#Gladius Drone

[rory-multifandom-mess]

Hello, I hope this ask finds you well.

Here is a little something I wrote. A little snippet of a Murder Drones Fantasy au that popped into my head today. Centered around Thad because your dedication to him has infected me as well. Sorry, but it is a tad long.

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Thaddius Gladiator, an aspiring squire seeking knighthood in the Knight Order which defends the subterranean fortress named simply Outpost III. Named such as it was built by a race of beings known as Humanity who sought to expand their power across the world, to extend their reach across the cold, black seas to continents rich in resources. Particularly, the misbegotten land of Copper IX, named after the mineral it was rich in. 

To Thaddius’ people this was known as the Burden Times, as Humanity created his people to be nothing more than mere servants to pull the material wealth hidden within the bowels of the earth, to forever labor without respite to the benefit of their uncaring creators. Because of this his people were merely named Drones. Alas, such time was not meant to last for a calamity of a grand scale came to unfold to punish Humanity for their hubris and their blasphemous act of unholy creation through the esoteric power of alchemy. 

A terrible power came erupting from the depths of Copper IX, which raced across the land from shore to shore in a scorching flash. It sundered the sky and slew all life which dwelled upon the surface of the now dead lands of Copper IX. All life but the resilient Drones, for the hardiness and inhuman constitution instilled into them by their cruel masters, which allowed them to labor for days without rest had now shown itself to be a blessing. Now the land of Copper IX, devoid of Humanity, now belonged to the Drones and now finally may they live for themselves.

But, this time of freedom was nothing but a brief flash of relief. As the Humans across the void dark seas loathed the idea of their flesh forged servants living free and sent an iron ship containing their deathly solution to the problem of their servant’s freedom. When the iron ship, propelled by arcane technologies, wreaked itself upon the dark shores of Copper IX, from it came leaping three dreadful figures who wasted no time in bringing death upon the free Drones of Copper IX. 

These horrid creatures were akin to the Drones, to a degree, in appearance but whether they were born of the same flesh alchemy the Drone were created from or demons of the Inferno given flesh, the free Drones of Copper IX did not know but it mattered little as these abominations would deal death all the same. In swift action the Drones fled to the subterranean fortress-bunkers of their long dead masters, entombing themselves within to save themselves from the ones they now call the Sky Demons. 

Now, back to the young man mentioned earlier, Thaddicus Gladiator. An aspiring squire he is, seeking to make good use of his strength and bravery to protect the people of Outpost III, to fulfill his childhood dream of serving along the valiant protectors of his home and to prove himself in the eyes of Lord-Defender Khan Doorman. The man who led his people to the safety of Outpost III and constructed the nigh unbreakable bulwark, the Gates of Adamantine that stand as their first and greatest line of defense against the Sky Demons. 

Thaddicus was strong indeed, with a deft hand at swordplay. Wielding a sword of a foreign make, a gladius it is called. Its narrow tip allows it to pierce armor with ease and its short length allow it to be withdrawn from the foe’s flesh with a deadly swiftness. Despite this it is not swordplay that Thaddicus excels at, mighty be his swings but his real talent lies in his potent throws. Place a javelin in his hands and it shall fly with a force that may tear a man’s head from his body, he hurls with a precision that allows him to strike a fly sitting atop a man’s head without even a glancing cut to the person’s scalp. 

With such strength in his body and with the kindness, the humility in his heart to temper it. He shall prove himself a knight of grand renown yet. But unbeknownst to him, to the people of Outpost III and the knights which defend it. There shall soon be a reckoning, brought about by the daughter of the Lord-Defender, Uzi Doorman. Named after one of the odd weapons once wielded by their former masters. For in her rash but brave attempt at slaying the Sky Demons once and for all with a weapon she constructed from the arcane technologies left behind by Humanity, she would allow the Sky Demon to breach the defenses of Outpost III and reveal the cowardice of the knights who claim to defend it. Thaddicus, poor unfortunate Thaddicus in all of his bravery and might will sadly fail to stop them.

OOOOHHH THIS IS SO GOOD? IT ALMOST READS AS A MODERN DAY VERSION OF BEOWULF…. I LOVE THIS SO MUCH. Lord-Defender Khan Doorman made me giggle so much.

ALSO AAAGH OMG. So many people lately have been telling me that I inspire them and I feel so flattered??? Like I never thought people would find my insanity to be inspiring. I’m so happy to be suddenly giving people ideas for more creativity!!!

And also. more THAD UAHAHAHA MY PROPAGANDA IS WORKI [i am shot]

[interdimensionalburnout]

>It's footage from Berri's camera drone, hovering above a large bread-loaf shaped shaped generator. The thing is full of large puncture holes, and the top appears, well, scored like a loaf, a massive slice gouged along the length. Smoke pours from many of the holes, while steam billows out of others. More steam spills out of the wall behind the generator, through severed ducts that emerged from the hidden boiler the machine powered. Berri appears to have been set on leaving it utterly ruined, but without the urgency of someone committing any kind of wrong.

>In fact, she's just sitting there, reclined between two pipes emerging from the wall across from the boiler room generator; in her hand is a simple revolver, firing shots into the side of the already burning machine with sort of lazy precision. Her aim is noncommittal, but she appears to be shooting a heart into the machine's side paneling.

>She's about four bullets in, when a woman barges in through a side entry, blowing the solid steel doors off their hinges with a heel, wrapped in a massive, plated boot. Powered Armor. The thing whirrs and clanks against itself, the exoskeleton hauling heavily-modified armor, the woman armed with the kind of heavy rifle that would be more at home on the back of a military transport.

>"STOP BLOWING HOLES IN THINGS, YOU CRAZY BITCH," is the woman's grand opening, followed up immediately by burst-fire hail in Berri's direction. Berri lets herself fall slack, slipping between the pipes and onto the floor, seeming to land on her back wrongly. She rolls out of the way of another round of bullets, feigning the kind of aches an old woman would posses, while the armored woman, Devil Redd, lays down more covering fire, slowly stomping the distance between her and this random bitch away.

>"I'm gonna gut you like a pig, girl." Redd's voice is hoarse, with an accent that Berri seems to recognize, delight on her face as she pivots on her heel, now fully on her feet. With a flash of the arm, Berri's sword is suddenly weaving her sword through the air, as if she was stabbing wildly, merely along for the ride as the sword makes wide, thrusting arcs in the blink of an eye. The camera zooms in from its perch on the ceiling, as the firing has stopped. Redd's un-helmeted head looks on, eyes blazing, mouth agape: Berri is attempting to hold her sword forward, horizontally, at JUST the right angle, tilting this way and that, trying to keep six 50. cal bullets balanced on the tip of her gladius, stacked in a perfect column.

>"You're gonna need a faster gun if you're gonna gut me, luv," Replies Berri, mimicking the accent with distasteful exaggeration. She's completely vanished from the line of fire when the next six bullets are sprayed at her, but with a too-quick flick of the wrist, six old bullets were left in the air, in her place, each one catching a new bullet. "Or maybe a sharper one, seein's how you mean to 'Gut Me.'" Berri's too close for Redd to do anything about, now, though that doesn't stop Redd from trying to bring her rifle stock down on the back of Berri's head. The power armor gives her an extra foot and a half over her, but Berri's ready for her, even though her sword's back in its sheath.

>Berri's left arm meets the rifle bash directly, and on impact, a shimmering, deep-green gauntlet, shaped like a metal hand and wrist materializes from her wrist to her fingers. It's shaped like plate armor, but even as a solid-light projection, it's clearly made of scrap metals, blocky and crude. But it absorbs the bash of the gun, and blows Redd's right arm our wide, wrenching it out of her left hand and nearly disarming her outright. Berri follows up by shifting her weight onto the insides of her feet, sliding her heel and bringing an armored right hand close to her body.

>The uppercut that follows is a brutal thing, the solidified energy-barrier easily tearing through the thin deflective field of Redd's power armor, and crushing the lower-left side of the chest piece. Redd gives a gasp, merely a human with advanced machines at her disposal, against whatever the hell Berri has going on at any given moment. Berri drops her body low, knees locked like gears in tension for just a single heartbeat, before releasing, as she rams her shoulder hard into that break in the power armor.

>As her shoulder connects with the stunned Redd, more projected Ghost Armor reveals itself, crude shoulder pauldrons, with hard-edged, blocky plating. Semi opaque, like the gauntlets, with a metalic-green sheen to them, Berri's shoulder drives into Red, knocking her backwards. The mercenary, who just this morning had felt like an underworld king, with her impregnable fortress and extremely profitable chem-smuggling organization, barely held her ground, planting a foot behind her and shakily standing her ground. She's dropped her gun, taking a wild right-hand swing at Berri.

>Berri simply leans away from the swing, dropping into a peak-a-boo defensive stance, from which she laid several more punches into the power armor, battering red's ribs, even through layers of steel, framing, energized plate, and kinetic-energy absorbing fabrics. Each swing is a thunder-crack to the audio, and another deep, sharp-knuckled dent in the two large plates that made up Redd's chest piece. Eventually, the seventh punch, delivering a third blow to the first wound, from the first uppercut, drives her to her hands and knees.

>She attempts to say something, but her teeth are stained red, and it's unclear what she was trying to gurgle. Berri steps back, drawing her sword out of its sheath with the same casual energy as pulling out a wallet, and says, "I get that question a LOT, lady." Berri puts her arms out wide, shrugging. "I don't got any good answers anymore, neither." With a flourish, she flips the sword into the air, catching it after a single twirl and driving it through the center of Redd's chest, just as she had pulled herself from hands and knees, to just knees. The strength drains from her arms, even as she attempts to clutch at Berri, but Berri's already turned away from Redd, leaving the sword in her chest. "To you, though, I'm like a bolt of lightning, burning your house down outta nowhere, right?" She walks a slow arc around Redd, looking off, beyond the walls of the generator room, beyond the prison. "I might as well be just that, hay. The first strike of a one-woman storm. Whatever I'm doing here, whoever I am or oughta be..."

>Berri finishes the arc, calmly grabbing the hilt of the sword, and leaning in close to Redd, who glares in desperate defiance, even as her eyes get cloudy, "I'm sure I'll figure it out if I keep killing dickheads like you, and like them," Berri points her right hand to the door Redd came in through, where the bobbing beams of flashlights can be seen in the gathering haze of steam grow closer and closer. Without taking her left hand from the hilt of her sword, she pivots and faces Redd from the left, smoothly grasping the blade of her sword with Ghost Armor, and bracing her left foot against Redd's limp left arm. But she points out, with her left index finger, northward beyond the basement prison-walls, to the Magisterial Palace. Redd's eyes follow the finger as Berri says, "And like them. But you first, scumbag."

>Berri grips the blade tightly from both ends and heaves a mighty ho, wrenching her new, ancient, mysterious blade in an upward angle, horizontally through Redd and her custom power armor, armor to make her a one-woman army in her own regard, in her own league. It's cleaved, cut smoothly, bloodily, brutally from the center, as a hot knife glides through butter. Berri knocks the woman over with a hard, awkward thud as the sword is wrenched through its victim, and her bracing leg slams to the ground next to the corpse. The video cuts as Berri whips her sword first right, and then left, the blood and mechanical fluid being flung from the blade with superhuman force before she sheathes it, and the video feed cuts.

[abhisheksaini-2008]

Videography Drones of Various Types: Picking the Best for Your Requirements

Drone videography has changed the manner in which we catch the world from a higher place. Drones give you an unparalleled perspective, whether you're a professional filmmaker, a hobbyist, or an aspiring vlogger. Yet, with such countless choices available, how would you pick the right one? Here is a complete manual for the sorts of robots most ideal for videography.

1. Customer Robots

DJI Mavic Series

The DJI Mavic series is a well known decision among specialists and experts alike. The Mavic series is renowned for its small size, foldable design, and high-quality cameras that strike a balance between portability and performance. Models like the Mavic Air 2S and Mavic 3 deal 4K to 5.1K video goal, deterrent aversion, and high level flight modes.

Autel Mechanical technology EVO Series

The Autel EVO series is one more astounding choice for those searching for top notch drone videography. For instance, the EVO II has a camera with a resolution of 6K or 8K, which provides incredible color accuracy and detail. Its hearty plan and long flight time make it a solid rival in the customer drone videography.

