by Gross, Dave
Sebastian Nemo’s swift assault had taken its heaviest toll on the clockwork infantry. Aurora looked down to see reductors and perforators lay down a field of covering fire to keep the storm knights at bay as Prime Enumerator Septimus directed his enigma foundries across the field.
The foundries resembled Septimus except in a few key features: their additional limbs were similar to the repair probes of the Galvanizers, and upon their massive shoulders rested batteries of receptors for salvaged essence chambers.
Each also carried an empty emergency vessel, primed to receive the soul of a human optifex or—should the unthinkable occur—Aurora herself. Such battlefield transferences were far from ideal. Unlike the Anima Corpus Procedure, they could fail or damage the mind of the subject—or so the priests cautioned those who might recklessly throw away their lives in battle to gain eternal life inside a clockwork vessel.
In one moment of intense frustration, Aurora had considered the prospect of death as a means of circumventing the fluxion directive’s permission, but she had immediately rejected the notion. Not only would it require accepting the stain of defeat, but also the very idea of purposefully allowing herself to die remained abhorrent. If she ever fell in battle, it would not be because she allowed it to happen.
Wherever the clockwork priests went, they paused to retrieve the essence chambers from the broken bodies of the fallen obstructors, eradicators, and reciprocators. With the help of their hovering accretion servitors, they salvaged what they could of the damaged clockwork infantry. With speed and economy to shame Immoren’s greatest field mechaniks, they returned the essence chambers to the refurbished combatants and returned them to the fight.
Elsewhere, optifex directives—trios of priests—focused their efforts on repairing injured troops. Two directives remained near the Transfinite Emergence Projectors, though the Cygnarans had failed to cause significant damage to either of the battle engines. The permutation servitors orbiting the battle engines whisked into position to optimize the targeting of the Projector’s aperture pulse weapon. Yet the moment they detected incoming fire, they zipped as swiftly as reflex servitors to intercept the attack. Moments after each sacrifice, replacement servitors emerged from the assembly plant housed deep within the battle engine.
Lumichem-spraying attunement servitors flew over the heads of the oncoming Cygnaran infantry. The bright alchemical goo highlighted the soldiers’ positions even as it thickened to clog the joints of their armor and inhibit their movement.
After the servitors hovered clear, Pollux ordered the reductors and perforators to attack in earnest. With the glowing stains to guide their aim, reductors peppered the enemy with their swarm projectors. The tiny projectiles blossomed as they flew toward their targets, their spring-loaded saws chewing through armor and mangling the bodies beneath.
The perforators raised their arms and fired armor-piercing protean javelins upon the front ranks. The Cygnar infantry fell beneath the deadly hail, their armor of no more benefit than cotton tunics.
Aurora watched as Nemo turned his attention from his Storm Strider’s doomed attack on her Prime Axiom to hurl another arcane storm through a Lancer. Burst after burst of lightning coursed through the reductors and perforators, mangling their clockwork bodies and leaving behind scorched and steaming wreckage—leaving too little for even the optifex and their servitors to repair.
Aurora channeled her thoughts through the top-shaped Corollary hovering just beneath her. It was the first of the light vectors to benefit from the arcane displacement fields that propelled the servitors and granted the clockwork angels true flight. The arcane repeater buried deep within its globular chassis magnified her thoughts, sending her mental control farther across the field. Its external coils flickered with surges of arcane energy from when it had absorbed a fraction of her residual power, storing it for later use. She called on that reservoir now, drawing back that stored portion of her mental strength and pouring it into the Diffuser.
The light vector fired shot after shot. As each ripspike emerged from the barrel of its high-tension launcher, fins sprang up on its base. Guided by Aurora’s thoughts, they twisted to guide the missiles over and around the intervening storm knights, bringing them unerringly toward their target. Four ripspikes sank deep into the Lancer’s steel carapace, but only half their job was done.
