Siesta watched the ships heave away. The Nordflotte high command decided to send half their strength to run down and ultimately destroy this threat before it would spread to the rest of the kingdom. The very fact that Germania was at war with her homeland of Tristain served to only stress her beyond compare.

Consequently, she secluded herself inside Monsieur Simon's personal quarters given that he had left it apparently unlocked. Strange, there were these noises coming from under the bed. She turned to her side and sure enough...she noticed cockroaches scurrying out from underneath the bookshelf to her right. She squealed.

One of the barmaids rushed in and, though squeamish, swatted the roaches away with a broom. The insects retreated back under the bookshelf. Both ladies then realized that there was a solid wall of stone and mortar behind it.

"Odd," the barmaid remarked. "Herr Simon usually keeps his quarters clean. There should be a mouse hole behind it where those pests might be hiding."

Siesta wordlessly pressed herself against the shelf to peer through the cracks. To her surprise, it gave slightly under her weight. She made a strong shove and in one swift motion, the bookcase slid easily to the side exposing a doorway into a secret room with a corner from which the last of the roaches disappeared into.

Both ladies gawked at their discovery. The room was small with a single desk and a stool. An extinguished oil lamp sat on the table.

"I didn't know this was here," the servant said apologetically.

"I am not all that surprised," Siesta replied, entering.

"Wait! What if…"

Siesta was already at work. Her curiosity nursed, she pulled at the top drawer, finding a collection of old faded photographs. The foremost displayed a dozen men adorned in unusual clothing with what appeared to be crude musketry suspended by a leash hung over their necks. Each man had a smile, an arm over each other's shoulders. She ran her fingers across the picture, feeling for any bulges that dried paint would normally leave out.

"Strange…portraits…" She pulled at the other drawers and found even more articles—manuscripts penned in writing that she could barely understand heaped over even more photographs.

The barmaid strode towards her. Siesta heard her gasp.

"What is it?"

"That…that can't be! That's…that's…" she stammered.

"Who?"

"Herr Simon! That face...that is most definitely his face!" the barmaid replied, shakily pointing at the central figure. Siesta realized that it was indeed a much younger and clean shaven Monsieur Simon. As to what he was in this old portrait, she could only guess. But the oddity of everything in it—from attire to the things they carried to the desert mountains in the background—struck her as a remnant of the past that was not to be known by anyone else.

"Are you sure this is him?" Siesta asked mainly out of denial.

The barmaid shook her head. "Yes. Yes! Mein Gott…I have only seen a few paintings about him because of his influence but…this is…I can't even…"

"Take it calmly." Even I don't know what we just stumbled across. As Siesta ruffled through the articles, she came across the bundle of pictures at the bottom of the drawer. It was her turn to be taken aback as this time, she could very well see, clear as day, clean shots of a T-80 and its tank crew lounging with smiles on the hull.

"Start digging trenches!"

"Come on, you heard the commander! Dig, dig, dig!"

Agnès turned to the mages standing behind her. "Well, what are you waiting for?"

They gawked at her. "Pardon?"

The chevalier growled. This was not the right time for petty hierarchies. War was war! "Move the earth! We need all the manpower we have and you are all part of the force pool."

From behind, Groβherzog Guldendorf cleared his throat before they could protest. The mage knights stiffened as the Grand Duke rounded the yard. He patted the chevalier on the shoulder. "Shall I repeat? File out and clear up trenches for our troops. That is an order!"

"Oui!"

With a few flickers and flashes, the mages dispersed.

"Arrogant fools," Agnès muttered.

"Keep your head, Chevalier de Milan. The strain can be overbearing for some."

She paced to towards the tent. Old Osmond greeted her as she returned to the table. Julio had the journal flat open with loose notes scrawled over the maps. Duke Laurent de la Vallière was busy rewriting the overall strategy on used notes. They hoped the trenches would wear down the Germanian offensive.

"What now?" Guldendorf asked.

"We sit in the pits and build up the pillboxes," Laurent replied.

"Acknowledged." The grand duke marched back outside.

Agnès crossed her arms. "Pillboxes? More foxholes for our soldiers to die in?"