2. DJI Inspire Series for Professional Filmmakers 

The DJI Inspire series is the best option for professional filmmakers. The Zenmuse X7 is one of these drones with interchangeable cameras and lenses that can shoot in Apple ProRes and up to 6K CinemaDNG. The Inspire series is ideal for high-end productions due to its superior flight stability, advanced camera controls, and dual-operator capabilities.

Freefly Alta Series

The Freefly Alta series is prestigious for its high payload limit and accuracy control. Hollywood productions and other professional filmmaking scenarios frequently employ these drones. The Alta 8, for instance, can convey weighty film cameras, offering unrivaled adaptability and camera development.

3. Racing Drones FPV (First-Person View) Racing Drones

 FPV (First-Person View) racing drones are becoming increasingly popular due to their distinctive, high-speed footage. These drones, which are equipped with a small camera and a live video feed, are able to capture thrilling, fast-paced shots that traditional drones are unable to. For those who are interested in trying their hand at FPV videography, manufacturers like EMAX and TBS (Team BlackSheep) provide customizable options.

4. DJI Mini Drones 

The DJI Mini series, which includes the Mini 2 and Mini 3 Pro, is ideal for novices and travelers seeking a portable, lightweight option. Notwithstanding their little size, these robots sneak up all of a sudden with 4K video capacities, stable flight execution, and easy to use controls. They are an incredible decision for easygoing videography and travel vlogging.

5. Cinema Drones: The DJI Matrice Series

 The DJI Matrice series is designed for industrial use, but its adaptability and durability make it the best choice for cinematic videography. Multiple payload configurations, including high-end cameras and LiDAR sensors, are supported by models like the Matrice 300 RTK. Because of this, they are appropriate for intricate shoots that require precise data and high-resolution footage.

6. Specialty Drones Underwater Drones 

Drones like the PowerVision PowerRay and the Chasing Innovation Gladius Mini offer unique capabilities for underwater videography. These drones can dive to great depths, capturing stunning high-definition underwater footage. They are fundamental devices for sea life researchers, submerged producers, and bold videographers.

Drones for the Home Indoor drones like the Parrot Anafi and Ryze Tello are made for use in homes where GPS signals might be weak or not available. They are lightweight, flexible, and outfitted with crash aversion frameworks, making them ideal for catching film in restricted spaces.

Conclusion 

Your specific requirements, budget, and level of experience all play a role in selecting the appropriate drone videography. There is a drone out there that is ideal for you, whether you are a seasoned professional or just starting out in the field of drone videography. You'll be able to make better decisions and take your videography to new heights if you are familiar with the various drone types and their distinctive characteristics. Cheerful flying!

[dronedeals]

UNDERWATER CHASING GLADIUS MINI DRONE

Prior to the appearance of Drone, the best way to accomplish top-notch aeronautical pictures was to lease a Helicopter or plane or put your confidence in a hang lightweight plane. Today, flying cameras are typical, which brings up a conspicuous issue: is there anyplace else automatons can go?

One chance: submerged. The Gladius Mini UnderWater Drone from Chasing Innovation is one of another yield of submersible cameras that would like to accomplish for submerged photography what quadcopters accomplished for elevated photography.

Features of CHASING Gladius Mini

The Gladius Mini can work in both freshwater and seawater—you basically need to swap out a screw-in float. It's equipped for working as profound as 300 feet submerged and has five engines, which empower it to go all over, to and fro and to pitch up or down at a 45-degree point. You can secure in the automaton's edge just as your ideal profundity in the event that you need it to saunter at a given profundity.

The Mini can travel through the water at a stately 4 bunches (or about 4.6 miles every hour).

With respect to the camera, there's a 12-megapixel, 1/2.3-inch sensor fronted by an f/3.0 focal point. It has an ISO scope of 100-3200 and can catch both JPEGs and DNG group RAW pictures. You can record 4K video at 3840 x 2160 at 30fps with a piece pace of 60Mbps. You can likewise record full HD video at 30, 60 or 120 fps. Stills and video are spared to a microSD card.

On either side of the camera are LEDs to include some submerged brightening. Each LED yields 1,200 lumens of 4,000-5,000K light with a CRI of 80.

Utilizing the free friend application, you can Livestream your submerged film to YouTube or view it on a VR headset (however it's not in 360 degrees). You'll likewise have some fundamental powers over introduction parameters on the camera.

Design of Gladius Mini

The CHASING Gladius UnderWater Mini Drone really comprises of four unmistakable pieces: the automaton itself, a remote control, a 165-or 330-foot spooled tie string and a base station that ties into the automaton and remains onshore. The base station fills in as a Wi-Fi hotspot, handing-off directions from your remote and telephone to the automaton, and sending video film back. You can convey each of the four of the Gladius CHASING Mini Drone parts in a rucksack, but an enormous one.

Of these three pieces, the automaton is the most sturdily fabricated. The remote, then again, isn't. Actually, while expelling the cell phone clasp, a bit of the brace severed. The remote doesn't feel like it can withstand even a solitary drop, not to mention months or long stretches of generous fieldwork. All things considered, the tie and its association focuses are solid.

PERFORMANCE  and Picture QUALITY  of Gladius

Setting up the automaton was genuinely clear, however, it took us numerous endeavors to make the underlying Wi-Fi matching. There are no directions in the crate and the application (in any event of this composition) just contains guidelines for a prior Gladius CHASING Mini  UnderWater Drone . You can download a manual for the Mini on the Chasing Innovation site, which we'd suggest.

We set sail, so to speak, on a huge lake and adapted rather rapidly that working a submersible automaton is fundamentally unique and ostensibly more troublesome than an airborne automaton. The automaton will glide in the water, so you have to open and actuate the rotors to make it move. In the wake of guiding it out around 30 feet, we plunged. The Gladius CHASING Mini  Drone camera's ongoing, 720p video feed was smooth enough, however, it would once in a while drop all through spotlight contingent upon objects moving before it. The Gladius CHASING Drone slice a genuinely straightway to the focal point of the need notwithstanding wind and waves undulating toward the shore.

Not at all like aeronautical automatons that utilization mechanical gimbals to balance out your recording even with wind and choppiness, the CHASING Gladius Mini UnderWater Drone’s camera has no such pay. While exploring at or near the outside of any annoying water, your video will have a similar hurling quality. Go somewhat more profound, however, and things will get steadier.

As we slipped, the Mini turned out to be progressively flimsy. Indeed, following a moment of the submerged route it turned out to be practically difficult to guide the automaton—it would turn sideways or around and around (the application discloses to you the direction of the Drone and our own every now and again looked aslant.) The main order that worked was forward. We found, in the wake of pulling the automaton out of the water, that kelp had stalled out in the rotors. The CHASING Gladius Mini UnderWater Drone has none of the refined item recognition and shirking sensors that are currently typical on even section level elevated automatons. What's more, the presented rotors appeared to work as a vacuum for submerged vegetation.

Regardless of whether you needed to evade a snaring experience with ocean growth, you're not ready to truly observe what's beneath the camera, which implies you could guide over, nearby or into kelp without knowing it. That is lamentable on the grounds that it's typically the sea or lake floor that has all the fascinating stuff.

On the off chance that you realize you're going to experience ocean growth, your most solid option is to keep the automaton securely over the floor and tilt it down. You can't tilt it in excess of 45 degrees, however, so it's problematic. It additionally won't help in case you're propelling from shore and there's a lot of development along your way.

When the rotors were cleared out and the exercise took in, the CHASING Gladius Mini UnderWater Drone’s had the option to move effortlessly through even uneven water and it holds its position well. It's not as deft as an elevated quadcopter. It's hard to dish it, however, you can move it advances and in reverse no problem at all.

To the extent picture quality goes, the CHASING Gladius Mini UnderWater Drone’s helped us to remember a GoPro around Hero 4/5—i.e., it's not terrible when you think about the options in contrast to recording video or stills under profound, cold or in any case aloof water. New Jersey lake beds in pre-winter aren't the most bright subject you can imagine, yet the tans, pale blues, and greens recreated alright. The focal point held concentrates well, however, it can't concentrate intently so coasting items can distract it. The twin LEDs make a pleasant showing of keeping the prompt territory (1-2 feet) before the automaton lit, without hotspots. The outside of the focal point repulses water spots when it's out of the water and getting dry.

Maybe the greatest obligation with the CHASING Gladius Mini UnderWater Drone’s was the network between the base station and our iPhone. Multiple times during our utilization, the remote and application lost association with the automaton camera, driving us to reboot everything (the genuine automaton has no force button so you simply reset the base station, remote control, and application). The base offers two Wi-Fi frequencies—2.4GHz and 5GHz. At first, both showed up as choices on our telephone however then 5GHz vanished out and out leaving us with an exceptionally spotty 2.4Ghz. When endeavoring to download pictures locally to our telephone, the association much of the time dropped out. (Strangely, when we put the microSD card into our Mac, none of the automaton's documents were perceptible, in spite of the way that they were on there.) we don't know whether this was a flawed base station or an endemic issue.

One territory where the CHASING Gladius Mini UnderWater Drone’s outflanks its aeronautical partners is battery life. You can get somewhere in the range of 1.5 and 2 hours of activity on a completely energized battery.

Final Conclusion about CHASING Gladius

The CHASING Gladius Mini UnderWater Drone is a fascinating idea and one we're planning to see created with the expansion of a greater camera, all the more impressive LEDs, picture adjustment and the capacity to stay away from (or in any case manage) such oceanic vegetation.

 In the event that picture quality is your top need, you're in an ideal situation placing your camera in lodging or jumping on another GoPro and getting in the water yourself. On the off chance that that is not an appealing choice, the CHASING Gladius Mini UnderWater Drone’s can serve however you'll need to work around its confinements and be set up to manage its spotty availability.

Pros of CHASING Gladius: Supports profound jumping; can hold profundity and direction; can be utilized in both new and seawater.

CONS CHASING Gladius: Frequent network issues*; remote is delicate; no article identification or shirking.

Cost: $1,199

[scentedperfectionperson]

Underwater drone is ready to make a splash

If you’re shopping around for an aerial drone, then you’ll know that there are now lots of companies making them. What’s perhaps a little more surprising, however, is the number of groups offering aquatic drones. Already, we’ve seen li’l remote-control submarines such as the Trident, FathomOne, CCROV and BlueROV2. Now another one has taken the plunge into the market, in the form of the currently-crowdfunding Gladius.

The 3-kg (6.6-lb) drone is being made in Standard and Advanced models, both of which come with a 30-m (98-ft) tether running up to a Wi-Fi-equipped buoy that’s towed along at the surface. This means that the tether doesn’t have to reach all the way from the Gladius to the operator. A longer 100-m (328-ft) cable is available as an upgrade, allowing the drone to travel farther from its buoy, and/or to dive deeper – its maximum dive depth is 100 meters.

for more information:

[hedome]

English, Etymology, Gladius

Etymology From Latin gladius (“Roman short sword, gladius”), possibly from Gaulish *kladyos (“sword”) (compare Old Irish claideb (“sword”), from Proto-Celtic *kladiwos (“sword”), from Proto-Indo-European *kelh₂- (“to beat, break”). Cognate with Latin clādes, clāva, percellō. Doublet of glaive. Pronunciation IPA(key): /ˈɡlæd.i.əs/ Noun gladius (plural gladiuses or gladii) (historical) A Roman…

[tulparav]

Sualtı Drone Nedir, Ne İçin Kullanılır? Tarihi Hakkında Bilgiler

Sualtı Drone Nedir, Ne İçin Kullanılır? Tarihi Hakkında Bilgiler 👇

Sualtı drone cihazları son 30-40 yılda geliştirilerek önemli araçlar haline gelmiştir. Birleşik Devletler Donanması, sualtı drone’ların geliştirilmesinin yolunu açarak 1960’larda kayıpları bulmak ve enkazları keşfetmek için su altı kameraları ve su altı drone cihazlarını kullanmaya başladı. 1985’te Titanik’in enkazını keşfeden cihaz su altı drone’uydu. 2000’li yıllarda bu cihazın yetenekleri ve…

[adddisoncale]

CHASING Gladius Mini Drone is one of the best UnderWater and Camera Drone. The Price of CHASING Gladius is $1199 with 5-star market rating.

