The Ancients and the Angels: Celestials

by M.C. O'Neill

  ***

  “Black Sun One, this is Treetop Actual,” the brass on the comm barked. “Give me your status.”

  Master Sergeant Lauryl’la Hay’cenn scanned the readouts on her armored limmer’s console. Although she had wanted to make pilot, the break to her arm earlier that summer had prevented her from such reflexive acrobatics, so the Air Guard assigned her to the position of navigator. So many fine elves of the ADF had been killed or captured in the last month that almost everyone of age was conscripted into its forces by the first week of Ninthmoon. Promotions were frequent as many elves did not survive their stations for very long. Lauryl’la had been a lowly sergeant just the week before.

  During her stay at the Health Circle, she was terrified and confused. The break to her arm from the fall Quezz gave her had caused a mean fever and her body had ached everywhere. Klaxons screaming “Code Black!” bounced off the walls and the attending wardens had much difficulty performing the simple operation of setting a bone. Between the wails of the alarms and the thuds of the monstrous beasts outside, the maiden wondered what was happening to the world and if she would live to see it again. After weeks of rotation with the AYP to the Air Guard, she would see it and fight for it.

  “Eh, gyroscopics at seventy percent,” she recited into the comm. “Countergyro in synch. All readings nominal. Prepped to shunt and purge. Avionics are in the flow.”

  “Copy, Black Sun. The sky is thin. Permission to throttle.”

  The heavy armored limmer sang its wakesong as the motor prepared to lift the dense wood of its circular hull. Lauryl’la gave the small picture of her mother resting on the dashboard a quick caress. This flight and this fight were for her. Looking down into the bellycaster’s chamber, she called to the fiery-headed lad spinning its pod idly back and forth.

  “Hey Copperhead! Keep sharp! We’re gonna do this!”

  “Whoo-hoo!” the young elf hollered. “These moths are gonna eat some iron!”

  Lauryl’la cocked a crooked smile at that. The little elf was growing on her every day, and she didn’t mind working with him as much as she had thought she would.

  His stomach lurched a bit as he saw the pavement below fall farther under the shadow of their battledisc. They were rising higher and higher off the ground and he had a front row seat of the ascent from the windows surrounding his pod. Remembering to be tough, Quen’die’s estranged brother closed his eyes for a second and thought about his sister. With all hope, the twain would meet again one day, but between his mother’s demands against the idea and their separation from the structure of the shelter’s network, a quick rendezvous had proven to be difficult.

  Kaedish was on AYP duty at the time of the demonic first strike. As his mother was with Lord Mitlan at the Circle of Finance and his father was in a place unknown to him, the lad was well-insulated within the safety of an official government bunker from the very beginning of the troubles. After some time, he had been reassigned from guard duties to the Air Guard where he had his marksmanship skills put to the test. Baby pudge forgotten due to his days with the AYP, the young elf wondered if these horrible times were not indeed some of the best moments of his life. Feeling the actual chug of the modified miniball-casters was much more rewarding than playing Martian Patriot.

  Captain Ping held the limmer steady and remembered her crash course in flight training. This was her actual first time in the air as all her formative lessons had been performed in the safety of simulators deep within the Air Guard’s bunkers. The truth versus the training was a bit different, but the young sea elf handled the gist of it.

  “Black Sun One aloft,” she called into the comm in her broken Atlantean. “Prepare to engage on my mark. ETA to mark: one minute.”

  During the first days of the infernal’s attack on the city, Ping had holed up in the spacious and rather lavish basement of the Mitlan estate. It was reinforced and quite accommodating compared to a common household’s. The behemoths did not congregate often by the coasts much for reasons unknown, however, flights of demons were rampant in that area as they had attempted to sink boats and ensnare seafaring elves in their wicked nets.

  Food had fast become scarce down there and she was not able to leave the sanctuary as she could hear the crashes and bangs of rummaging demons in the abandoned house overhead. By a twist of fate, the former housewarden had found a secret tunnel’s entrance behind a life-sized oil portrait of Venn’lith she had decided to destroy in a manic (and bored) rage one lonely evening. How she hated that maiden and her demeaning beatings. Why the tunnel was installed there had been a total mystery to the sea elf, but at that point, she didn’t really care.

  After three days of scurrying through the subterranean darkness, she had emptied out into the middle of Shelter Nine which serviced the uptown district. By the time she had reached the facility, she was dehydrated and to the point of starvation. Within a few more days, she had been conscripted by the ADF air guard as they needed to train pilots and train them with haste for the counterattack.

