by P. S. Power
It made sense after a fashion, too.
"Honey? We should head to the commons and see if anyone needs to be calmed down. People might be worried. This really won't hurt us though, I don't think. We should get with Kolb and Doris too, if possible. They'll know about this kind of thing and having a unified front will make it seem safer, don't you think?"
Tor suddenly found himself wrapped up in a hug.
"You're really not mad about the gold then?"
It was such a strange thing to say that he laughed and kissed her, finally free to really do that, knowing they weren't related at all. That made things a lot more comfortable.
"No, not at all. In fact we should do more of that kind of thing. I hadn't thought of farms before myself. That's brilliant really. At this rate we'll run out of orphans to hire for the work... We are paying them, aren't we?"
She shook her head, but started to walk on her own. After a moment, without closing her eyes, her clothing melted over her, moving from light pink silk trousers and tunic to her black velvet looking Lairdgren Group uniform. It was a good idea, since it seemed a lot more official than his pajamas, so he copied her, still leaving off the purple stripe that ran down her leg. Otherwise it was the same. Plain and military looking in cut, but different in material, not being made of canvas.
Lights turned on as they moved, with Ali touching the wall of the place, just running her hand along it like a soft caress, so that she could set things off as they went.
"No. They get part of the profit from what they grow, but we aren't emptying the banks to give them coin or anything. I thought that made sense, because... well, it does. Alphonse told me that I shouldn't let anyone just have gold, or they'd think I was weak and at least one of us has to seem like they'll put a foot down... Oh..." There was a flare of angst then, but she didn't take the words back, even if they were a bit insulting.
"Right. Good plan then. It makes it seem like I'm an idiot, instead of just generous, but there we have it. Even the Prince of the Realm thinks that you're better that way than I am." He smiled though, a bit lazily and then patted her back. "Not-flyers I think. No need to scramble just yet. Maybe no one will even show up? Most people will be asleep at this time of night after all, or at least they should be. I know we should." Without meaning too, he yawned, hurriedly slapping a hand of his mouth. "Oh, sorry about that."
Ali, being secretly brilliant it seemed, already had all her amulets on. They were separate ones, not worked down to the few multi sigil amulets that he had yet. It meant that she looked a little lumpy, over her rather ample chest. She was thinner than when they'd first met, and taller, but that part hadn't changed at all. He wouldn't have noticed it if she wasn't fighting to find the right magics down her top at the moment. There was a hand piece too, for the Not-flyer, but she kept it around her neck on a string. The field was military grade at least, so fast enough if needed, but Tor really thought she shouldn't have to spend a minute searching for it like she was. He just lifted into the air, his special Not-flyer being controlled by his thoughts.
It was easier and looked better, as well as being a good bit faster. No one else had them yet though, because he'd failed to make them for anyone. Gerent had one. No one else, though there were a few in his room. He hadn't even given one to a person that could make copies of it. He'd need to do better that way, at least for his friends and family.
Especially if a real war was coming. A few seconds might make a huge difference sometime.
After about a minute and a half Ali was ready and they were both able to move outside, to find that the streets were filling up with worried looking people already. He'd thought the school might be alerted, but it seemed it was going to be the whole town. That was more people than Tor had been considering at all. Probably because he was a little narrow minded. Thousands of people, or more than that, would have seen the light and heard the roaring it caused. A few had probably even been close enough to feel it, and would be woozy and out of sorts for a few days.
Just being woken up suddenly could do that, right?
In the stone paved commons they found milling people, with Instructor Roberts wandering around in night clothes, muttering at people.
"We don't know what it is... Stay calm, everyone. Stay calm." It wasn't all that helpful, but was having some effect. Kolb and about twenty of his "Instructors" and top students boiled into place, all with some kind of weapon out, ready to fight off an attack. That was a bit of a slow response, but they'd mainly been asleep, at least from the looks on their faces. The large man called out, not seeing him in the rather dark space.