[codylabs]

Afterland

Chapter 1

It was on the morning of the forty-first of February, year fifty-three hundred and three, (Gladius Major 2 standard calendar,) when I first thought to think that the war was over.

��So I talked with Katie the other day.” Dunkalk broke the silence rather suddenly.

“Oh yeah?” I drug my eyes away from the deep layers of whirling abyss I’d been admiring in my coffee, and glanced up at my friend. “That’s cool. You two getting back together or what?”

“Huh? Oh, no, no, no. No.” He shook his head, and his eyes wandered out the window. “Y’know. Just catching up. Work, bills, the like. She’s a clerk at the naval office now. Nice salary… And besides, I mean, she’s gone and found another man. They’re engaged now. Wedding’s in June or something. Happy couple.”

“Ah.” I tried to offer my consolation. “That’s too bad.”

“Ha ha, yeah, you’d think so, but I’m not twisted up over it though.” Dunkalk wasn’t actually talking to me, and I didn’t know who he was talking to. Maybe the rising sun out the window. Maybe the buildings. Maybe his reflection. “I mean, I’m glad for her. It never really would’ve worked out between us, and… Hmm. You shoulda heard the way she talked about him… Happy couple.”

“Hmm.” I nodded wisely.

“And it’s not like she just found another jock with a taller shell than me, either.” Dunkalk waved a claw dismissively. “He’s another human. They’re fixing on starting a family.”

“Hmm.” I nodded wisely. The information finally worked its way from my ears to my brain, and I perked up with a frown. “Really? Katie? She never struck me as the homemaking type.”

“Yeah, well. You never knew her as anything beside a pilot.” Dunkalk scoffed.

“And you did?”

“No. That’s the funny part.” He plucked whimsically at a loose pebble of exoskeleton on his chin. “And maybe that’s why I’m not sad. Because she’s not a pilot anymore. She can… Be who she is. Be who she was. I don’t know. She’s got a life of her own now.”

“Huh.” My eyes drifted back down toward my coffee. It was very dark, deep down in the depths of that drink. Black like the void of outer space, but shiny, and the sun shone off my coffee just as it had shown off the canopy of my fighter. And there were bubbles in the coffee, faint and tiny bubbles around the edges like drones popping to life on my HUD, dodging around and peeling in closer, loosing flares and bullets and whatever other tools they had in their bellies, fighting for their lives just as desperately as I fought for mine, but I knew them better than they knew me, and my fighter was just a touch quicker, my aim a touch truer.

The bubbles popped.

“Yeah.” I agreed.

The war really was over.

“Eh.” Dunkalk shrugged. “Anyway, speaking of women, how’s Authia been doing?”

“Good.” I nodded. “She’s getting her numbers up in the simulator. But she needs a lot more cockpit time than she’s been getting.”

“Yep. Ain’t no substitute for experience.”

“Nope. Actually, we were gonna take the Skips up later today, as a matter of fact.”

“Cool.”

“You wanna come?”

“Naw. Tom and I were gonna hit the fair later. Blow some cash on the races.”

“Oh. Well that’s cool. Tell him I said to suck the lemon.”

“Copy.” Dunkalk downed the rest of his drink in a single swallow, rolled to his feet, and made for the door. “But uuhhh, hey Marshal, do we really have the money to spend on flight time? Deuterium prices being what they are, and the jobs ain’t coming.”

“They’ll come.” I finished my drink, and followed him. The air outside the diner was crisp and fresh, and smelled faintly of cherry blossoms and rocket exhaust. And compared to a year ago, the former was now much stronger, and the latter much fainter. “They’ll come.”

~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~

A Series-82 GDRL Combat Skip handles a lot differently than a single-engine propeller-driven crop duster. It had been invented several thousand years later, for that matter. But the machine war had been so large, and so long, and had taken so many things from so many people, that on a few of the poorer frontier planets, folks could still be found flying single-engine propeller-driven crop dusters, for lack of anything else with which to fight.

That was all she'd had to fight with, at least, when the machines first came. That little plane had carried her to safety when the deforestation units leveled her planet's western hemisphere. It had later carried a machine gun between its wheels when she'd tried to dent the endless lines of dust-belching excavators. It had protected her from that dust for years, as she patrolled between the lookout posts on the border. She'd been flying it when she first heard news of planetary liberation: the burning streaks and sonic booms of the Grand Liberation Armada reentering. She'd been flying it when she first saw a Skip in action. She'd been flying it when she first met Marshal.

She'd flown that same plane into enemy territory under the dust,carrying missiles to the auto-factories while Marshal and his team distracted the machines in the upper atmosphere. She'd ducked beneath that plane's canopy to shield her eyes from the blasts. She'd glided it home on fumes, landed it on a beach just short. She'd flown that plane until it was so old it was falling apart beneath her. She'd flown it right up until the day that the GLA was ready to move on, and Marshal got up the guts to ask her whether she wanted to join the team and go with them, and then, she left that little old plane back on her homeworld, and never saw it again.

Now here she was three years later, wearing a space age flight suit, holding a EM-shielded pressure helmet, looking out her apartment window toward the Series-82 Gravity-Drive-Rocket-Lift Combat Skipper parked outside the hangar, wondering if she could ever possibly master it in time to make herself useful in the war... At least, that's what she used to wonder. Before the war ended.

There was a clattering of straps and pressure seals coming down the hallway, which stopped outside her door and knocked. "Hey Authia, you all dressed up?" Marshal asked.

"Yep! Yep." She buckled the last few latches on her space suit, stood up from bed, and stepped out the door. "All ready?"

"I'm ready." He gave his helmet a little toss. "I had Briggs run the coolant already, so we should be good to launch as soon as we get the fields charged."

"Sweet. Charging to 30% today, right?"

"Right. And how much altitude is that?"

"Eight point four kilometers. You know I know the math."

"Yeah, I know."

It was a short walk from the apartments to the hangar, then a far longer walk to make it across the width of the hangar itself. Theirs weren't the only craft here, there were countless others: retired spacers kept little fusion dinghies here, civilian hobbyists with planes, loggers and teamsters with cargo helicopters, even a few other mercenaries stored Skips like theirs. But there weren't that many fighters out in the open anymore; they'd all been mothballed by now, wings folded, fields depleted and coolant drained, hoisted onto racks on the wall and wrapped in tarps, waiting for something; waiting for what? Waiting for another job? Waiting for the airshow? Waiting for another war? Or waiting for this last war to be covered over by enough years of nostalgia that the dated tech could be sold to collectors?

Most days, today being no exception, her own team's Skips were the only starfighters to be seen. And that was just as well to her, for they stood out. They gleamed. To her, they were the most beautiful machines on the world. A proud row of four stubby, angular knife-shapes, propped up on narrow landing legs, shining like shards of mirrors in the sunlight; the shape was for radar stealth, the shine for warding off lasers. The skips' g-drives were all completely internal, so the only openings on their surfaces were the cockpit canopy, the fusion-powered thermal rocket on the back, and the barrels of weapons. The light glinted slightly differently off the fins, flaps, and the texture of the reentry tiling on the belly, but the seams between were invisible.

Beautiful machines. Proud, sharp, polished, deadly; begging and pleading to be deadly again.

Briggs intercepted them about halfway across the tarmac."G'morning kids." She croaked, at which point she reached her limit for the number of polite things she could say per day, which was one. "You both reek." Smell was about the only one of her senses that battle and age hadn't damaged in some way, but as the ancient stories say, she'd been just as grumpy young.

"Morning Briggs!" Marshal smiled at her, as if by enough years of so doing he might change her. "How's it going?"

She ground her mandibles together with a truly awful noise. "Oh, I'm having the time of my life." She spat, which was her way of saying she was perfectly miserable, which was her way of saying that everything was going fine and normal. She fished a claw around in her bag and pulled out a pair of clipboards that she tossed toward the pilots. "Alright, same thing every week, same for both Skips. All 7 preflight safety pins have been removed and stowed for both craft, cryostats holding pressure at ten hundred, supercon stable, deuterium level ninety-five hundred, propellant flatzero so keep the intakes open and don't break atmo, fins locked in atmospheric position, G-fields charged along the laterals to 30%, launch brackets linked to pilot release, base power connected, inbound and outbound paths already cleared with the tower. All systems green, I hope you both crash and die."

"Copy that." Marshal glanced down the checklist and handed it back. "Did you replace that compressor bearing from last time?"

"Of course I did."

"You're awesome, Briggs."

"I know." She stated matter-of-factly, hefted her bags over her shoulder, and walked off to let them get on with their preflight. Authia had just begun checking pipes and running down a checklist of her own when she heard Briggs call over her shoulder. "Same time next week?"

Authia caught a hint of uncertainty in the question and glanced at Marshal, suddenly unsure how many 'next weeks' there would be.

"Eh." He closed an access panel and gave it a little pat, with no idea either. "One day at a time, how 'bout?"

"I tell myself the same thing." Briggs grumbled. "So am I gonna miss my show again next week or not?"

Marshal hoped so. He glanced at Authia. She hoped so too.

"Let's plan on it." He nodded.

Briggs slouched back to wherever she lived, while the pilots ran through their preflight, and birds sang over the empty runway.

~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~

It wasn't a big place, this town. A shallow valleyon the outskirts of a larger city's wreckage, little hills and little buildings around a little river, dangerously overpopulated by refugees from every land. A few years ago the valley had been half crime-ridden ghetto and half barb-wired staging grounds for the armada, but Marshal had seen it transform into quiet suburbs and golden farmland, as the apartments had grown and the law had come and the armada had left, when the war had ended. He and Authia's Skips hardly had time to raise gear before the place disappeared into the distance behind them, and all they could see now were the blooming wildflowers on the concrete shores of the crater lakes, where the bigger city used to stand. The control tower told them they were clear to begin maneuvers.

"North Heston" had been the name of the city. "Strawberry Bend" was the town that remained. Neither had ever felt much like home to Marshal, or to Authia, or maybe to any of them. Places of dust and scars and memories, weren't they? The war may have died, but it had bled and spat and urinated itself across all this land before it had, and the smell would remain. Strawberry Bend would not, could not forget anything in this lifetime, nor could any town on this planet, nor could countless other planets besides, nor for many lifetimes more.

The Skips had been running on their thermal rockets until now, with their noses angled steeply upward to let their little wings catch the air. Now that they'd reached a safe distance, Marshal signaled to Authia to spread out to 300 meters, so they could activate their gravity drives.

Ordinary gravity-powered vehicles, like shuttles and tugs and those little floating baseballs that kids have, need their drive coils to be continuously supplied with power from an onboard reactor or battery or something, then have the whole engine on a gimbal for steering. Fighters, however, don't have the luxury of extra weight for a reactor or a battery, and couldn't risk anything as complicated and fragile as a gimballed drive. So the Skips' cores were closed systems; no electricity in, no electricity out, no moving parts. They were built as a tangled mass of magnetic coils and bottles of exotics facing every which direction, each wired into each other in a way that allowed the pilot to shunt energy from one to the other. Also unlike most commercial g-drives, which are only designed to expend energy by pushing off of nearby matter, the Skip's were designed to rapidly swap to and from a reverse mode as well, where they recycle energy by 'braking'.

Marshal eased off the throttle on the thermal rocket, thumbed on the g-drive, and pulled his joystick upwards. Briggs had charged the lateral coils up to 30%, so that the drive had essentially been trying to pull him both left and right at the same time for this entire flight. As he touched the joystick, the engine dumped all the power from both into the upward coils. The ship's invisible 200-meter-wide gravity field finally decided on a direction, grabbed all the air around the ship, and forced it straight downwards, propelling the Skip straight upwards, at more than 40 Gs. A set of reverse-wired coils in the core acted enough like a compensator to keep him alive; he only felt about 2-3 Gs of it.

It carried him upwards about eight point four kilometers, at which point it ran out of energy, and he slowed to a hover. On his left, a half second behind, Authia bobbed up level, and fell in. They punched the rocket throttles and bore back downwards now, letting the movement of masses of air through the fields charged the cores back up.