Each imbedded spike sent silent signals to the nearest Convergence vectors, clockwork vessels, and priests. Sensing their designated target, the perforator prefect moved his troops forward and launched a volley of protean javelins toward the Lancer. The armor-piercing missiles tore the warjack to shreds, cutting off Nemo’s reach on the western side of the battle.
Aurora sent her Assimilator gliding eastward toward the remaining Lancer. Unlike the globe-like Corollary, the upper chassis of the heavy vector resembled human shoulders with asymmetrical arms. As it approached, storm knights and Cygnaran infantry stepped forward to block its path. The hovering vector fired its tri-barreled cannon into the enemy troops. As its segmented javelins arced just above the soldiers, Aurora triggered their charges to shower the troops below with a horde of tiny projectiles, each buzzing with a pair of razor-sharp saw blades. The dissevering microswarm left a cloud of blood and steel filings above the fallen bodies, clearing the way to the Lancer.
Once the path was clear, Aurora sent her lightning-charged Modulator gliding past the Assimilator and took to the sky.
“Numen!” shouted Sabina, flying after her with five more angels close behind. “Should we not remain close to the Conservator?”
Aurora ignored her. While the ablator blades and bucklers of the heavy vector provided another layer of personal security, Aurora wanted a better view. She wanted to see how Nemo reacted to her counter attack. If it had worked, she hoped she had drawn the attention of his remaining Storm Strider and Fireflies away from the Prime Axiom.
The Strider moved to the east, away from the colossal. Then both the storm gunners and the Fireflies redirected their attacks not to her attacking vectors but to the Galvanizers and priests repairing the Prime Axiom. A white net of voltaic destruction danced at the feet of the Prime Axiom. Gears and blades flew off the Galvanizers, while optifex shook in a brief, fatal dance before falling to the ground.
Surrounded by the telltale runes of a warcaster, Nemo channeled another spell, adding his own lightning to the storm. Bolts of electricity coursed through the surviving Lancer and blacked the Axiom’s legs as it finished off the repair units beneath it.
Aurora cursed herself under her breath. She’d been rash to place so many of her critical repair units in such a small area. In a few flashes of lightning, Nemo had nearly obliterated her capacity to repair her most powerful units.
Strobes of light alerted her to a new threat from the east.
Somehow the stormsmiths had advanced to the front of the Cygnaran lines, their storm towers summoning dark clouds above the Convergence forces. As the artificial wind blew away a tarpaulin, Aurora realized they had advanced under the guise of Cygnar infantry, revealing their weaponry only after they had reached their positions.
And there were twice as many on the eastern flank as she had expected.
“Damn him,” snapped Aurora. Once again Nemo had concealed the true movements of his troops. She had expected stormsmiths on either side, but instead they were concentrated on one side. Their lightning fell among the Convergence troops as the Storm Strider closed to support them.
Once they had swept the field clear of soldiers, the Cygnaran troops turned their attention to the Transfinite Emergence Projector. Smoke from the long gunners sent a dark cloud into the sky, and blinding white fingers leaped from the Strider’s cannon.
One struck a permutation servitor, blasting it to a molten splash upon the battle engine’s chassis. It leaped on to destroy a second servitor before drawing black wounds on the Projector itself. The ten-legged giant tottered as three of its legs melted at once. Then it fell. When it hit the ground, it th
rew up a wall of dust and detritus blocking Aurora’s view of the eastern front.
The swiftness of the devastation stole Aurora’s breath. Where moments before her defensive line had stood, only a steaming junkyard remained.
Rage choked her. She could no longer stand merely to defend her position. She needed to strike at the heart of the enemy.
“Follow me!” Aurora raised her staff and plunged down toward the Cygnar commander.
“Everyone!” Sabina shouted to every clockwork angel within range.
They formed their own storm of steel and brass. Their lightning was the flash of binomial blades, their thunder the scream of Aurora’s staff as its polynomial beam shredded the knights surrounding Sebastian Nemo.