"A defended foxhole, ma'amselle. We never really bothered to actually pile up a barrier over the hole as we thought it irrelevant in the heat of battle."

"Exploit the lulls," Julio interjected.

Laurent shook his head. "Exactly. We have ample time before the Germanians would mount another attack. I doubt they have enough artillery to level us all here. No. They wouldn't risk that. They are unkempt but not reckless."

The chevalier peered over the map, seeing the hastily scribbled notes and illustrations that suggested several plausible maneuvers. "We are an important target, then?"

"We are strong providers of food, some fine wine, commodities; goods mainly. And our roads are necessary to support a speedy surge to the capital."

"We are a bridge."

Laurent looked up for the first time from his notes. "A meaty, juicy bridge."

"Not to the mention the terrain," Osmond judged. "Vallière encompasses a fortifiable position. A wide elevated land of sprawling hills that could be used as a staging point for assaults against any and all neighboring territories…including the capital."

The Duke allowed a small smile. "The Vallière lineage has had a history of holding out against invaders on this very land. Rarely has it been overrun—in the times that it had been, the attackers had paid a high cost."

"Flanking us is a difficult prospect as well," the Headmaster continued, "Grammont's bastion is a solid fortress, indeed built do withstand a grand army the likes of which stands before us. To our north are marshes that would cripple any mobilizations, not to include the arcane spirits laying dormant there. Simply put, the Germanians have no better choice than to ram through us."

Outside, they could hear the sounds of the soil moving to and fro in mass bulges. The last assault had come dangerously close to a pyrrhic victory for the Tristainians. Similarly, the Germanians were stunned at their first defeat and scrambled for reinforcements before launching another offensive. That gave them two to three days—less time than necessary to call up more reservists to beef up their own numbers.

"We might just fill up the trenches before dusk," Julio noted, glancing through the flaps. Her Majesty appeared from the adjacent hut, soaked in the blood of innumerable casualties.

Agnès had never seen Henrietta so haggard. She just hoped this 'entrenching' tactic would pay off so she would not have to see her liege so caught up watching the front and the rear while getting bombarded by the sleepless Germanian artillery.

The Archduke of Westphalia threw his hands in the air. Three brigades. Three brigades! Over three thousand well-trained, able-bodied soldiers had been thrown at the defenders. More than four thousand of their own men had been killed—no, slaughtered—over a few feet of land in contrast to the three hundred or so Tristainians seen lying across the plains on which Freiherr der Walen was felled. These inferiors were giving their all, and astonishingly, they were very effective. That meant that they were willing to risk their absolute annihilation to break their blitzkrieg here on these very hills.

It was frustrating. All the more so for the men under his command.

"This is not good for morale," a Hessian adjutant voiced bitterly. He then gestured at the next line of infantry assembling below them. "We should send in our modern musketeers."

"And risk lose them to those inferior swine?" another general retorted.

"They could tip the scales! Look at how much we could have gained had we deployed them in support of der Walen's charge!"

"You must not forget that we need a standing force to screen the melee to allow the musketeer brigades to fight effectively," the officers rebuked. "That's at least a frontier detachment protecting two battalions worth."

"The cost for such effectiveness is staggering; that explains why we are barely gaining ground."

"Your pessimism is not helpful at all."

"Oh, pressure me to think clearly!"

A hard slam on the table stopped the argument. "Look! They're digging."

"What?"

The Archduke pointed at the amount of activity bustling across the river. "They're digging into the earth. The mages, the commoners, they're all turning up soil."

"What for?"

The other more experienced officers chimed in. "Defensive positions."

"Scheisse…"

"You know what that means. We have to attack now before they could put up fortifications!"

"Are you blind? We just lost our initiative. We barely have enough men capable of engaging them at this moment!"

"But we must strike now! Commit our reserves; our artillery will support them."

"Yes, but our ships are occupied!" The Germanian Central Fleet had been disengaged from fire support when separate flotillas of Tristainian vessels flanked them from their unguarded north. They withdrew almost immediately, pulling the frigates away from the battlefield and farther to the bumpier and slightly mountainous terrain of the Tristainian countryside. A smart diversion and one that deprived the invaders of their most powerful asset.