At a kilometer altitude he hit the G-drive again, instantly slowing his descent and peeling off to the right, with her just behind him. From the ground, it would have looked like both of their ships hit an invisible midair wall, and rebounded like billiard balls.He turned the sticks this way and that now, and his Skip bounced around the sky chaotically, while the gravity fields climbed and kicked and churned up great currents of air, filling the sky with a thunderous 'whumping' noise whenever they collided. Authia matching him movement for movement, step for step, move for move, but always maybe just a touch slower, maybe at a slightly wrong angle. She finally slipped up and fell out of sync entirely, and careened off East, back toward a nearby crater.

Two bounces and a second laterand he was right behind her again. He thumbed the radio to tease her or offer some advice (he hadn't decided which by the time he opened his mouth,) but then realized too late that she'd been baiting him, as she bounced straight backwards. She passed below him within about 50 meters, close enough for her drive field to encompass not only a lot of air, but his Skip as well. With the enormous traction that offered, she shot off to the North at more than 60 Gs, propelling Marshal at about 20 Gs south.

...Back overland.

"Alright, alright. Nice one. Didn't see that coming." He steered himself back toward the 2-kilometer-wide crater lake, where she was currently hovering still.

It was a game the team played over the craters, something between dogfighting and sumo wrestling, trying to throw one another out of the 'ring'. She liked it better than maneuvers or actual combat sim because she was willy enough to win almost half the time. He'd been trying to ween her off it since it didn't teach actual useful skills and largely just wasted fuel and encouraged them toward increasingly risky almost-collisions. But how could he bring himself to say no, when it was really so fun, and he liked seeing her win as much as she did... And so what if her combat skills stayed a little dull?

Wasn't the war over?

He dived his Skip down close to the water's surface, so close that his drive grabbed traction on the liquid itself, and jerked him forward, left, and up behind her at 90 Gs. The airframe shuttered in the turbulence, and by the time he should have been in range of her, she had anticipated him, dived down and south toward the water, baiting him again. He bounced after her, taking the bait willingly, thinking about how he would bounce down at the last second, bouncing her up and breaking her traction with the water, then... Well, what if she tried the same thing? What if they both grabbed each other and the water and launched themselves downward to their dooms? Would they be able to realize before impact? What if only one of them realized it? Which would? And then what?

It was a dangerous game with no reward. He hesitated.

The hesitation was his loss, as he found himself thrown out of the ring again before he could even react, and heard her laughing over the radio.

He glanced down at the water and the hard ground. "Alright, no more games." He wondering how close he'd been to death, or whether he would ever know. "You need to practice your maneuvers."

"Aww." Her Skip turned in a lazy little roll. "Well can we buzz Glasstop Island along the way?"

"...Oh alright." He relented. "Fall in."

Their maneuvers took them away from the craters and the city, past the machine's old landing units and a few of the auto-factories that had been destroyed mid-assembly. Past the dead husks of fallen ships, friend and foe, finally down dozens of kilometers of coastline, past the mountains and the poisoned reefs, far and away until a parting in the clouds allowed them to see Glasstop Island, the city-sized potato-shaped rock floating in the sky. Well, not floating, exactly. More like it had been undergoing the slowest reentry in history, and had been doing so for two years now. Thirteen gravity tugs sat anchored comfortably to its bottom side, converting the massive energy of the asteroid's slow descent into electricity, enough to feed the industry of half the continent. Every hour, on the hour, the tugs would drop a full battery into the ocean below for recovery, and every day, high at noon, massive winches would lift a couple dozens batteries back up.

Glasstop Island currently floated 27 kilometers up, in the upper reaches of the mesosphere. That was no problem for the gentle, thousand-kilometer-wide fields of the tugs' drives, but the Skips' short-range G-drives couldn't get enough traction on the thin air to climb that high. And since their thermal engines were intaking air for propellant too, they just had no way up.

None, of course, besides the batteries.

It was almost the hour.

Authia hit the throttle and went vertical, and Marshal behind her. The rushing air charged their G-drive laterals up to 100%, but they didn't use them yet. Instead they kept the thermal rockets floored, as the air grew thinner and their hull temperature began to climb from the friction. At hypersonic speeds the air intakes began having problems, but by that point the rockets were beginning to overheat anyway, so they cut out the engines and drifted as high as they could. Their altitude read 19 Kilometers, still 8 short of Glasstop, when high above, they saw the battery release.

Their fingers twitched on their G-drive controls for a few minutes of anticipation, as the battery plummeted slowly down toward them. The pumps in their thermal engines sucked in a little air, enough for a quick burst, and that was all. As soon as they got a good estimate of the falling mass's trajectory, they fired that burst and coasted toward it. Marshal had gotten used to how big things could be in space, but Authia never had, and it always took her off-guard to see these things up close. Just this one battery was taller and wider than any of the apartment buildings in Strawberry Bend, bigger than some of the armada's ships, impossible to really conceive of, and seeing her Skip's shadow for scale didn't help.

They passed within spitting distance of the battery's underside, close enough for nearly the entirety of its dense material to be inside their fields. Soon as they reckoned it was, they fired their G-drives and bounced away from it at more than 120 Gs, nearly quenched their drive coils, straight upward toward Glasstop. The battery was falling a fraction of a percent faster below, while above, they'd achieved hypersonic speeds again all of a sudden. Their ships shuddered and almost glowed in the heat, but this time, they didn't slow to a stop until they were up past 27 kilometers, close enough to get traction on Glasstop itself.

They kept it slow now that they were here, and not by choice; their G-drives didn't have any energy besides what they got from their tiny braking approach of the island. So they bounced lazily around the island's underside, past the tugs and their huge domed drive cores, past the massive nets and pitons used to hold the island together, past the strange pairs of walking arms in charge of shuffling around the batteries, past the island's jagged skirt of rocky spires.

Then across the top, so smooth and shining after having been melted to glass by the asteroid's first few aerobraking passes. There were buildings up here under construction, apartments and houses and roads, fancy and exotic land already bought and paid for, by investors and benefactors anticipating the day when the island would finally be set down in the ocean. Ordinary folks like Marshal and Authia would never be allowed on this land when it finally did; there would be rich people living here then, in their mansions carved of glass, playing golf on smooth translucent hills, and drinking Champaign from goblets of stone just for the irony, but for now, Glasstop Island was still technically in space, and space was free.

They dropped gear and set down on the roof of some pretentious villa, and sat still for a moment in the silence, for no reason but to see the bizarre and breathtaking sight again: this flying crystal city luxuriating above the sky, resting on the backs of a baker's dozen steel Atlases whose grip was failing slowly enough to bless the world beneath with thunder, while all around, a green and gold horizon tinted by peaceful blue stretched out in an endless curve.

And from up here, it was hard to believe there had ever been war.

Marshal glanced over at Authia. Saw sunshine lighting her helmet yellow from behind, planetshine blue from the front, and saw her eyes and her mask and her hair beneath it. And he wondered if whether or not, even after all this time, he had ever known her as anything besides a pilot. And he wondered who she was, and who he was, and whether she ever wondered the same.

He saw her eyes wander across the horizon, saw her catch herself, and return her attention to her cockpit. "Alright." She radioed over. "Glasstop Island reached. What's the next waypoint?" And he knew this was correct of her to say, for she truly was a pilot, and so was he.

A forbidden hurt lingered always in his chest, a thing he could never say and never admit, even to himself, for it was too horrible: it was a longing for the war to return. Oh, how he missed the war, the action, the excitement, yes even the pain, because back then he knew who he was, and had friends who knew the same. "Let's take a dive through Philippian Gorge, then two laps around Springland Peak." He answered her, as he raised gear and bounced back over the edge of Glasstop, down toward the planet again. "And no daredevil moves this time, alright? You gotta be a precise. Gotta be 5 moves ahead. Like a computer. You got me?"

"I got you." She stopped her antics and went serious as she followed, for she really did want to be a pilot, and for the rest of the flight, she really did try.

~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~

"Marshal! Hey yo Marshal come in, would you pick up already!"

Marshal thumbed the radio over to isolate the ground frequencies. "Copy that Dunkalk, you're coming through loud and clear, over."

"Awesome, hey yeah, listen, Tom and I are at the fair, right, and we were in the livestock section, because, well I guess it doesn't matter why, but we were looking at the pigs, and there was this guy there who was selling these long little brown little piglets and he was selling them real cheap because he was tryin'a get rid of 'em because he signed on as a colonist but anyway we got talking and anyway we might have a JOB!"

"A job doing what, selling long brown piglets...?" Marshal frowned, with his attention momentarily split between Philipian Gorge and this nonsense gossip.

"Oh lick a battery Marshal, I mean it's a pilot job! Escort!" He could hear Dunkalk's mandibles clattering excitedly as he tried to string words together as fast as possible. "And boy are you gonna hate it, but you gotta answer fast though, like, you gotta give me an answer in like 100 seconds because he's literally on the phone with the colonial office right now to delay them making it public because then everybody and their mom is gonna be applying, so-"

"Wai-whoa hold on okay slow down!" He pulled the Skip hard back to a standstill hover, dumping all its momentum into the laterals. The cockpit became suddenly silent. "What's the job?!?". Authia's Skip circled his and jerked to a stop as well as she listened in. "Why will I hate it? What's the job?"

"Escort...! As... I said!" Dunkalk made a distinctly audible effort to make the words come out slower. "So! They're fixing to launch a colony toward one of the wiped worlds, it's like, 50,000 passengers, right? Tom, what did he say the pa-...? Yeah, 50,000. Fifty-grand folks signed up for this, and they launch in 9 days. They've got a colony together, habitats, fusion plant, underdrive tug, they even got authorization for a nuclear arsenal for O-prop and/or pirate-be-gone, all they need now is a couple mercs to run patrol, in case they run into any leftover machine nests. 8 month journey, 206lightyears, it's food, lodging, air included in the contract, it's a good deal. Easy money. Ee-saaayyy mon-naaayyy-"

"Yeah, okay, okay, but why would I hate it? You said I would hate it, this sounds great."

"You'll hate it, because the underdrive tug they're using is one of those military surplus type-35s. Nowadays they're so cheap that the whole thing costs less on resale than the fuel needed to make the return journey... So they're gassing it up for one-way. We ain't coming back, Marshal. We'd be colonists."

"Oh." He let go the controls and just sat and blinked, in stunned silence.

"But like, we're down to like 50 seconds to make a decision though man, like seriously right now right now this could be the deal of a lifetime, we'll retire as I dunno farmers or something, you down? I'm down."

"You're asking me to just leave my whole life behind in the next 50 second?!?" He frowned hard at the comm as if this would somehow impress Dunkalk with the seriousness of the matter.

"45, but yeah."

"You talk to Briggs and Poppa about this yet? If we don't got the whole team I-"

"Briggs'll do what whatever we tell her and Tom's on the phone with Poppa now uh- hey gimme that Tom." He heard the sound of Dunkalk snatching Tom's phone, and the speakers and earpieces of both phones being pressed together.

"Heeeey there Maaaarshal." Came the elderly, drawling voice of Poppa. "Saaaay did you hear about the little ol' gig Dunkalk just drummed up for us, hmmmm?"

"Yeah, yeah, I heard, what do you think about it? No take-backs on this one."

"Weeeell I think I need to finish this game..." The clack of a checker tile. "Then yeaaaah I'll be right there, gimme uhhhh five minutes I'm still in my pajamas I gotta find my flight suit..."

"But you think it's a good idea? You wouldn't mind a new world?"

"Listen sonny boy, if you think Ima chicken out a' this one you can come bite my aaaaaaaaaaa-"

Marshal flipped the comms off for just a moment to make a brave, if futile, attempt to think this through.He'd just started to try to start to get used to starting a civilian life, and now here it all was being uprooted again and lobbed onto some other planet he'd never heard of. Forever. He glanced out the cockpit at Authia, and thought what a tough place she'd been in without them here, but what if she didn't want to go?? And it occurred to him that perhaps the years had run him dry of things to tie him down, until now there was only her. "What do you think?" He mimed at her though the glass.

She looked around, contemplating. Then held up a thumb and nodded happily. It hadn't been a hard decision for her. He flipped the comms back on.