The knights raised their blades, lightning leaping up to caress the winged warriors. Many of the white ribbons missed their mark. Still more wreathed the bodyguards who dove in front of Aurora to protect their leader.
One singed the tip of Aurora’s wings, a sudden halo coruscating across the steel blades that formed their feathers. Her power field crackled and glowed, withering until she felt the hackles on her neck rise in the static field. Yet her shields held, and the lightning warmed but never seared her skin.
The surviving angels slashed through Nemo’s bodyguards. The knights had only an instant to strike before their winged assassins flew on, yet several hit their targets as a white-clad officer cried out, “Strike, soldiers, for General Nemo, Cygnar, and Morrow!”
Thus emboldened, the knights threw every sinew into their strikes, their storm glaives driving hard into the clockwork angels. Aurora gritted her teeth at the sound of screaming metal peeling away from her bodyguards even as she soared across the knights, searching for Nemo.
“Look out, sir!” cried Caitlin Finch. She thrust her staff upward. Its blinding discharge leaped up but came nowhere near Aurora.
Then Aurora spied Nemo, a ball of lightning cupped in one hand, his spear shaking with energy in the other.
For an instant, she feared to approach him.
Aurora barely glimpsed the black-robed figure before an immense force struck her from below. It flung her off course, tumbling her over the blue line of Cygnaran soldiers. Some of the troops had the presence of mind to turn their weapons upon her. Sizzling bolts lit up her force field and smothered her in a shroud of energy.
Screaming, Aurora rolled, curling her wings around her body while pushing her geomantic propulsion field to the limit. In an instant, her desire to kill turned into a need to escape—to flee these unpredictable foes.
Behind her, more clockwork angels cried out and fell to Cygnaran lightning. A shadow covered her, but before she could raise her staff to strike it, she felt Sabina’s hands upon her arms. The prefect sheltered Aurora with her body and added the force of her own arcane displacement to hers.
“Numen, you are injured!”
Aurora shrugged her off. “I’m fine,” she snapped. A moment later, she blinked as a trickle of blood ran into her eye. Touching her brow, she felt the warm steel of her helm, half-melted under the touch of a galvanic beam. Along with her weakened force field, it had served its purpose. Aurora’s flesh was burned and bleeding, but not seriously. She threw off her damaged helm. Her hair spilled loose and whipped across her eyes.
Two more clockwork angels joined them as they retreated from Nemo’s force. “Where are the others?” asked Aurora.
“They defended you to the last, Numen,” said Sabina. Her mechanikal voice box clicked, stifling any further emotion.
Aurora looked back to see a few mangled wings among the furiously hacking storm knights. One silvery arm reached up to ward off the blow of a crackling glaive, but the blade fell. An instant later, so did the arm.
Aurora had seen death before, but it was never easy to see one of her troops fall—especially her angels. She gave up the last of her plan simply to defend the site.
We shall sweep the field of these storm lords, she swore, and our enigma foundries will recover the soul essence of our fallen from among the graveyard of our enemies.
Once she had returned safely behind her own lines, Aurora again surveyed the field. Even without benefit of her full attention, the Prime Axiom had reduced the captured Storm Strider to so much scrap metal. Ribbons of steel fell through the grinding triple-drills of its arms. Another harpoon lashed out, narrowly missing a Firefly but cutting an advancing rifleman in half.
The Modulator finally came within range of the Firefly. Aurora reached out with her mind, projecting her thoughts through its interface node and thence into mechanikal action. As the power of its voltaic nimbus generator surged, she caused the vector to raise both of its galvanic arc emitters to throw beams of pure electricity—not at the warjack, but into the nearest Cygnaran forces.
The Modulator’s emitter surge speared two lines of Cygnaran soldiers. Neither armor nor human bodies could halt the beams, which flowed through each victim to drive into the next and the next behind him. The stricken soldiers leaped up, jerked for a moment, and fell limp beneath the merciless rays.
