground and even from some buildings. The places already overgrown with it develop strange storms with lightning strikes constantly descending...and the whole time a dull green glow surrounds the world. Albus tried to take one of the things...he was dead in seconds, the green crystals overgrowing his corpse in front of our eyes!"

"You didn't bring any of those crystals with you, or?" inquired Hodor worriedly. He certainly didn't wish for something like that to be brought here.

The soldier gave him an incredulous look "How? The crystals even grow over metal...the only thing we have done is avoided them while we searched the city for anything worth taking."

Figures...thought Hodor "So where's the rest of your army?"

The legionary became suddenly very quiet "Dead...I don't know if anyone survived beside me."

"The crystals?" asked the male elf.

Pullus shook his head "No, something else..." he tried to formulate his memories into words but he was not a learned man, only a farmer with no land to call his own anymore "we were camping in the ruins, trying to keep the bonefires going with what little wood we scavenged in the buildings. I was eating my bucellatum when a cacophony of strange noises broke out. My contubernium was ready for combat in minutes...or so we thought."

Tuke perked her ears intently, anxious to learn what happened next...

"As if Emroy wanted to mock us, we found ourselves right in the middle of a battle, a battle of steel titans that shook the earth as they walked. Man-like monsters went from building to building, their three red eyes glowing malevolently as they spat fire on us" Pullus trembled as he remembered the stench of burned men, the screams of the dying..."I saw Varus as he tried to rally the troops around himself, he was killed when one of the metal giants stepped on him...it probably didn't even register he was there, too focused fighting other metal monsters I suppose. Our lines quickly broke causing beastmen and legionary alike to run in all directions hoping to reach safety...because of the green crystal, I doubt they succeeded. As a scout I knew better and managed to reach the Gate without running into the metal monsters or the crystals, and once I was back through the Gate I ran to the forest and never looked back."

Hodor sighed "This is troubling news...I hope that whatever is on the other side of that Gate doesn't a-"

Before the elf could finish his sentence the earth shook, Tuka glanced out of the window and trembled at the sight of a giant red dragon attacking her village.

With claw, tail or fire breath, elven homes were destroyed and the lives of the people she called friends snuffed out.

Pullus paled as soon as he spotted the dragon and did the only logical thing, he jumped out of the window and ran for the hills.

Hodor cursed and grabbed his bow and quiver "Tuka, hide!", he had little hope in fending of the dragon but what else could he do?

With speed and accuracy surpassing those of any human he released an arrow at the monster but it bounced harmlessly off the dragon's scales...it did manage to get the dragon's attention though, which wasn't really a good thing.

"Father!" Tuka screamed as the dragon inhaled air, preparing itself for another burst of fire.

"To dust!" said a strange, loud voice.

The elves looked in stunned silence as a metal giant appeared from thin air, its one metallic claw holding the dragon by the neck. The beast tried to fight its unexpected assailant but failed to break free of the grip...then the giant ripped the dragon's head from the rest of the body.

Hodor watched the gory display utterly stupefied. On one hand he was happy the village was saved, on the other hand he had a really bad feeling about this metal giant with the scorpion tail emblem.

"F-father?" asked Tuka timidly as she approached him.

Hodor hugged her "It's okay, everything's alright." he said that even as he watched another strange metal beast appear, from it emerged creatures with three glowing eyes holding strange devices in their hands.

"The Black Hand has arrived!" announced one of the monsters in the imperial tongue, though with a heavy accent.

I hope at least though Hodor.

THE END

A/N:

Flamethrowers need more love in fiction.

bucellatum- Roman army rations, dry biscuits.

contubernium- a unit of eight soldiers.

There's no real point in expanding this story, we all know that the Empire is done for.