"Situation Report!" The loud bellowing got almost everyone to start trying to explain what they'd seen, which was a bright white light, followed by thundering that sounded funny. Tor just floated over, rising about three feet in the air, and making his clothing glow a nice bright purple to get everyone's attention as he did. It was flashy, true, but worked. Half of them apparently already thought he was a showboat anyway, so why not own it?
"Quiet please." He didn't bother yelling, since those that heard him started repeating it after a few repetitions, some yelling. He seemed pretty much in charge after all. When the growing crowd was quiet, he waved for Kolb to come closer. Doris was at the edge of the group, barely visible in his pale glow.
"It was an EMP, at least that's my best guess. I had word earlier that Dan Green and Alice Orange, two of the Ancients, were attempting to find Gray in or near Two Bends, which is to the south of here." Kolb at least would understand what he was saying, he thought. Doris too. The explanation to follow was for the rest of them. "What this means is that, while scary sounding, what we saw is a weapon that is designed to shut off old technology machines. It won't hurt us. At least not those of us this far away from it. We'll need teams to make certain that anyone living in the area of the blast itself is safe and has help for a few days, as well as healing. We don't know if there will be continued... hostilities. We should set a guard and get teams together now."
For a few seconds, no one spoke, but Kolb recovered first, bellowing again.
"Six teams for search and rescue. I want combat students for that. Each one take a builder with you. Lairdgren Group, get with Tor. Fighters with me. Everyone else go to the Head master." Then, without waiting, he moved off toward the right hand side of the area and made his own clothing glow a brilliant blue color. There was a green light from the other side, leaving the purple one in the center.
The Lairdgren Group was all there though, except one of the younger new girls, that had gone over toward the green glow, clearly confused. That or feeling she wasn't really part of the group yet.
"Builders over here! All of you! If you can make a copy at all, get your butts over this way!" It wasn't like they needed anyone to make magic for them, not overly, but there was too little sense of community for that section. His yelling got nineteen people in all, about half of them looking completely baffled at his words.
"Lairdgren Group, and anyone past third year, get with Kolb for the forward search groups. Ali... I want you to stay with the headmaster here. If he needs anything made at all, you can handle it. We need some fighters to stay here too. The rest of you... Stay here for a bit while I get things set up. There shouldn't be a lot of damage from anything, so consider this an emergency drill. We need lights set up around the commons here. Then we need to make certain that everyone here has a shield on. Got that? Don't wait to be told what to do, just start working." It was a bit vague, but it seemed like a plan, or at least close enough that most of them actually seemed to think that they could figure something out.
He took Ali by the hand for a bit, but they walked over to the Headmaster, who was standing and glowing still. He seemed more than a bit at a loss as to what to do exactly. That made sense, they didn't know the situation on the ground at all.
"Headmaster Hardgrove! We should see to food for the area that might be under attack. No one should be hurt, but people will need the reass
urance. Can we set up some care packages? Baskets with a little something in them to hold people through a day or two?"
"Oh, yes, I think we can do something like that. I... don't know how to pay for it, it would be different if this was a real emergency, but I'm to understand that it is more of a drill now?" He touched his white beard, that was still flat on the bottom, but longer than the last time Tor had seen it. He was wearing night robes, but they seemed to be real.
They weren't, the man was loaded with magic. He even had a communications device on him, which was something Tor had forgotten to do, leaving his in his bedroom. They really needed a lot more of the things, he decided right then. Tor hadn't given the man the device personally, which meant that the king had. That was interesting, but not all that important at the moment.
Contacting the palace would be his job after all.
"I'll cover it. Get with the shops in town and keep an itemized list of things. I'll open the house here for extra kitchen space. Um... Find Sherri and have her set that up. She knows how and works with the homemaking section, who should be in charge of that part of things, I think. Instructor Hendrix? I don't know the people in that area too well."