"We still have our ground cannons. Calibrate them towards the riverfront. This is a ripe chance while we still have it!"

"Our cannoneers are lacking ammunition, verdammt! Do you not see how much munitions we expended on our initial assaults?"

The Archduke growled. More arguing. No wonder they could barely accomplish anything. He was beginning to despise the new military directives. Mixing the arrogant desk-work (higher-ranking) cadets with the experienced (lower-ranking) field officers had proven to be more disruptive than beneficial.

"We need cohesion!" he declared, putting the debate on hold. The Junkers and the Hessians stilled as the older generals glared. "We attack when we are ready. I will say when. That is my final word."

He could tell that a majority of his subordinates were not complacent.

Henrietta planted her hands on the table. She followed Julio's finger across the map of the Vallière fiefdom.

"Enforcing a delay would buy us some more time."

"For what else?" Laurent asked, doubtful of the Romalian's suggestions even though he sourced it from the Marshal's personal volume.

"For more reinforcements, Monsieur Vallière. Wear them down."

"Offers a feasible counterattack in the event that our reserves could come up here fast enough," Her Majesty said, grateful that such reserves were not comprised entirely of students who barely finished their education.

Laurent compared his notes with the discernible scribbles on Marshal Vorovian's journal. It seemed entirely plausible. Were they desperate enough to actually implement such experimental measures? They did not have much in the way of manpower when it came to replenishing the ranks—an advantage only the Germanians and the Gallians had.

"We tire them out until they are too exhausted to offer up a defense." Duke de La Vallière huffed. It did not just sound practicable. It sounded too smart to be practical. "They are always on the offensive. If we catch them under guard…"

"Ambitious train of thought," Osmond commented.

"Ambitions can be considered," Henrietta said. "Go on."

Laurent tapped the end of his pencil. "They are totally focused on smashing through our lines. We hold out against their onslaught long enough to damage their confidence."

"They don't have a defensive perimeter," Julio remarked. He pointed at the lines drawn across the cartographical sketch of the river separating the two armies. "What they have is just a mass of soldiers huddled in tents waiting to cross in droves. No walls. No barriers. Though there are a few formations of defenders, they are too stretched along the river front to be truly efficient."

"That's the idea," Laurent added, "They always go on the attack. We blunt their attack, disorient their forces, and when they fall back, we go on the pursuit." A wry smirk stretched from ear to ear. "We cross the river and tear into their camps. They are expecting a breakthrough against us, not the exact opposite."

Osmond posited to test his proposition. "You are saying that the Germanians are unprepared for a counterattack?"

"They have the numbers to occupy Tristain three times as much. But that does not mean that they have the cohesion to absorb a wisely placed jab into their tender nether regions," the Duke concluded. He glanced at the Romalian.

"We could test it."

The Headmaster withdrew from the table. "I am unsure of this. Even if they fall back, I don't think we are capable of pursuing them. Our best victory here would be the destruction of their capability to launch another offensive."

"Well, we do not have our good Marshal to confirm his theories," Laurent said, "How else can we prove this would work?"

Osmond sighed. "Given that we do not have anything else at this time, I have to concede. Very well. But I cannot ensure that we can draft up the students again."

"Hopefully we would not have to," Henrietta replied. "How sooner can we muster up enough troops to apply this rerouting?"

"In foresight…after the next wave, if they would come. The trenches should prove significant by then." Julio forwarded the note detailing his interpretation of the elastic defense strategy. The look on Laurent's face soured immediately.

"This is ridiculous. You don't expect me to just give up portions of Vallière land to these wroth, unkempt—"

"We do, Monsieur." The Romalian centered his pupils on the Duke's. "Sometimes, we have to sacrifice honor for victory."

Laurent exhaled bitterly. "On any day but this, I would go for honor."

"We have that both," Julio replied with a haphazard smirk.

It was cryptically awing how the cones came off like screw caps. Saito held his breath when the dislocated warhead floated inches from his face, levitated by the Elves across the small beach to the makeshift pallet of spare planks meshed together by strands of rope skinned off of the branches cut from the nearby trees. He could imagine how much power lay compact inside the conical metal container. He had read articles about it back home and Google searches were generous to multitude of images for his mind to dwell on.