"Poppa, let's do it. Dunkalk, you there?"

"Yep, here!"

"We'll take the job. Tell the guy yes. We'll own this."

There were some scratching noises and some excited talking on the other end that he couldn't make out, then Dunkalk hollered "We got the job!"

[e350tb]

Steven Universe: Marooned Together - Chapter Forty Six

(with thanks to @real-fakedoors for proofreading!)

Twenty-eight years ago…

The last thing Sadie Miller remembered was the screaming of air-raid sirens.

Slowly, she opened her eyes - she was a small room, sterile and green, behind a glowing yellow wall. Across the hall, she could just about make out Kiki Pizza, huddled into a ball - she reached out, but as her fingers touched the wall, a jolt ran through her and she was forced back.

“Nice try, human - we improved the containment cells.”

She glanced left - she could just about see a big, orange gem glowering down at her.

“Nothing gets in,” she sneered, “nothing gets out.”

“Attention!”

The orange gem snapped to attention as a blue one with boots that ran up to her knees marched into view.

“Uh, Holly Blue Agate, I was just…”

“Mm-hmm,” Holly Blue sounded deeply unimpressed. “There’s been a change of plan. There’s been a breakout - some of our ships have been commandeered by Crystal Gems.” She said the words with utter disgust. “We’ve lost a good number of our humans and Blue Diamond wants the rest moved to the Zoo immediately. This warship is being pulled out of the line.”

“Yes ma’am,” the orange gem said.

“I need these humans processed - correctly - by the time we arrive,” added Holly Blue. “Once we’re there, we will need all hands to begin the process of moving the Zoo to a new location. The last thing we want is any rescue operations.”

She turned to Sadie, her nose wrinkling.

“Is this the Sadie?” she demanded.

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Sort her separately,” barked Holly Blue. “Yellow Diamond would like to see her…”

The present day…

The group found little but darkness at the top of the elevator shaft. Stevonnie guessed it might once have been a grand atrium, but now it was overgrown by shrubbery and weeds that rendered the once-circular room almost shapeless. A tiny sliver of light peered in from a hole in the roof, providing just enough light to see - it shone on a single, unobscured word in the gem language.

“What’s that say?” they asked.

Lenny pursed her lips.

“It’s gem,” she replied, “b-b-but the syntax is all wrong. Like… it’s-it’s antiquitated?”

“Like Old English,” mused Lars.

All eyes fell on him.

“What? So I did okay in linguistics!” Lars threw out his arms. “It’s no big deal!”

“I think it says… Diamond House?” mused X.

“So it’s like White Diamond’s old apartment?” quizzed Stevonnie. “Is this the living room?”

“Really?” Lars tilted his head. “So, White Diamond just sat here, sitting on a couch, watching the Diamond equivalent of Buddies? Like, can you even imagine White Diamond having a life?”

“I guess even a dictator needs ‘me’ time,” muttered Lapis.

“White Diamond,” said Garnet, “doesn’t work like that.”

She looked to the left, pointing at a gap in the greenery.

“We’re going that way,” she said.

“You know what we’re gonna find?” asked Lapis.

“No. It’s just the only way out of here.”

Twenty-eight years ago…

Yellow Diamond towered over Sadie, her hands tucked behind her back as she regarded the human. It was almost as if she was looking at a small pile of dung that had graced her chambers on her command ship.

“The Sadie.” She sniffed, “I had expected more.”

“My Diamond,” said Aquamarine, floating casually next to the prisoner, her wand preventing her from moving, “this Sadie is the main motivator of the Lars and a close associate of Rose Quartz. She could be very useful to…”

“I didn’t ask for your input, Aquamarine,” Yellow Diamond scowled.

Aquamarine thinned her lips, sweating.

“White Diamond,” continued Yellow Diamond, “has insisted on taking a test subject from the human sample. I have seen both the Sadie and the Jamie and frankly I am not impressed by either.”

She raised a finger.

“That having been said,” she continued, “the Sadie appears slightly more… adaptable. She isn’t blubbering on my floor, for a start.”

She clapped.

“Leave us be, Aquamarine,” she ordered, “I want to see if this Sadie is capable of understanding the… gift we will be giving her.”

Aquamarine nodded, floating out of the chamber. As she left, her wand lost hold of Sadie and she dropped to the ground.

“Argh!”

“So, Sadie,” boomed Yellow Diamond. “Stand.”

“Ugh… go… go fuck yourself.”

Yellow Diamond’s lips thinned.

“I’m going to assume,” she declared, “that that’s a human insult. I suppose even the most base of lifeforms have some spirit.”

Her eyes narrowed.

“There is no escape,” she continued. “Do you know that? Do you know that we’ve reduced your planet - your species - to cosmic dust? That there is no safe haven for you anywhere in this universe? And are you aware that, for you at least, there will be far worse to come? You can make it somewhat easier for yourself if you cooperate. I do not like to repeat myself, so stand.”

Sadie looked up again, something flashing in her watery eyes - defiance.

“Go,” she spat, punctuating each word. “Fuck. Yourself.”

For a moment, Yellow Diamond seemed to smile, just the smallest bit.

“Were you a gem,” she spat, “you’d have made an excellent soldier. Alas...”

She crossed her arms.

“...you’ll just have to make an excellent war machine instead.”

The present day…

Garnet held her hand forward, purple light beaming from one of her gems like a flashlight and illuminating the gloom ahead. It was a long, cavernous tunnel, darkness broken occasionally by the smallest cracks through which sunlight shone, carpeted by growth with broken, indecipherable murals and writing along ruined walls. The air felt damp and cool, like a deep tunnel in a mine, and occasionally Stevonnie heard wet squelches under their boots.

“The m-majesty of th-this place,” mused Lenny, “i-it must have been i-incomparable, like…”

“It’s like Wales,” said Garnet.

“...Wales?” quizzed Lars.

“We’re in a dark tunnel, it’s cold and something is dripping onto my shoulder,” repeated Garnet, “It’s like Wales.”

“Is that why you have a British accent?” asked Lapis, “‘Cause you went over there once?”

“No,” replied Garnet. “That’s why they have a Garnet accent.”

“That makes sense,” muttered Lapis.

“Should we be talking so loud?” asked X. “I mean, if Chrysalis hears…”

“Robot hearing, X,” replied Lars. “She’s gonna know we’re coming even if we whisper.”

“Lars is right,” said Garnet gravely. “Sadie will know we’re here before we know she’s-”

A yellow beam burst out of the darkness, slamming right into X. For a few seconds, he screamed, electricity coursing through his body - then, with a cloud of smoke, he vanished, his gem clattering loudly to the floor. As quickly as they could, Stevonnie ducked down and grabbed it, tucking it safely away in their pocket.

Slowly, ever so slowly, Sadie stepped out of the darkness, eyes glowing brilliantly in the gloom.

“Targets located.”

“Sadie,” whispered Lars.

“Chrysalis,” Sadie corrected him.

Lars shook his head.

“No, it’s Sadie,” he said, “I nearly got through to you last time - this time I’m not leaving until you remember who you are.”

“Then you will not leave.”

“Maybe,” replied Lars, “But at least I’ll have tried.”

Sadie raised her arm, the bright red light of her charging attack illuminating her face.

“Then perish.”

Stevonnie instantly leapt into action, shield drawn, shoving Lars out of the way as the beam shot towards him. It bounced off their shield, slamming upwards into the roof - a rain of fine rubble fell down upon them, but they paid no heed.

Lapis threw out her hand, the dew in the walls and growth flowing around it - there wasn’t enough for a giant wave or fist, leaving her to twist them into a weapon instead; a short, translucent sword, not unlike a gladius.

“A sword?” quizzed Stevonnie, eyebrow raised.

“Hey, gotta fit with the theme,” shrugged Lapis, glancing at Stevonnie’s own weapon.

“Right,” nodded Stevonnie, “Let’s do this.”

Sadie grit her teeth, her arms transitioning into twin blades. She shot forward at superhuman speed, her left blade crashing hard into Stevonnie’s shield as the battle was joined.

Far below, back in the atrium, C paced back and forth, occasionally sighing loudly in boredom.

“You holdin��� up okay, C?” asked Jenny, sitting on a rock and wiping her blaster rifle with a flannel.

“Yeah, yeah, just… ugh,” replied C. “There’s so little tech here, man - it sucks.”

She kicked a rock, pouting.

“Didn’t you bring a tablet or something?” asked Bismuth.

“Yeah, but that’s not cool and new,” muttered C.

She sat down, grumpily taking out her small green tablet and tapping on it.

“Bet X is having all the… hello, what’s this?”

A signal was showing up on the corner of the screen.

“Guys, I’ve got something!” she called, “There’s some kind of remote signal coming through… says it’s called…”

Her eyebrows shot up.

“...Chrysalis?”

There was a clatter - the sound of rocks shifting on the floor - and she was suddenly aware of a series of dim red glows in the dark tunnel from which they had came.

C swallowed.

“Guys,” she looked up from the screen warily, “I think we’re about to be attacked by…”

“Rebel targets sighted.”

C finished, perhaps unnecessarily, “...Chrysalis drones.”

Twenty-seven years ago…

“Most of the organic form is surplus to requirements. The skin can be replaced with an nano-graft - functionally identical but far more durable…”

Piece by piece, they tore Sadie Miller apart.

“...we can use some of the forearm, but the rest will need to go - the other seems to be too damaged from resistance, however…”

She was strapped to a gurney, unable to so much as scream under the stasis power of the attending Aquamarines, reduced only to staring at her captors. The Peridot - a heartless parody of the one she knew called 4DT - passionlessly suggested bits of her to remove or replace, slowly and deliberately ripping her very humanity from her, replacing everything with machinery.

“The lungs will not be needed - hand me the nanoscalpel…”

Eventually, she began to drift in and out of awareness as they played with her nervous system, her bones, her brain. There was still pain, omnipresent and searing, but she became horribly used to it. Before long, she was repeating the same words in her head over and over, the same manifesto…

My name is Sadie Miller.

“Voice module installed. State your designation.”

My name is Sadie Miller.

“Chrysalis.”

My name is Sadie Miller.

“Inform White Diamond’s Pearl that control has been achieved.”

Awareness faded once more, but she spat out the words on last time in the deepest pits of her consciousness.

My name is Sadie Miller…

The present day…

She watched through eyes that weren’t her own as the shell of her body swung its blade at Garnet, blocked by her gauntlet. She felt the vertigo and the dull pain as her left hook flew into the robot’s face, knocking her backwards. As the robot recovered, she began to repeat the mantra once more, mentally clenching her fists.

My name is Sadie Miller… and I’m taking myself back.

[skillsntalents]

They sent us a water drone! Or mini-submarine with a camera, whatever you want to call it. The company Chasing sent us their latest version of their water drone, the Gladius mini. I have to say I am impressed. Disclaimer: We did not pay for the Drone, they agreed for us to do an honest review, also if you buy the Gladius Mini through our link in the description within 30 days of clicking it, we will get a small fee.  The camera capabilities are outstanding. In some big ways, they are better than a GoPro. It has 4k video that you can adjust right on the screen. You can adjust the hue, contrast, sharpness and the bitrate. In 1080p meaning HD video, you can even control the frames per seconds. You can go up to 120 frames per second so you can really show every movement in slow motion. The two main things that the GoPro 7 camera is superior over the gladius mini camera is it stabilizes the video by itself via software and it has up to 240 frames per second. However, since the drone pretty much stabilizes itself there is no need for extra stabilization. Also, 120 frames per second is plenty if you want to slow things down and show the details.  For its unique capabilities we will for sure use it in our next swimming camp to correct techniques and have amazing footage. If you are a coach or you are in a swim team and you think your team can benefit from having one of these, click on the link bellow. Or contact us with any of your water drone questions to skillsntalents@gmail.com I forgot to mention one thing… It is super fun to play with! I’ll see you later! Buy a Gladius Mini: https://ift.tt/2ZHLEHq Other Gladius videos on Youtube Mauritius by Neo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mN828EutzI CHASING GLADIUS MINI UNDERWATER DRONE | Lake Exploration Copenhagen Denmark https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QjRXlxe3jk ENVOYER UN DRONE SOUS MARIN DANS L'OCÉAN ! (Exploration) Gladius Mini https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXSP42qt3ak&t=594s CHASING GLADIUS MINI UNDERWATER DRONE | UGC content of Blue Water divers at Gran Canaria https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dttClPV4YGY&t=114s Gladius mini Arctic Test, Depth test and light test. ROV Full HD https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vys2F1QO-tE&t=134s Underwater drone finds German WW2 aircrraft pieces. Gladius Mini. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qIv3piPJaVo&t=819s Thailand https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5nsSzlqe8c by Skills NT Swimming

[judethomas21]

Win a Gladius Mini 4K underwater drone, in this week's MakeUseOf.com competition! Explore the depths up to 100m~

[thewildwaffle]

Abduction - Chapter 9

 If you’ve been reading along, or if you have a comment of some kind, please leave feedback! and thanks to everyone who has been - it’s really helped me stay motivated. This is the longest I’ve actually stayed with a story like this, which is seriously amazing! Thanks everyone!