Ali nodded then and turned to wave at some people, they all just stood there though, looking scared and milling a bit, not dressed for the cool night it seemed, with a lot of the girls clutching themselves as they huddled together for warmth.
"Everyone, over here! Instructor Hendrix, Sherilyn! We have a task." She sounded nearly excited that they were being included. Then it was her old section and her friends after all. She had a lot of friends it seemed, since way more people came over than if he called.
That got taken care of without him, and Ali seemed fine, so after a pat on the back, a small squeeze to her shoulder to let her know he was leaving, he headed back to his room at a pace faster than even Tiera would have been able to run, floating about three feet off the ground as he did it so that he wouldn't hit anything in the dark by accident.
Five minutes later he had his communications device in hand and activated, moving back toward everyone else at decent speed. Behind him, keeping up easily, was a large case that followed him, just hanging in the air when he stopped in front of the Headmaster.
The amulet for it glowed with a green sigil that looked like a rectangle, on nice white focus stone, the string was plain hemp though. He handed it over to the man who was busily listening to an older woman that seemed hard and a bit angry about something.
"We have neither the time nor facilities to do this. I don't even know what's needed! Should we send staples? Flour and canned eggs, potted meats and jellies? Or will they need finished goods? Not knowing the situation on the ground it's ridiculous to do anything."
Tor rolled his eyes, not bothering to hide the fact that he was doing it. The Headmaster looked at him, not even seeming mildly amused at the slightly upset lady in her nightdress.
"Counselor Baker?" It was probably more polite than he deserved, since he was being a bit rude. The man didn't call him on it out loud at least, leaving him that much dignity. He stopped then and made his face serious.
"Chest of gold. I have no clue what's in it, but it should be enough to get started."It wasn't a huge thing, but was filled to the top and about two feet long and at least that deep. It was about a foot high too, which meant it had a few hundred coins in it, not all of them gold though. "I can get more in a few hours. Now, as to what people will need? Comfort, is my guess, this time. In the future we'll want to have things ready to go for real emergencies, but baked goods and sandwiches are a good idea right now. Things that people can nibble at and not have to worry about cooking."
The women huffed at him, but didn't call him names directly, so there was that much consideration given.
"You couldn't have warned us that this was coming? My girls are good, but we would have had something prepared which would be preferable, if we knew ahead of time." She seemed personally wronged by the idea, but Tor just nodded.
"I agree. I keep telling the bad guys they should send letters first, but they never do."He smiled and shook his head. " That sounds like I'm mocking you, but I'm not, I swear. I really do wish we'd get more warning about things like this. In a way, that's what this is. Find out what works, and what doesn't, and use this to set up emergency plans. We need to be mobilized and ready for anything inside half an hour I think. We should also have everyone practicing with some kind of weapons too. Just in case."
Not everyone knew about the coming war yet. It was funny, but he picked up from the crowd that most kind of did though. No specifics, really, but people weren't totally ignorant. Not all of them were comfortable with the idea of fighting though. Like most of the girls and women around him. Some of the boys too. Tor could understand that himself. It was his least favorite thing to do on any given day. That didn't mean it wouldn't be good for them to learn how to do it. The really bad part about war was how it could be foisted onto innocent people without warning.
There was almost no reaction from the people around him to the words, and the Headmaster took possession of the amulet for the floating case without comment. The woman didn't let him go though, glaring at him with a stern look that perversely left him feeling that he was about to get poor marks. After a few seconds she took a deep breath and turned to Ali, her face a bit kinder suddenly.
"Very well. Miss Baker, would you be so good as to lend your off campus dwelling for this task? We'll use the kitchen here as well, but that will greatly increase the space to hand. I have no clue as to how we're going to deliver anything, but I'm sure we'll muddle through." She nodded her head politely to the older man and then cast a sidelong look at Tor that seemed pretty unfriendly.