But having a part in the handling of such delicate yet extremely lethal instruments of annihilation was entirely surreal. It was akin to living a dream. A messed up dream that feels more like a nightmare with each passing day. Why are we even doing this?

He had asked that question many times in the fierce debate on whether or not to employ these weapons. The commandos had their say and though they were still divided on the matter, they still carried out their tasks with diligence.

"Saito, you once told me about two whole cities from your country that were greatly destroyed in an instant," Louise said.

Saito exhaled. He had to thank his old Japanese textbooks and some random Internet articles to rouse her curiosity. "Atomic bombs. Think of them as…the predecessor to these…things."

"Oh," she huffed. The moment passed silently before she continued. "How…damaging?"

"So much."

Louise opened her mouth. Seeing how disturbed he was about the topic, though, she decided not to prod any further. Perhaps when all this is over, she should try learning more about her husband's world and the insanity that plagued it.

The Tristainians watched as the Elves laid down the last of the bombs. Four of the 'Spetsnats' men swarmed the pallet, carefully tying the warheads together. Oleg and Vassily handed over another set of ropes to ensure that the ordnance was held completely still. Yegor made it explicitly clear that they be handled with the greatest care; it was common sense to everyone who was not Halkeginian.

However, they had toiled into the night and as such, it was an accepted consensus that they rest where they were. By dawn, however, they were wary of skirmishes from the angry survivors of Kiel. Still, even as the pallet was assembled onto the deck and the trawler sailed farther into the ocean, it had been a calm morning.

Until Malicorne nearly hyperventilated.

"What is it?" Guiche asked.

The chubby mage recovered and pointed to the skies over the port city. They all eyed the skyline, seeing skyships bursting through the clouds.

"Bloody hell," Matilda breathed.

"The fleet is back," Wardes said.

Saito groaned. "For crying out loud, what the hell! They are not going to let up!"

Gorian stared at the approaching fleet. The Germanians relied on numerical advantage and superior firepower combined with their signature barbarity in the heat of battle. In the case of their airborne navies, they preferred to cluster their ships together. That made them appealing targets for a flak barrage, a shell that would detonate once its fuse burnt out and cause significant damage to anything caught in its radius…

He tapped Karin. "How are you feeling?"

She grimaced. "I am fit."

"No, you are not. How is your leg?"

She scowled. "I am capable. Do not think of me as a casualty that needs to be sorted."

"Technically, you are." He looked her over. "But you are right; you are still capable."

Karin quickly saw through his facade. "What are you planning now?" Inwardly, she prayed he was not phasing through another insane idea. It was, after all, his madness that had driven them where they were.

She tilted her head. "Be honest with me, Gorian. Are you planning to have me stall them again? Like you always have in the past?"

"I am not going to take that risk with you again!" he nearly hollered. "Look at your leg. No. I want us all to survive here!"

Before he let his arm down, she had already raised her right arm to discharge a controlled gust of wind while the other rested over the wandsword that was her cane. Her limp had barely improved since leaving Vindobona.

When she finally turned away from him, Gorian disappeared below deck. "We end this now," he muttered, his voice filtering through the noise and into Karin's open ears.

The far seers had detected the group far from the range of their cannons. They had already seen the remains of Kaizer Albrecht to know that these intruders were responsible for these horrid disasters that had enveloped the heart of their mighty empire. The commodore of the flotilla had assigned six ships to contain the violence in Kiel while he personally led the rest to deal with these pests once and for all.

However, try as he might, they were still a far ways off to their targets. The far seers also said they spotted Elves among them. He found it strange at first then gaped in horror when the thought of an Elvish plot to strike at the bastion of human civilization crossed his mind.

On his order, the thirteen Germanian skyships pushed through the clouds at breakneck speed, taking the risk of exhausting the magic keeping them all airborne.

"They're getting closer!" Malicorne screamed.

Guiche pulled his hood, dragging him from the banister of the departing trawler. "Do you have to be so edgy!?"

"What am I supposed to feel then!"

"Shut up, you two!" Oleg hollered. "Damn it. Our guns cannot reach them at this range."