First Chapter   Previous Chapter   Next Chapter

***

Loud! Oh my heck it’s so loud!

It sounded like the most annoying fire alarm ever created - and he had heard a lot of annoying fire alarms in his life. He’d even started a few.

The equipment on the walls rattled with each ship quake. “Ooooohhhhhh, we are going to die,” Mike droned.

“Those big laser beams are still getting through the shields!” Wenona had been sitting by the window in her usual spot when the Gladius arrived on this hellish mess. She’d stayed frozen to the spot since. The ship shook violently again, knocking Mike to the floor.

Oh freak, this can’t be how I go out, not after everything else I’ve been through.

“Human Mike, Human Wenona! Are you alright?” Demfar scrambled into the room, his four tentacle-like legs were spread wide to help absorb much of the ship’s tremors and shudders. “It’s the Burnti Blockade - it’s an all-out war now and we’ve shown up right in the middle of it!”

“Really, Demfar?” Mike grimaced as he was nearly knocked over by another particularly strong blast to the ship’s hull, “Really? We hadn’t noticed.”

“Human Mike, how could you not have noticed? We are very much under attack as we speak! This is not normal!”

Demfar looked up worriedly at the light panels as they started flickering. “Oh, I do hope the med bay’s generators hold up. I fear we might have a few new patients in here once this is done.”

“We’re returning fire!” Wenona yelled from the window. She was standing now, pressing her face closer to the glassy surface to get a better view. Mike could see around her as yellow bursts erupted from canons that must have been beyond their view, which shot out in rapid succession towards the looming enemy ships.

“About time,” Mike murmerred. He felt so helpless.This wasn’t something he could just punch or fight his way out of. What could he do? Nothing. Just sit by and watch while his life was on the line. We’re going to die.

“Mike! Wenona!” Mike jumped as a familiar deep voice shouted right behind him. Jebannuck ran into the room, hardly stopping as he grabbed Mike’s arms while still in motion and quickly crossed the room and reached for Wenona’s hand. “Humans, with me, NOW.”

“What? Where?” Wenona pulled her hand away but stood and took a step towards Jebannuck.

“I’ll explain on the way,” he extended his arm hurriedly as a gesture for her to follow. As he turned, he nodded to Demfar, “Orders from the captain, you’re relieved from their care.”

Demfar looked like he was about to respond, but at that moment, the main lights went completely out. After a few seconds, there was a low hum and blue emergency lights started glowing from inset panels along the walls.

“Frewan,” Jebannuck cursed and pulled the humans with him through the door. Neither one of them protested as they ran to keep up.

Mike could feel his heart beating faster and faster. His eyelids felt like they were frozen open at the widest they could go. Everything seemed to be happening in slow motion, but his senses felt so alert that it was hard to process everything. There was one thing he knew though. He felt certain of it. They were all going to die.

He’d felt fear before. This wasn’t that. He’d felt panic and primal rage before, when he and Wenona escaped their confines on the Montauk ship. This wasn’t those either. This was dread, as he had never experienced it before. Heavy. Final. Absolute. Everything around him felt distant and detached, like it was happening to someone else and he was just watching, doomed to whatever outcome they all ended up with.

Jebannuck was talking as they ran. He tried listening, but the words felt meaningless in his ears. There was an escape pod. Somethings about an escape pod. They’d be back later? Jeb was talking so fast, it was hard to keep up. It was all Mike could do to keep up with Jeb’s near sprint of a pace. They turned corners and rushed past corridors. They reached a wide section of the hall with door and window ports all along one wall. Mike had seen this place before, had passed it before. He’d seen crew members watching stars pass at warp speed during their lounging breaks. None of that now.

Jebannuck headed immediately to one of the small control panels next to a door panel and began punching in commands.

“Both of you, over here, now.”

Mike felt his legs moving forward, but his eyes wandered towards the window ports just off to the side. There were a lot of lights and beams flashing in various colors. A lot of ships. One ship with a red hull looked like it was heading straight at them.

A loud “woosh”-ing noise brought Mike’s attention back to the interior of the Gladius. The door next to Jeb had opened. Inside was a small room.

Oh, duh, Mike thought, Escape pod. We’re getting out of here.

The pod had four belt harnesses inside, two on each side. In the middle was a small navigation console, like the ones on the bridge, but much, much smaller. There were also what appeared to be, storage bays overhead and under the harness seats.

“Get in. Quickly. Don’t mess with the controls, I’ve set it up for you. Gamnut 4 is a habitable planet, but by no means the safest. You’ll be in one of the planet’s more temperate zones. We’ll be back to pick you up the moment it’s safe here. Don’t wander off from the pod,” He inhaled and pointed directly at Mike, “Don’t. Do. Anything. Stupid.”

Mike didn’t feel like he had the capacity to fire back with a snappy comeback. He didn’t have the time either. Jeb ushered them both into the pod and made sure they strapped in. As soon as they were secured, he bounded back out the door and entered a few more commands to the control panel.

“Human Mike, Human Wenona, please be sure that you-”

Jebannuck was interrupted. Loudly.

Whatever he was going to say was swallowed up in the loudest explosion Mike had ever heard. Glass, metal, and debris were flying everywhere. The concussive wave knocked Jebannuck, headfirst, inside the pod, throwing him onto the floor where he rolled and smacked hard into the base of the navigation console. A few broken beams flew in behind him, and hit the floor. Then they began sliding back out. In fact, a lot of dust and debris were starting to slide back. If Mike’s ears hadn’t just been bombarded by the explosion, he would have heard a loud sucking sound.

Before he could put together what the heck just happened, the doors to the pod slammed shut and sealed. Mike felt the pod blast off from the ship. He could see the Gladius out the small porthole window on the door. There was a jagged hole near where they had just shot away. It was getting harder and harder to see it as the ship grew smaller and smaller.

The pod must have been really speeding along.

Mike looked at the navigation console. He felt his hands twitch. He wanted nothing more than to reach over and take control. Too bad he was strapped in. It also didn’t help that the controls were all in standardized Juntag code. He hoped that whatever Jebannuck had entered earlier would get them where they were going, and get them there in one piece.

Jeb. Oh frewan, Jeb. He still hadn’t gotten back up. The pod jostled on its course and it looked like Jebannuck was maybe starting to stir and shake his head, but once their trajectory was stabilized, it was clear that the only movement actually from Jeb were the dark gray bruises spreading across his skin. His chest rose and fell slowly, but shallowly.

Mike scrambled and fumbled with the clips and straps that held him fastened to the harness.

“Mike, no! What are you doing?” Wenona’s voice was low and sounded more like a raspy whisper. “Stay buckled up, what if we crash?”

Mike had finally gotten a few straps loose and was nearly able to wriggle free of the remaining bindings. “If we crash, then Jeb’s gonna die. We’d all die, probably. I’ll hurry.”

Once out of the harness, Mike crouched down by Jebannuck’s side. The pod jostled again, making Mike nearly lose his balance on top of Jeb. Instead, he caught himself before completely falling over, but not before he smacked his head on the navigation console’s base. He saw white stars flash in his eyes and he muttered a few choice Earth swears. “Are you okay?” Wenona began unclipping her buckles and straps before Mike, through clenched teeth, grunted and waved for her to stop. She stopped, bit her lip, and refastened the few buckles she had managed to get loose. “Whatever you’re doing, do it quick and strap back in. We’re still in a war zone, remember.”

Mike pressed his hands hard against his forehead where he’d hit, took a deep breath and set back to work. He reached under Jebannuck’s arms and tried picking him up.

Nope. Too big. Not going to work. Dumb idea.

Mike did get Jeb up into a sitting position though, and that allowed him to grab the unconscious alien around the torso and drag him under the empty harness seat next to his own. He braced himself against his harness when the pod bucked and trembled again. Taking another deep breath, Mike tried again to lift Jebannuck off the ground and into the seat. He got him halfway and tried reaching for the loose straps against the wall. Using his shoulder, his elbow, and a few times, his head, Mike was able to prop Jebannuck up long enough to strap, clip, and buckle the comatose sefra into the harness seat. More or less.

“Mike, the controls are beeping. I can’t see what it’s about from here.”

Before he could get to the console, the pod lurched hard to the side. The lights from the ceiling panel went out. Mike flew off his feet into the wall above the last spare harness, but before he hit, something… changed.

The impact was soft. Well, it still kind of hurt, but not nearly as much as it should have. Mike’s first cognitive thoughts were that maybe the wall was made out of a spongy material. Or maybe he died and was now a ghost. That would maybe explain why he was floating.

Oh wait. This is space. Stuff floats in space usually.

“What hit us, or we hit, or whatever, it must have knocked out the artificial gravity,” Mike pushed off from the wall. He glided across the pod then he launched himself into a slow motion backflip. The lights flickered back on slowly.

“I freakin’ hate space. We’re gonna die out here. Not even on the ship. Just, out here by ourselves,” Wenona was fighting a panic in her voice. It was subtle, but Mike heard it.

He caught himself on the top of his harness and pushed himself back down to the floor.

“We’ll be okay.” He wasn’t sure about that, but what else could you say? Yeah, you’re right, we’re all going to die?

“We’ve got to be almost there by now.” He strapped himself back in, and looked at the navigation display. He couldn’t make heads or tails of what the writing was about, but one of the graphs seemed to be mapping out their trajectory. “Got to be getting close,” he mumbled, mostly to himself.

They were getting close. It didn’t take long before the feeling of gravity returned - natural gravity - from the planet. The pod shook again, though much less violently than before, as it entered the atmosphere.

What’s this planet’s name again? Gambit? Gamner? It had a number with it too. Don’t remember what that was.

He took a deep breath as he glanced out the port window again, hoping to get a look at the planet. The window was facing the wrong way and showed only the stars as they slowly faded into a teal sky.

He hoped he wouldn’t be calling this planet “home” for too long.

[caveadministration]

Gladius

Chapter 7: Bread and Circuses

Shikamaru sighed in boredom and disappointment as his friend cheered along with the roaring crowd. Down below, two minor gladiators started off the show. They had skill, all of the fighters did, but they didn't have any talent. There was no strategy, just the equivalent of two boys whacking sticks together, except these sticks were pointed and busy causing significant injury. Not so deep down, Shikamaru knew that he enjoyed the fights, especially if there was strategy. It was fun to predict the outcome and thrilling if he was wrong.

Shikamaru also knew that it was all a distraction; a way to appease the crowds and draw their attention away from the crumbling social and economic structure that the Emperor had built. He had thought about talking to his friends about it but had stopped himself before he could. It was slightly treasonous, and he was intelligent enough not to take the risk and, if he was being honest, they would probably disagree with him as most families in Rome were brainwashed to agree with The Emperor’s ideals.

Ino hadn't shown up today which was odd for her blatant love of violence, and Choji, Shino, and Hinata had joined their families in their boxes. Considering their status, it was a wonder that they ever joined Shikamaru in the stands. Yes, all of Shikamaru’s friends were clan children, but the Akimichi, Aburame, and Hyuuga were noble clans and they didn't, under principle, frequently consort with the lesser patricians. It was only the clan names that kept their parents from driving them apart. Shikamaru turned to look at the noble clans’ boxes. If he squinted just right, he could see Hinata next to her cousin and her sister, her father behind them.