With a savage grin of triumph, Aurora turned to see what Sebastian Nemo thought of her own storm-flinging vector.
He had left his earlier position. In fact, Aurora could see no sign of him until she spied the storm knights and the entire command unit of the Cygnaran army running full-tilt through the wall of dust rolling in from the east.
There, in the haze where the stormsmiths and Strider had cleared the field of Convergence defenders and toppled the Transfinite Emergence Projector, the core of Nemo’s battlegroup rushed unopposed into the village. Aurora’s breath caught in her throat as she saw their goal.
They charged the realignment node.
“Order Pollux to pull back all units!” cried Aurora. Even as she shouted, she turned her vectors and the Prime Axiom around to return to the tower.
“But Numen,” said Sabina. “Those on the western flank are fully committed under heavy att—”
“Pull them back!”
“Yes, Numen.” Sabina sent one of the Angels to relay the command. Even as she did so, the Prime Axiom came under heavy fire from two previously silent gun emplacements. The infantry that had not accompanied Nemo swarmed the colossal.
For an instant, Aurora considered turning the Axiom back to destroy them. Satisfying as that might have felt, it was not the mission, and she remembered the holiest directive of her order: Nothing must impede the Great Work.
Directing all her vectors to follow, she flew toward the realignment node.
Down below, she saw Pollux coordinating the retreat toward the tower. Behind him, the reductors and perforators fired on Nemo’s battlegroup. In response, a Firefly reached out a tongue of lightning to destroy a few perforators. They fell with their arms still raised to launch their javelins. The rest staggered back against a brutal volley of rifle fire from the direction of the river.
Cygnar’s forces had enveloped the village—and the tower!
As she saw her soldiers fell back, Aurora saw no enumerators remaining among them, no enigma foundries. They would remain fallen until Aurora could turn the tide of battle back against the foe.
Had Bogdan and Septimus fallen? It seemed inconceivable, yet she could not see either of the priests on the field.
Aurora understood that everything depended on preserving the security of the tower for just a little longer. The death of a few hundred soldiers was a small price to pay for the success of her mission. The Great Work depended on it, as did her own future.
The Cygnarans reached the southeastern foot of the tower. The eradicators she had stationed as guards stood their ground, holding both shields before them to deflect rifle fire and absorb the lash of lightning from the warcasters and their Firefly.
When the storm knights closed, the eradicators transformed their protean shields, releasing the heavy triangular blades with which they could sever heavy steel beams. In close combat, no storm glaive could match them for power.
> But then Nemo reached out his aged hand, and the storm answered. Dancing among the armored knights, the lightning leaped from combatant to combatant. It briefly wreathed the Cygnaran knights, whose armor received and passed on the charge. But when it touched the eradicators it tore them to pieces. Without hesitation, the Cygnaran attackers turned their weapons on the heavy door of the tower entrance, hacking and melting it to slag.
As she dived toward them, Aurora saw she was too late. Nemo, Finch, and half a dozen others ran through the sundered portal and into the entrance at the tower’s base. Two dozen others turned and stood to cover their siege, even as reinforcements arrived from the east—infantry, riflemen, and stormsmiths.
“Numen, we’ll never stop him that way,” said Sabina.
Aurora knew she was right.
“To the aerie?” said Sabina.
“No,” said Aurora. The guards she had stationed at the lifts would slow them, but the observation deck wasn’t important. Neither was her personal pavilion. She had one advantage remaining, and she would use it. “We take them from above.”
THE EIGHTH HARMONIC
False shadows of consciousness mock the divine.
Nemo
The steel-shod feet of Nemo’s storm knights banged on the steel steps, echoing up and down the rising corridor.
“Where are we going?” said Bronwyn. The druid had demonstrated remarkable patience thus far. While he felt no need to apologize for keeping the details of his mission from her, Nemo felt she deserved an answer after saving his life.
“We must find and destroy the tower controls,” he said. “Whatever the Convergence are doing here, there must be a way to disable the function of this tower.”