"Even with your sophisticated musketry?" Matilda groused.

"They're priming to fire," Colbert warned intuitively. "Everyone, steel yourselves!"

No sooner had the word left his lips when the aft of the trawler was ensconced behind a coagulated mass of glass stretching above the sails. It would be enough to protect against the artillery shells that the Germanians were feeding into their cannons.

"We should be able to hold off their fire," Bidashal echoed, keeping his palms towards the shield. Beside him, the Elder had his staff raised, enhancing the effectiveness of their spell tenfold. "It will not last for long but it should absorb most of the damage."

The distinct rasp of the spring on the Kalashnikov caught their immediate attention.

"Bozhe moy," Semyon growled. "Yegor, what do you think you are doing?"

"The magic that keeps them afloat rests in their sails, is it not?" he asked calmly.

"Well, technically, yes," Guiche replied.

The Marshal quickly motioned at the Void mage. "Louise, please open a portal to the deck of the foremost ship you see."

"Yegor!" Semyon—and the other surrounding Tristainians—loudly protested. "You will not put us all at risk! Enough of going commando."

"We must break their formation," Krazov interjected, "so we can go on unmolested."

"And how is a single man with a Kalash going to break a large concentration of skyships, eh?" Misha argued, slightly flinching as a wall of water leaped up over the Elves' shield.

Yegor flicked his head at the bridge. "Head downstairs and get your guns. The ships may have range but our bullets can travel the distance. The sails would be the targets."

"Yegor, they are out of our range!" Oleg hollered as the Marshal marched to the bannister where the edge of the shield shimmered.

"They will be when you are standing on their decks."

"And you expect us to go with you?" Bohdan countered, defiantly showing his arms crossed.

Yegor stared. Some of his fellow Spetsnaz, though professional and hardened, were dumbfounded. "I don't have to ask you to come. Just anyone who wants to tag along. You can stay here if you want. I'm going." He motioned once more at Void mage. "Louise, the portal? Please?"

Saito moved quickly and had his hand occupying half of the rifle. "Marshal, with all due respect, can we do something less insane?" he coldly requested. "Louise is tired. My friends are scared out of their skin. Everyone else doesn't want to do this."

"Correction," Vassily remarked. "I do."

Semyon threw his hands into the air. "Well, the both of you can go ahead and get yourselves killed! As for me, I am staying here on this damn boat and steer it as far away from the fleet as possible."

A wave of agreement to stay on the ship resonated across the whole deck. Yegor looked at his only ally. Vassily nodded slightly. The Marshal then tapped Saito on the shoulder. "Young man, I only need Louise to open up a portal."

Saito glared. "And if I deny you the permission?"

"I not asking for your permission. I am only asking you to trust me."

"Again with trusting you," Semyon snorted. "Do you know how many people were killed by trusting you? This is not Afghanistan, Yegor. This is Halkeginia! Do not make this any worse than it already is!"

"I concur," Montmorency and the rest of the Tristanians chorused. Yegor saw that his own strike team had crowded alongside his fellow Spetsnaz. He eyed Karin hesitantly keeping her arms crossed.

The Marshal breathed. He carefully brushed Saito's hand off his rifle. "Just trust me, comrades. To be frank, none of you will be putting your lives on the line for this one."

Krazov stomped his heel on the floorboards. "Since the divisions are apparent, looks like I'll be coming along." He hefted his army rucksack over his shoulder. The PB silenced pistol came brandished out of his hip holster. "I have what I need to make this work, Yegor."

Semyon pinched the bridge of his nose and turned away, being the first to be visibly upset.

"All of us have learned never to trust the KGB," Mischa said to the nearest person next to him, "And ever since Vassily, who is KGB, joined our unit, the only person who knew him best was Ilya. We just hoped he would not send a report to Moscow that would get us shot."

"I barely understood anything you just said," Matilda remarked.

Mischa eyed her. "Think secret police. Very, very ruthless secret police."

Yegor smiled. "I appreciate your approval, Vasya." He turned to find Louise straddling in front of her astonished husband and friends. She had a look of determination on her face. Her fine petite features were now dented with wrinkles that only he could see. And to think she was barely out of her teens.