Next to the Hyuuga box, the Akimichi and Aburame flanked it either side. Shino sat stoically next to his father while Shikamaru could see Choji laughing with his parents. Out of the bunch, the Akimichi were the least stuck up. Above them, the Emperor’s throne was surrounded by Uchihas. As the opening match staggered to an end, his esteemed holiness entered the box and reclined on the throne. Ah, so that was why the royal families kept their children close. They wanted to please the Emperor.

The announcer boomed from his place in the stand, his voice magnified to be heard over the crowd. “All rise for His Imperial Majesty, Emperor of Rome, and Lord of the known World: Madara Uchiha, the first of his name.” The people in the stands rose to their feet and roared their approval. Shikamaru did the same but with much less enthusiasm; it was best to keep up appearances.

It wasn’t unheard of for the Emperor to visit the arena and its gladiators, in fact he came quite often, but not to a small-scale event such as this. The roster did not hold much appeal with none of the heavy-hitters present, only fodder until the main event later in the afternoon. Shikamaru narrowed his eyes. Either it was a random appearance - unlikely - or there was an announcement to come, one important or personal enough for him to appear in public himself rather than simply send out a missive.

“People of Rome.” The Emperor’s voice echoed throughout the stadium. “I have grand news for the arena. Soon we will house another champion, the likes of which has never been seen in a gladiator fight before. Next week, the tournament will host Rome's first gladiatrix, a female gladiator!”

Once again, noise exploded from the spectators, but this time confusion and disapproval dominated the applause. Shikamaru could hear people talking around him about how a female gladiator in the arena was a disgrace to the sport, that a woman wouldn't last long in such a violent environment.

But between the outrage, Shikamaru could hear whispers of intrigue. He did have to agree, it was a new element - and therefore more interesting - but it could also be unpredictable. For this idea to succeed… this gladiatrix would not only have to defeat her competitors, but also make a spectacle, otherwise she would never be recognised.

And if she did fail, it certainly wouldn’t make the Emperor any more popular.

Beside him, Kiba nudged him in the ribs. “A chick, huh? Well I can’t wait to tell Ino, I’m sure she’ll be a fan.”

Shikamaru nodded in agreement and threw a quick glance up at the royal families. “Ino might be a fan, but I can’t say the same for the Hyuugas.”

Hiashi Hyuuga, Hinata’s father, wasn’t sneering, but he certainly looked displeased. Hinata was sharing excited words with her sister, but one look from her father sealed their lips. The Hyuuga had a history of misogyny, and it was delightfully ironic that both the heirs were female, but clearly that wasn’t enough to convince Hiashi on how proficient a woman would be in the arena.

“Yeah, but they’re stuck up,” said Kiba. “Besides, Choji, Shino, and their families seem plenty excited.” Or as excited as the Aburame could get considering their covered faces, but the Akimichi family were just as enthusiastic about the news as they were about everything else.

Shikamaru nudged him back. “And we don’t even have to wait until next week to know more.”

Kiba grinned. “We just have to ask Lee and Tenten.”

Sakura did not sleep well that night. A hay mattress on a stone slab might not be the most uncomfortable surface, but it was every noise that startled her awake, and each shadow that passed between her cell bars that sent her heart racing. She may have won the fight, but it was clear that some gladiators were more… vexed by her than impressed, and she couldn't rule out Hidan. If he decided to take revenge, then being in the same barracks wouldn't exactly be in her favour. Secure walls and doors lay between them, but Sakura had lived through enough to know those wouldn’t stop revenge.

Her injuries didn’t help either. Between those still healing since the attack on Suna, the brand smarting on her hand, and the stab wound in her leg, every movement was wrought with pain. Yes, Moegi had once again bandaged her up, but that wasn’t enough to dull the… discomfort of being impaled.

She was happy to have missed dinner. She was too tired to deal with the other gladiators and the meal she had with Moegi was sufficient enough, but would they see this as a sign of weakness?

Yet, there was nothing to be afraid of. No spectre came in the night to assassinate her and the most she heard of other people were the midnight murmurings of her cell-mates. When morning drew close and the witching hour had long since passed, Sakura finally closed her eyes and stole a little sleep before a bell clanged throughout the compound. A guard strolled into the barracks, rapping on the cell doors, others following him in.

“Rise and shine. You don’t get paid to laze around in bed all day.”

Wincing slightly as she rose from her bed, Sakura quickly pulled on a clean tunic and her sandals. She stood near the door and stretched her joints before the guard came into view.

“Out you get,” he said, opening the door. Sakura walked out to join the other gladiators who had been released from their cells. Her leg still throbbed in pain, but she wouldn’t give anyone the satisfaction of seeing her limp.

She passed Itachi and Kisame, eyeing the blindfolded Uchiha. Sakura still couldn't quite comprehend how he could be such a dangerous opponent, but even as the thought crossed her mind, Itachi’s face turned in her direction. Sakura felt a chill crawl up her spine and quickly looked the other way; it was almost as if he knew exactly where her eyes were.

The other two gladiators from Kiri stood silently near Kisame, and Sakura joined them with the other guards. Kisame gave her a wide, toothy grin, but otherwise she was completely ignored. Fair enough. She could understand wanting to keep to yourself.

Kakuzu followed her as he was let out of his cell, but the calm morning was disturbed as Hidan joined them.

“God fucking dammit. My neck hurt like a bitch last night and now I get this shit ass wake up call. What a great start to a great fucking day!”

“Shut up, Hidan. Nobody wants to listen to your whining,” Kakuzu growled.

“Fuck you, Kaku-fucker. You're not my fucking boss. And you!” At this Hidan turned towards Sakura and she tensed at his tone. Another fight was not what she was looking forward to towards before breakfast.

“You've got some big ass balls if you think I've forgotten about yesterday. And,” at this Hidan’s gaze turned less vengeful and more sleazy. “If you wanna go again, I'm not saying no, but the outcome is gonna be a lot different.”

Was he serious? Sakura still couldn’t comprehend how he could still be so horny, especially after she cut off his actual gods-damned head.

Sure, there were some in the world who took pleasure from pain, but there was a difference between a sharp, searing tug of the hair and decapitation. And although it was rare to see a man understanding of a loss handed to him by a woman, this wasn’t exactly the outcome she had anticipated.

“Yeah?” Said the guard. “Well I think it's time for you to shut your traps and head off to breakfast. And if you don’t, then it's only fair for you to go hungry. That clear?”

Hidan grumbled in discontent but it was obvious that he knew when to shut up when it counted.

Finally, Deidara and Sasori joined them, arguing quietly amongst themselves, and the guards escorted them towards the dining hall.

The hall was mostly empty when they arrived, only a few other barracks had woken up earlier and although she drew a few stares, Sakura was ignored in favour of enjoying breakfast. Perhaps her addition was not as much of an upset as she had previously thought?

She joined the rest of her barrack at their table, sitting as far away as possible from Hidan who took the opportunity of their guards leaving to once again run his mouth.

Sakura listened half-heartedly as he droned on and on about how unfair life was before she tuned out completely. Slowly chewing her breakfast, Sakura could hear more men enter the hall; gladiators claiming tables and guards taking their places along the wall, light murmuring following them.

She tensed a little every time someone walked behind her but slowly began to relax. That was until a group of men talking loudly at another table got up and strode towards her. Or to be more precise, Hidan.

“Well Hidan, who knew you’re such a shitty fighter. I mean I knew you were bad, but not enough to get absolutely fucked up by a girl.”

Slowly, the entire table turned to face the speaker.

Two men now stood in front of the table, followed by others behind them. They were similar enough in features that they were most likely brothers. Both with wild black hair, sharp eyes, and strange masks covering their mouths.

“Or was it all a show to get Pinky here a bit of a rep. What’d she pay you for it? Something worthwhile I hope.”

Sakura grimaced. As if the innuendo was bad enough, he couldn’t even think of an original nickname. From the corner of her eye she could see Hidan’s face as a grin started to stretch across it. Ah, this might not end peacefully.

“Now, now,” said Kisame. “You don’t have to start a fight, Meizu. In fact, why don’t you and your brother just turn around and finish breakfast.”

Hidan stood up. “Oh no no no, if they wanna fight, I’m more than happy to give it to them. Let’s see if the so-called ‘Demon Brothers’ hold up to their name.”

Meizu laughed. “But Hidan, you don’t understand. Gozu and I don’t want to fight you. We want to fight her.”

“Ohhhhhhhh, rejected.”

“Shut up Deidara,” Hidan sneered. “What? Too pussy-footed to fight me?” He began to step over the bench. “Well why don’t we just-”

Sakura stood up. Hidan stopped talking. She walked around the table and faced the two men. Gozu opened his mouth to speak. Before he could, Sakura punched him in the face.

Yes, a slap would have been more effective, but a punch sent through a bit more of a message, and a broken nose. Gozu doubled over in pain while his brother - Meizu was it? - snarled and rose his own fist, ready to swing.

Quickly, Sakura dropped into a crouch and whipped her leg around to catch his at it moved forward. She winced as her thigh smarted at the sudden movement, but now was not the time to stop moving.

“You fucking bitch!”

As Meizu tripped and fell, crashing into a nearby table, Gozu retaliated, blood streaming down his face and she used the moment of her sweep to rise into a high-kick and smack her foot into the side of his face. He went down again. Sakura took the opportunity to slam her heel into the small of his back and then spun back around to face Meizu who was coming at her with what seemed like a knife.

Sakura raised her elbow and blocked his attack before thrusting her fist into his stomach. He let out a gasping breath and fell to the ground. By now, the rest of their lackeys were cheering them on, but to her surprise not engaging in the fight. A previously arranged agreement? Or maybe not confident enough. As her attention drifted, she almost missed the blade moving to stab her leg. It nicked her calf as she moved to stomp down on Meizu’s face and he motionless, passed out.

Movement behind her and she ducked under Gozu’s arm and landed a cupped hand on his ear. He screeched and collapsed in front of her and suddenly everything was still. Sakura dusted off her hands and wiped a streak of blood off her cheek before walking back to her table to finish her breakfast. Nobody spoke as she sat down until Hidan let out a crowing cheer.

“How was that fuckers? And if you want round two I’m available to kick your asses too!”

As Sakura spooned more grain into her mouth, Deidara nudged her with his shoulder.

“Nice one, yeah. Maybe later we can go one-on-one.”

“Unfortunately, you won’t be training with the others today,” Genma said as he stood before the table. “You have appointments for your weapons and armour. And good work by the way, it was a good show to watch. Very clean and efficient and it’s nice to see those two get put in their place.”

“What a pity,” said Kisame, still grinning despite the early hour. “I was looking forward to crossing swords with you this afternoon. Maybe we can give that a shot tomorrow.”

Sakura looked at the men around the table, more interest in their eyes than yesterday, and by the sounds of the rest of the gladiators in the hall with their cheers for her and jeers for the brothers, more respect.

“Yes, maybe later.”

Sakura washed her breakfast down with a gulp of water and walked behind Genma out the building with faint calls of praise following her. She might have a better chance here than she thought.

“You know, Lee, I thought that you’d have better things to do than hang around in the forge all day.”

“But Tenten! It is the springtime of our youths! And! You have not left here to experience it!”

A hammer fell onto the blade, hot and malleable as each strike shaped a dangerous edge. Tenten set down the hammer and lifted the blade eyeing it before placing it back down and continuing with her strikes. “But I have a very important order to finish and as much as I’d like to leave I can’t. Also, I just don’t want to.”

Lee’s eyes trembled as they filled up with tears and Tenten braced herself for the onslaught.

“Tenten! You cannot mean what you say! You must be passionate about y\Youth and embrace it!” Lee sobbed it all out, as water and snot poured down.

Tenten sighed. This time as she lifted up the blade, she plunged it into water; it hissed as the water evaporated into the air. This time she was satisfied with its shape. “Maybe later Lee, but not now.” She walked towards the grinder and set to work sharpening the would-be sword as Lee remained blubbering on the floor. “And I have an appointment soon, so either you should leave or make yourself useful. There’s a cloth on the bench, hand it to me if you could, and there’s another one there for you to blow your nose.”