She was just scared though. For herself, but mainly for her students, some of whom could very easily get caught up in dangerous situations if things like this kept happening. Plus, it was pretty clear that she was one of those people that really didn't like him, if only from reputation.
He'd just have to deal with it.
"Thank you, ma'am. I'm sure that everyone will be most grateful for your aid in this." It came out with a bit of flowery appeal, but he might have just as well called her a bitch for the expression on her face as she stalked off.
Oh, well.
"Tor? Is there a problem?" The voice came from his right hand, where the communications device was. It sounded awake and alert, but wasn't anyone that he needed directly either.
"Hey Kevin. There's been a large explosion in Lairdgren County. I'm... sort of familiar with the kind of weapon that would make that happen, and it won't be harmful to anyone directly, I don't think." Then he had to go over everything for the Royal Guard, who clearly sent for someone before the end of the conversation. The King would want to know after all. The Heir too, since he was more familiar with the situation on the ground at the school.
Kolb jogged over, still giving off a deep blue light. It was actually a good look for the bald man.
"We have six teams going and six more staying here in case of attack, or to pursue the... target, if needed. Fines assigned a builder to each of the groups of seven going out. I'd like one with each of the teams staying back as well. Not my section though." It was leading and the man wasn't even pretending that it wasn't. To make that work though, some of the others would have to take up the slack. Half the student's that could do magic weren't in the working group after all.
Tor had a few seconds while he was waiting for someone to come talk to him, so he gestured, and jogged back to where a rather confused and lonely clutch of young builders stood, clearly at a loss for what to do. There were only five of them left, all very young. There should have been several more than that, but they'd either been given something to do, had a plan... Or gone back to bed. Builders were often kind of lazy outside of their specialty. Some were even within it.
"You're all builders." It was a statement, but no one said it was a lie, even though one of the boys stuck his hand up f
or attention. He was tall, and clearly noble by blood. Still young though and aware enough that he wasn't the highest in the land that he managed to sound decently humble.
"I... I just started a few months ago. I can make copies, from templates, but..." He seemed ashamed of that, as if it were some lack, being new. Tor wondered how huge he was going to get though, if he was that tall at fourteen? He had to be over six-six already.
"That's fine. If we need copies made for this, you'll learn to do it without a template fast enough. You have the needed talent or you wouldn't be here. You all do. If you didn't you wouldn't be here. Right now though we need you to go with Instructor Kolb. He'll introduce you to your new working group of fighters. Six of them, one of you to handle any magical needs that come up. Make friends, since their going to be your new partners and you will be working with them in the future." It left them a body short, but if it came to it Tiera could do copy work. She didn't like it much, but it was an emergency. She'd deal.
Without so much as a harsh word the large instructor got the new kids moving as if they belonged in the task and it was only natural. That meant that Tor just had to wait for someone to come back to the device, so he could fill everyone in. It took a while. A lot longer than normal for some reason. When he heard the collection of voices, they did not sound pleased at all. It shouldn't have been that big a deal though, not really.
"Attack! The Capital is under attack. From the sky... some kind of... streamers of smoke and light? The East wall has been breached!" This came from a distance, but Tor didn't wait to find out what it meant.
"Kolb! The Capital is under attack... Rockets I think from the sound of it." It was his voice, but the words weren't his at all. Cordes had taken over suddenly and started barking commands as if he had a right to do it.
"Fighters ready, we leave in two minutes. Kolb and Karen... I want you to take in the first wave, in Fast Craft. Everyone else get ready to move. If you can fight at all I want you over here and ready to get in a craft for transport now. No one flies in without a craft around them for now. We need data. Food services... We' need to increase production. Get ready to feed people and prepare for wounded. We won't have them here, be ready to move everyone to the battle site at need... Move!" His hand lashed out to push a boy that just happened to be standing too close. Not hard, but it got him to run a bit, toward Kolb, even though he looked more like a math student than a fighter.