"Louise, do you trust me?" Yegor asked.

"This is the last time I trust you," she replied, ignoring the hysterical wails of those around her. Even as Karin made to step in-between them, she still looked passed the railing to the closest vessel in the sky.

"Louise!" Karin growled. "This is not your decision to make." This time, however, her steely voice failed to curb her own daughter.

Yegor forcefully turned the Duchess around. If there was a look he never saw in this iron lady's face, it was that of sudden momentary fear. Just a glance of it. Perhaps it was because he had gripped arms so tight that they were going white. "I am sorry, Karin. But I must do this. I need your daughter to open a rift for me. And I promise you, with all that I am, I will never do anything like this ever again."

"Did you count how many times you've made such a promise!" she hollered.

"This will be the last one. You have my word." His arms then wrapped around her in a sealed embrace much to her bewilderment.

What?

Yegor smiled weakly. "You were always a troublesome girl. Adventurous, cocky, foolish. Just like my little Katya. Not anymore. But you will always remind me of her."

Who?

Saito took Louise's hand when he saw the bandolier wrapped around his waist. It was fully packed with grenades. Gorian let go of the Duchess, brushing her aside and nodding at the Void mage.

"Louise, you—"

By now, Louise's cloud of thought was beyond dissuasion. She shook off his hand and backed away. With the spell riding on the edge of her tongue, she raised her wand towards the incoming frigate. Karin could only watch in disbelief at how far she has been defied.

Gorian, spare my daughter. Spare her, please! Her eyes pleaded.

The rift started to form.

"Marshal! Stop this!"

"Yegor! Comrade major!"

"Gorian! Spare my daughter, please!"

The Marshal turned to Karin, now on her knees, flanked by both Soviets and Tristainians. Louise made to turn upon hearing her mother's voice. She felt her head locked on her shoulders by Vassily's free hand.

"Focus on the portal, dear," the KGB lieutenant said.

"But, mother—"

Yegor Vorovian exhaled. "Our skirmish with these sailors ends now! Madamoiselle Louise, please keep focused at the task at hand."

"My mother, I heard her—"

"Louise, for our sake, I am counting on you for this to work," he pleaded. A cannonball overshot its range and landed close to starboard, raising water high enough to drench everyone on deck. Nonetheless, he stooped down to look the girl in the eye. "I have made many promises to your mother, to your mother's friends, to my friends. I have not kept them. But before I die—"

"Are you crazy?!"

"Don't say that!"

Gorian raised his voice, straining his gaze on her. "Before I die, let me keep one final promise to your mother to bring you all back home in one piece."

For a moment, Saito swore he could see a glistening tear streak down the man's grazed face.

"Louise, I can see your mother in you. Make her proud. Make her happy. Do this for me. Because I am sure, after this, I will not be here to see her the day she was your age." He smiled sadly. "Happy. Free."

"I can see them shambling about," Vassily remarked, tapping the Marshal on the shoulder as the contours of moving bodies began filtering through the rift in the air. "We do not have much time, Yegor. We must act now!"

"Louise, listen to me closely…" Yegor said.

Karin felt something wet trickle down her cheeks. She refused to wipe her face. "Gorian, please…"

"…collapse the portal as soon as we step through!" he ordered.

"What?" Louise stuttered. The portal fluctuated.

"Louise!" Gorian screamed.

"Door!" Louise declared.

In an instant, the air in front of her wand condensed and suddenly flared until it spread into a roughly cut emptiness of high sky as though a surgeon had made a quick incision into a man's stomach, revealing its abysmal contents. The smell of sulfur and gunpowder wafted through. Already, seven Germanian sailors stopped to gape at the sudden vulnerability in their premises.

"Forgive me, mother," Vorovian said as Krazov pushed him through. Both men disappeared onto the deck of the Germanian frigate. The rift collapsed right as the Kalashnikov sputtered to life on the other side.

"Marshal!" Saito scrambled towards the closing portal, his hand barely touching the wisp of energy as it dissipated.

"I'm…sorry," Louise muttered. Her knees felt like jelly and she buckled onto her rear.