Lee did as she asked and soon the blade was sharp and polished, almost ready for the rest of the engravings, handle, and pommel. But first, she glanced at the clock, her appointment. As she put away her tools a knock sounded at the entrance and a guard poked his head around the frame. It was Genma.

“Ah, Tenten. I’ve brought you your new fitting.”

He walked in and behind him followed a girl, no a woman. Tenten had heard the news but it was still strange to see. However, it was clear that Lee hadn’t heard anything for as soon as he set eyes on her he froze. If Tenten didn’t know any better, she’d think he was petrified, perhaps in fear, but no. It was simply the calm before the… Lee.

Lee jumped into motion. “To see such a beautiful blossom in such a place is a miracle! I declare my love for you!” He ran towards her, but just before contact the woman dodged and Lee went straight into the wall.

There was silence as they all stared at Lee, at one with the stone.

“Apologies,” said the woman. “He startled me.”

Tenten smiled. “No worries, he’s like that. Why don’t you tell me what armour you prefer and then I can get to work.”

Not really anything to add at the end of this one, it was mostly just a bit of a fun filler chapter. There is the fact that gladiators generally slept on a stone slab and a straw mattress and as they fought in the Colosseum, they could buy better decorations/furniture for their rooms.

Hmu if I’ve missed something, and maybe, if we’re lucky, there’ll be a new chapter out in the near future.

I have edited all the chapters up to this one as of 2/2/19. Nothing major to the plot but it might be worth re-reading.

[jflashandclash]

Traitors of Olympus IV: Fall of the Sun

Twenty-Seven: Axel

Organic Situational Awareness

(or: The Wrong Time for Pride)

           Jack went from sinister to hysterical within one breath. Axel could imagine his surrogate father shift from a generalized glance, to narrowing in on him. This usually preceded an embarrassing story. Instead of an embarrassing story, Jack came near a sob. “My boy! Axel, my boy! We saw her, we saw my wonderful Flynn! That militaristic bitch-god of war, and Flynn’s fashionist ice cleft of a mother—they have her!  They have my amazing Flynn!”

           Axel clenched his teeth. He didn’t consider that Jack must have gone through the Princess Andromeda on the way down here. It would have destroyed the maniac to see Flynn and do nothing to help her.

           If Euna could hear Jack’s rambling, she gave no indication.

           Thalia snapped out of her surprise first. “Euna!” she called over Jack’s continued ramblings about the Ballad of Descent and Snack Breaks. The latter, something Axel’s stomach said they should have taken more of.

           “Wait,” Reyna whispered.

           Before she or Axel could grab Thalia’s arm, the huntress stepped forward.

           Axel could imagine Reyna’s complaint later, Don’t any of you know how to formulate a plan? I would have better luck attacking Russia in winter!

           Axel didn’t dare step after Thalia. A closer proximity to Kronos’ scythe might cloud his already foggy thoughts. He had never heard, had never felt, the Leonis Caput helm, itself, scream. It sent a jolt of terror through him. Pax had been through so much; Axel trembled to think of what might be happening topside to make the helm itself worry.

           At least everyone had heard the helm make that noise. That was new. He didn’t want to tell the others, “Oh, normally my helmet just talks in my head.” Out of the people here, only Reyna might have the slightest idea of what that meant, and he really rather she didn’t.

           When he tested the proximity to Backbiter, leaning towards Euna, reaching a hand out after Thalia, his mind sharpened. The Leonis Caput’s internal panic softened in the presence of its commander.

           It helped him comprehend what happened next.

           Thalia slid her bow onto the back, briskly closing the distance between she and Euna. “Hey, Euna, I’m talking to you! I didn’t swim through a river of blood—”

           Something made a crunch under Thalia’s boot when she was about five feet from Euna.

           “Wrong step, huntress!” Jack taunted.

           Axel had enough time to realize that Jack must not have been able to make out Thalia’s features in the dark, else her moniker would have been something much less polite and something that would incur a reprimanding from Axel since he’d grown to like Thalia.[1]

           Several small somethings exploded from the dirt at Thalia’s feet.

           “Styx!” was all she got out before those things wrapped around her and dragged her to the ground.

           A small burst of electricity temporarily freed the huntress, so she could fumble an arm out, before the snake-like forms entrapped her again. Within a breath, she was cocooned on the floor. The cocoon rocked slightly, emitting the occasional muffled swearwords. The swearing, at least, meant she could breathe.  Vines, Axel realized. Hopefully not poisonous ones this time.

           Calex took a step backwards in dismay.

           Reyna fingered her knife. Axel felt like he could sense Reyna calculate how dangerous Euna was and the quickest way to take her down.

           Euna’s head twitched. She glanced over her shoulder at the organically and all-natural, mummified Lieutenant of Artemis. “Hm?” she said, reaching up to pull something from her ear. Plants curled out of her hair and towards them, like they were tiny, environmentally-friendly radar guns. Her eyes looked like absent pits of blackness, similar to the cliff’s edge.

           Maybe Axel shouldn’t have felt it, but pride lifted his stomach. Euna had listened and learned. “Now that is a way to deal with a lack of situational awareness,” he muttered.

           Reyna shot him a look, then her eyes glanced from Thalia to the daughter of Demeter.

           “Oh,” Euna said, like they stumbled upon each other outside an ice cream shop. “Hi Calex, Axel, Praetor chick.”

           Calex gave her an uncomfortable wave and slung his bow over his back. His eyes darted from Thalia, back to Euna.

           Axel nodded his head to her. Then, he registered her shirt was torn open and immediately adverted his gaze. He wanted to scold Calex, but the Brit wasn’t reacting like he’d noticed her tattered state. For a bewildering moment, Axel had to wonder if Calex secretly saw everyone naked all the time. He could imagine Calex’s explanation now, “It’s an Eros thing.”

           Reyna frowned at Euna. “Daughter of Demeter, we came here to talk, as friends and allies. That—” She gestured to the squirming cocoon. “—is a friend.”

           “She’s safer in there,” Euna said, the comment indicating she knew Thalia’s exact identity. “Jack droned on a lot about things he’d like to do to some of the people he doesn’t like. I’ll need him singing soon and, until I no longer need him alive or can focus on shutting him up, she’ll be safer in there.”

           “Euna said she’ll let me keep my tongue if I’m a good boy,” Jack said. The pride with which he said it indicated that he thought he’d earned the appendage.

           “Or,” Calex said, his voice trembling, “We could toss that mad bloke’s head over the side of the cliff there, and we can head topside, out of this nightmare.”

           Axel needed to know how she would respond. He made a mental note to apologize to Euna later and glanced up at her face.

           She shook her head. “No. Jack said you’d come—”

           “Lucky, prophetic guess,” Jack hummed.

           “—and I need your help. Well, really Calex’s help, I think. Though, the two of you are supposed to be here.”

           Calex pressed his lips together in concern.

           Reyna clenched her fist.

           Looking at Euna, something was very clear: she didn’t need saving. Axel wasn’t sure she needed them at all. He puffed up his cheeks and popped them, exhaling deeply. He’d feared she had died in the Labyrinth, and they’d find her corpse. This was no corpse. This wasn’t the Euna he’d first met on the quest to Howe Cavern to save Rachel Elizabeth Dare, but this was still Euna.

           Judging by her resolve—the way she’d casually trapped a girl she had a crush on—Axel knew what was about to happen next. He glanced at the Leonis Caput helm latched to Calex’s belt. The imperial golden gleam made him nauseous still, but he’d need to don it. His eyes trailed to the scythe at Euna’s side.

           Hello Lieutenant, came the cold greeting of Kronos.

           He tried not to flinch and to focus on the tension unfolding before him.

           “Euna, we are here to help you,” Reyna said. Axel got the feeling he and Reyna shared another flaw: they weren’t great at gentle negotiation. “Put Saturn’s scythe down and the Plague Bringer’s head. Leave them here. We can travel back to the surface world. Our other friends up there are in danger. They need our help.”

           Euna looked annoyed.

           As Axel suspected, the daughter of Demeter had probably zoned out while Reyna was talking and just realized she was expected to respond.

           “Euna…” Calex said.

           Euna’s eyes flashed over to him, then returned to Reyna. “You don’t want me taking a piece of Kaos,” she said. “Backbiter told me.” Euna shrugged. “I’m going to kill your gods, Praetor. I can the others in a bit, but it would be dumb not to do this first.”

           “I’m a protector of New Rome. I can’t let you do that if your intention is to kill the gods,” Reyna said. She took a step forward. Reyna was at a major strategic disadvantage and she knew it.  Euna brought a small army of plants with her, and they didn’t know where else Euna had planted—Pax would laugh at that one—traps.

           Axel grabbed Reyna’s wrist.

           “And I can’t let you stop her,” he said.

           With his other hand, he withdrew his gladius and tossed it to the side. As he’d learned before, the blade wouldn’t help him in a fight against the daughter of war.

           Reyna’s glare was icy. “Axel,” she said. Her muscles tensed under his grip.

           “Mate?” Calex asked warily.

           Axel flicked out the stiletto attached to his wrist: a Mayan weapon, one he hoped the Roman goddess wouldn’t be able to influence or control, especially in the depths of Tartarus. Knife to stiletto: a very intimate fight.

           “What did the gods just do to my little brother?” Axel asked. Tears threatened to choke him when he thought about Pax pinned to The Princess Andromeda’s deck, withering in pain, sobbing, and screaming at Ares, unable to do anything as Axel—his protector, his older brother—lifted Pax’s head up to execute him. The way Pax quieted to spare Axel’s feelings, like getting his own dagger shoved into his throat was no biggie. The way Axel let all of his pride crumble, begging to be Aphrodite’s sex slave in exchange for his brother’s life, only to plea to apathetic ears.

           “I was too weak to dethrone an unjust tyrant,” Axel said, his voice trembling. “If I think someone is stronger than me, strong enough to succeed at bringing justice to the world where I failed, I have no other option but to help that person.”

           “Thanks, Axel,” Euna said, though Axel couldn’t look to see her expression now. “I really don’t want to have to kill the praetor. I know you like her and stuff.”

           By now, his and Reyna’s arms trembled as Axel tried to hold her wrist in place and she tried to withdraw. He thought about their time in the tent, about how she’d almost stabbed him through the heart. He wondered if this would be it, if they’d never get to “spar” again.

           “Attempting to tear off a piece of Kaos could kill her,” Reyna said through gritted teeth.

           Axel didn’t turn away from Reyna when he raised his voice to ask, “Euna, do you accept this could possibly kill you?”

           “Duh,” she muttered dully. For a faint moment, he could imagine Joey scolding her sister for stealing the little sister’s typical response.

           Despite everything, it made him smile.

           Reyna twisted her wrist, breaking his grip.

           She shoved him off.

           Axel took a step backwards, closer to Calex. He kept his stiletto in a defensive position.

           Calex flinched away. “Axel, have you gone mental?!”

           Quite the contrast, Axel felt uncanny clarity. He reached backwards, grabbed the Leonis Caput helm, and slit the tethering off Calex’s bag.

           “Sorry. I’ll be needing this,” Axel said.

           This was the one place they, the Leonis Caput and Axel, might be able to beat Reyna: in Tartarus, away from her mother’s realm, with his master’s blade so close.

           Reyna’s dark gaze flicked from him, to Calex, to Euna. Strands of hair had escaped her braid. Some stuck to her face with the dried blood from the river. Some was caught in the updraft, fluttering around like her purple cloak. Despite all of that, she still looked beautiful. However, with the nothingness behind her, Reyna looked smaller and less prepared than she usually did.

           She had nowhere to go. Strange to be cornered in the middle of an open abyss.

           Reyna exhaled and narrowed her gaze. “Calex, go get Euna,” Reyna said. Axel could see the tension run through her body as she prepared for an attack. They had battled and danced so often, he and the Leonis Caput could practically sense her wind up for a lunge.

           “Yes, Calex,” Axel said, feeling a slight grin tug on his lips as he lifted the Leonis Caput helm back to his face. “Go to the Sickle Wielder.”

 Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed! :D Shit’s getting real!

Footnote:

[1] Definitely still views her as someone who betrayed Luke. Eh, what’s a best friend to do?