  She had taken to the controls of the simulators like a duck to the sky and had no problems rising through the ranks almost by the day as she had always made top scores in her training pod. By the seventh of Ninthmoon, she was dubbed a captain, and after the eleventh’s first true battle, she would be made a major.

  “Black Sun One, this is Treetop Actual,” the comm squawked again as the disc cruised. “Please be advised you have elements of the 99th Gonduanna Pursuit Squadron inbound on your eight.”

  “Copy!” Ping shouted back to her commander over the somewhat soothing woob of the limmer’s motors.

  “Whoo-hoo!” Lauryl’la cheered with armored glee. “We’re gonna fight these creeps with the Crimson Domes!”

  Lauryl’la had every reason to rejoice upon hearing that announcement. The Gonduanna 99th Pursuit may very well have been the best of the best when it came to the history of limmerjocks. Nicknamed the Crimson Domes due to the red paint festooned atop their cockpits, this outfit had never lost one single pilot since its inception. No matter if they had fought over the lands of Tel’lemuria or in the skies over Thuless’in, the 99th struck fear into the hearts of their enemy targets. Atlantis was so lucky to have an unshakeable alliance with Gonduanna, and the Crimson Domes proved it.

  “Black Sun Squadron,” a heavily-accented voice cut through the comm. “Captain Kalan’dee of the 99th Pursuit at your support.”

  “Copy, Crimson Dome One,” Lauryl’la responded, trying to restrain her joy. “Good to have you with us today.”

  “Likewise,” he confirmed. “Prepare to split in a flanking maneuver. Bogies at our twelve. We’ll hit them at their three and nine.”

  “Affirmative,” the maiden smiled. That day she would fly with giants. Captain Ping was already veering their flying saucer to her right in preparation for the sneaky engagement.

  “Kaedish!” Lauryl’la hollered down into the caster’s belly again. “Be ready for this and don’t choke!”

  The young elf rolled his eyes and sneered at the sky from under his feet. “No way! I don’t choke!”

  Swiveling the bellypod, Kaedish trained the heavy caster’s sights on a flight of demons off to Black Sun One’s left. His trigger finger had, in all seriousness, an itching sensation run through it and he realized at last why casterslingers throughout history had referred to it in such a way.

  As they entered firing range, Kaedish made his dream come true of becoming the scourge of the battlefield. This was a much better experience than he had ever hoped, as he was not focusing his aggression against a brother or sister elf, but an alien force that epitomized pure hate for his kind.

  All over the world this kind of union was forming in perfect coordination. Tribes who, under their usual politics, fought at the first sight of each other since ages past had put aside their differences and death grudges and worked together to save themselves and their beloved old enemies. Tel’lemuria supported Thuless’in. Kumari supported Tel’lemuria
. Avalon supported the dreaded Xochians. A demon was a demon, and those fiends had proved well enough by that morning that they were no longer allowed on the face of the earth.

  “Yeah! C’mon! Get some! Get some!” the lad screeched like a macaque as he pounded the skies with the bellycaster’s miniballs. It was like shooting an elephant from a yard away as the foul demons melted into grue with each one of his bursts.

  The Crimson Domes were making quick work of the infernals, as expected, and flew off to battle, if one could call it that, the next flight circling through the air. The ease of the operation was more like a turkey shoot to the gold elf commander. Captain Ping was proving to be a great pilot as well, but she was not able to keep up with the living legends of the Gonduannian skies with much ease.

  “Black Sun One,” Kalan’dee interrupted the comm flow. “If the moths throw any of those things at your limmer, just use your boot daggers on them.”

  Lauryl’la knew that he was referring to those little imps that were reported to have led her mother to her death. The maiden hoped that a demon had the faint opportunity to do such a thing, as she wanted nothing more to get up-close and personal with one. With a growl the gold elf captain could barely detect over the flow, Lauryl’la acknowledged, “Just let ‘em try! Please!”

  It was unfortunate for Lauryl’la’s black bloodlust; the Crimson Domes and the Black Suns were too much of a match for the flights of demons that day, and not one of the craven vermin were able to get within range to chuck a ball of imps at any of the limmers. As the maiden reflected on the day’s battle that evening within her bunker, she figured it was best not to underestimate the power of the infernals, as staving off a node of those gremlins could have proven to be more difficult than imagined.