"Comrades," Yermolay stammered, glancing back and forth between the open doors leading to the lower decks. "Did you see the bulge in Vassily's rucksack?"

Semyon and Oleg quickly leapt into action to check the nuclear stockpile below. Saito grabbed Louise's hand. "Open another portal, quick!"

The firefight ended in minutes. Yegor kicked down the door to the bridge and mowed down the ship's captain and all others present. Krazov followed shortly thereafter, the top of his rucksack now exposing the MIRV cone.

"Put the bomb here," he said, rushing to the window to see the other ships slowly edging out of formation. "Nearest one is coming over."

Vassily planted the warhead on the table in the center of the room. He scowled. "This does not look good. There is too much degradation on the side. I do not think…"

Yegor already undid the latches holding the grenade bandolier to his waist. He grabbed the cone. "I don't care if it fizzles!" He rushed back outside just in time to see another rift tear half-way over the corpse of a dead Germanian marine.

"Damn it!" Saito screamed, bursting through. The doors to the bridge hung loosely off its hinges and he could see Vassily coming outside to meet him. He was waving him away.

"What are you doing!" he screeched. "Get out of here, now!"

"Where is the nuke!"

Saito immediately got his answer when Yegor stopped in front of him, warhead in his hands. To his horror, the pin on one of the grenades in the bandolier was missing.

At that moment, there was not a second for any clearer thinking. Krazov was already speeding towards the portal, yelling as he pushed Saito back into it even as the young man had grabbed a fistful of Yegor's sleeve.

The physics of Halkeginia were warped in the moment and all three unconsciously smashed through the rift a bare second before it closed, their bodies slamming into the Undine Knights gathered around it on the other side. As they tumbled across the trawler's deck, all eyes arced to the spectacle that unfolded a mile into the horizon above the Germanian mainland.

"Everyone!" Andrey screamed. "Shield your eyes! Shield your eyes!"

Even when they had their forearms over their faces, the flash seared through their shut eyelids. The explosion sounded like nothing Louise could never have fielded by herself. The release felt akin to a dozen firestones going off at once. A ball of light expanded rapidly, consuming the frigates, burning up the clouds, and creating a scene that only the scientists at atomic testing facilities normally saw through their screens behind protective eyewear. And it all happened in a heartbeat.

Then the shockwave came as they opened their eyes to see, whipping through everything, making its presence felt. The boat rocked violently, pounded by the disturbed waves. At the end of it, when the wind died, Colbert bobbed his head over the railing. Behind him, Semyon stammered to his feet as though he had seen the end of the world. The glass shield the elves held up ceased to exist.

"Bozhe moy… nuklearniy…"

Colbert let his jaw hang. There were no words to describe such a tremendous release of energy. He pushed up his glasses, knowing that he had just witnessed a great devastation. The tight formation of the flotilla had effectively vanished like splintered wood, the ashen vessels dropping from the sky like broken birds, some hurtling to the earth in splintered spirals.

"Nordflotte," Wardes echoed, "is no more..."

The boat drifted controllably farther outward into the northern ocean. Despite being a barman by profession, Semyon had some notion of seafaring but he deferred to the other Spetsnaz commandos who had more hands-on experience with ships. Other than a few directions and some corrections in navigation, absolute silence reigned over the vessel.

With nothing else to do, he handed the ship's steering to Bohdan and left the bridge. The first shapes that he saw were the huddled forms of the Tristainains, most of them barely nineteen years of age. All of them, he believed, were too young to have whatever pieces of their innocence torn apart like this.

He could understand them. It was difficult for a person who had grown up around magic and comfort afforded by manservants with silver trays and diamond-rimmed goblets. And although war was an ugly thing no matter what the era was, shock did not discriminate between the horrors of what happened to those who perished and the imagined ways they could have.

He sat down beside Saito who had Louise cuddled up in his arms. Guiche and his three lieutenants Gimli, Reinhard, and Malicorne were all exhibiting the symptoms of shock; he could tell. His fellow Russians were taking it slightly better though they were busy walking around or standing around, some wishing for a cigarette or a pint of vodka. Then the veteran mages and the Elves; he had no idea where they were but he did not bother. Better to leave them to contemplate having seen a nuclear explosion that incinerated sixteen skyships and their total crews of sixteen-hundred.

"All in the blink of an eye," he muttered out of thought.

"All in the blink of an eye," Saito mumbled back.

Semyon looked at him. He was not surprised to find the thousand-yard stare manifesting across his face. Neither was he feeling any better about it. "How are you feeling?"

"Calm."

He nodded his head. Right. Like I would believe that. "I see." He watched Oleg and Dima clear out the deck for the pallet. Then the dragging. I guess the mages have had enough of this and decided to let us haul it up here by ourselves. He decided to leave the young duke and his wife and help handle the warheads for disposal.

Upon reaching the staircase, he was greeted by the pallet itself, carrying all the ordnance securely wrapped in rope, floating before his face.

"Move," Karin ordered.

Semyon did so, stepping aside for the Heavy Wind, the Flame Snake, the Crumbling Dirt, and the Viscount to carefully levitate the explosives into the open to the waiting Spetsnaz commandos holding the weighted nets. "Yegor?"

"Resting," Matilda replied quickly, brusquely brushing passed him.

He watched them carefully settle the pallet close to the edge. He wondered how the boat managed to stay balanced with a large cargo stationed dangerously close to one side until he remembered that the Elves had volunteered to help maintain the boat's buoyancy. I still do not trust you, Alosh.

Oleg, Dima, and Yermolay then began stretching the netting over the warheads, making sure that the added weights would keep the bombs anchored to the seafloor for as long as it lasted.

By the time they had tied the corners of the net around the weights, a small crowd had gathered around the pallet. For the most part, everyone was silent; Semyon was sure they were recovering from the sight of a nuclear detonation but after their alleged covert operation against the late King Joseph of Gallia, he guessed that they were trying to calculate just how many firestones were needed to equal the same release of energy.

Probably fifteen or twenty. What would I know? Then it occurred to him. No. The warheads are supposed to have yielded far more energy. This cannot be. He looked back at the orange beaches of the Germanian heartland. Wait…

For a brief moment, he felt very relieved. He finally realized the true analysis of what Yegor had successfully pulled off. "The bomb fizzled. It could have been much worse."

"What are you saying?" Karin asked coldly.

Semyon saw her standing in the middle of the deck, staring at him as though he had his hand in a jar of sweets. "The bomb….the warhead… Normally, the explosion would have been greater and more devastating than what we had witnessed."

"I do not know whether to believe or not. In fact, I do not see the need to. The damage has been done."

"Duchess, I myself am equally…disturbed." He remembered her sitting on her knees, begging their former commanding officer to spare her child. The same face stared at him. "We are all recovering."

"When we have recovered from this, what do you think is the next course of action?" Karin asked hoping to shift the topic.

Semyon mused, returning to the cabin where the map of Eastern Germania had been tacked on the table. The location of the Site was colored in black and red ink. He pointed at the heavily encircled X. "The Site is here. Our intel confirms that the equipment stored in Vindobona encompasses over half of what was salvaged. That means that it is an absolute necessity to go there and destroy everything else." He gestured at the pallet on the deck. "For now, we dispose of the warheads here. Then, we sail along the coast until we reach the border villages. This trawler…will ensure our safe travel."

Wardes planted his finger on the yellow marble that marked their position over the sea. "Perhaps, we could utilize quicker means."

"How so?"

The Viscount offered his hand. "I was there. Her Highness de La Valliere is capable of opening doors to distant lands and to lands where her eyes cannot see unless she is guided by an individual who has—"

"…been there," Karin continued sharply. "I know, Viscount. Sounds feasible."

"If it is workable," Semyon said then stopped. He glanced to the deck where Louise was still hiding under her husband's arms. "If it is workable, and if Louise has finally recovered, then we will go ahead with it."

ORIGINALLY DRAFTED: December 11, 2014

LAST EDITED: June 14, 2016

UPLOADED: June 14, 2016

NOTE: Hey, folks. It's been awhile. Again. It's becoming difficult to keep writing as of late. Although I've already drafted more chapters back in 2015, I have yet to make any progress. Sorry about that. I will still keep writing though. If anything, I'm determined to finish this story.