Singing Sea, ?a?p?ra?l, Janarch, 9158

  The songs sung by the leviathans of the deep soothed the tautest of nerves.

  For who was strung tighter than a warrior or a soldier on the eve of battle?

  Especially, a battle with limited intelligence from a source of dubious provenance.

  One of the many pantheons of so-called gods across the spires worlds.

  One that they had skirmished with from the moment a Terminus world had been opened.

  It was for a foothold on this world that the leaders had risked moving on not much more than a few recordings and promises bound by oath and contract that they weren’t certain could be enforced.

  Orulon strode briskly through the narrow corridors of the Akuthan.

  He allowed the song from outside the ship to pass through his defense and linger, slowly, but noticeably taking away the nervousness.

  The leviathans sang in sadness for the sacrifice of their kin, but also with joy at the honor in service of ancient Akuthan.

  The venerable leviathan could continue to swim both sea and sky in a sort of half-life for thousands of years until the inexorable march of time brought him to a true end and the unknown realm beyond.

  The song pierced through the skin and flesh in a way impossible with any other material. For it touched upon and traveled through ways beyond the physical.

  The crew he encountered made way for Orulon, pressing backs against the walls. Punching fists to hearts with more vigor and solemnity than they had for their own captain.

  He ignored them as was proper.

  The thrumming beat of Akuthan’s heart reached him before he saw the massive organ.

  Dark red and slick with life-giving gel, it pulsed much slower than his own engine of life.

  The captain’s chambers lay nearby so that the ranmerbalaen singer could cultivate her bond with the Akuthan even in her sleep.

  The door slid open before he could announce his presence.

  “Enter, Benedine Orulon.”

  The captain, who was also the commander of the Quest, was a short, curvy, yet powerfully built woman in the height of her youth.

  Appearances were deceiving.

  Orulon had read the captain’s files.

  He knew that she was ancient. Well-beyond what was naturally possible for his people. A gift from the ship and her class.

  “Benedine,” a truly young man pounded fist to heart. “I am Adjutant Singer Pavoron. My honor to greet you.”

  Orulon returned the greeting and followed the adjutant into the captain’s chamber.

  Downright sprawling for its kind within the half-living ship.

  Almost as large as his own.

  Past the entry way was a small kitchen. Then a small dining area with a molded set large enough to fit four comfortably. The living room doubled as another command center judging by the round command console in place of the tables or entertainment centers he had seen on other ships.

  Granted, he had never been on a Ranmerbalaen ship before the Akuthan.

  Perhaps, their captains aspired to be greater.

  He supposed they did have a greater responsibility in honoring the sacrifices of so many.

  There were so few half-living ships that he would devote every bit of his being had he been captain out of fear of failing to live up to everything that their creation involved.

  The adjutant was a Lume. Skin the color of an early morning after the dawn with just a little cloud cover diffusing the sun’s rays.

  In contrast, the captain belonged to the Teneb half of their people. Her skin was pure. The color of the darkest night. One underneath thick cloud cover to block out the light from the stars and their homeworld’s triad moons.

  “Please sit,” she gestured to the empty table. “Refreshments? Snacks?”

  “I shall accept whatever you deem best, Captain Ealal.”

  “Spirits have little effect on your blessed constitution, correct?”

  “Natural spirits affect me not. It varies with enchanted or magical ones and those created with powerful Skills.”

  “Adjutant, please bring us a bottle of the Evergreen Dream and three glasses.” The captain sat across from him. “A creation of a distant relative of mine. Done purely without Skills or spells or esoteric abilities. Small batch on account of lesser demand. She’s gotten bored in her old age. The creeping song of mortality takes her back to the days when levels were low and Skills were weak or nonexistent.”

  “I’ve seen the same in my relations and other associates.”

  “We share a different experience to the vast majority of our people. Mine through my bond with Akuthan and you with your blessing.” The captain smiled. “Twice blessed. One in a million. Father a Lume and mother a Teneb. The perfect joining of our people’s two halves.”

  He caught his reflection in the glass wall behind the captain.

  Left half colored as the height of day without a cloud in the sky. Right half the color of night blanketed by the thickest clouds.

  One a million.

  Almost a taboo.

  But not forbidden.

  For their society craved the powerful offspring.

  “And such a power you possess.”

  “As you said, I’m blessed. And I never take that for granted.”

  “May I ask you a question? Understand, I ask this of everyone of your kind I’ve met.”

  “You’re my commanding officer for this Quest.”

  “Would you rather a class?”

  Orulon answered without hesitation for he had pondered that in is youth when those with classes grew in reliable, measurable ways while his growth was slow and erratic without the easy, clear markers of leveling up.

  “No. There have been no masters of weather in our recorded history that can approach my power and I am still young.”

  “Truth.”

  Pavoron returned with the bottle, which wasn’t green.

  The captain chuckled.

  “She named it after the scent of the trees near the ancestral family estate up in the mountains. The northern portion of the Caskarge Range.”

  “I’m familiar.”

  “Good. I prefer intelligent and professional subordinates who do not allow pride and status to take precedence over the only thing that matters.”

  “The Quest must be completed,” he agreed.

  The adjutant poured a glass of the clear spirit.

  Orulon received it with thanks.

  He swirled it to release the aroma and took it in deeply.

  “It does smell of those trees.” He let it linger. “I understand Evergreen, but what of the Dream?”

  “The dream of dawn in one’s twilight.” Captain Ealal raised her glass. “To a successful Quest.”

  The three clinked glasses and sipped.

  “Refreshing,” he said. “It reminds of the tea brewed with those needle like leaves.”

  “Among her ingredients,” she shrugged. “I see the value in a return to basics. To the purity of simplicity. But… I have to say I prefer the ones that taste like my dreams.”

  “There’s this one my mother keeps for special occasions,” Pavoron chimed. “A small sip always takes me back to the earliest giving day I can remember and the artifact my parents gave me.”

  “Which was?” Orulon said after a silent moment.

  “The complete starter set of Battleborn.”

  “Ah!” he smiled at the adjutant, grasping at the commonality. “What factions did you get? My first set was the Siege of Captrilon. The Maleri Reavers versus the Song Ladies of Ranmerbalaen Gratharana.”

  Pavoron’s smile grew wider at the knowledge that such a blessed individual played the same game in his youth.

  “I had the Alliance of Lud versus the Torruk Horde.”

  Captain Ealal snorted. “Youth…”

  Orulon and Pavoron looked at her expectantly.

  She waved it away. “Don’t let this ancient hag burst your happy little bubbles.”

  Pavoron cleared his throat and glanced at him as if looking for support.

  “Please do so, captain. We are subordinate.”

  She sipped and grinned.

  “That game takes heavy liberties with historical truths. The Maleri Reavers were barely-literate and half-starving not a pack of dreaded pirates. The Gratharana had one singer and she was a he three-quarters of the time. I don’t know enough about the Lud to comment. The Torruk do not, as a whole, horde. Not since their prehistoric days. They’ve taken great pains to avoid that since then.”

  “How do you know this, captain?” Pavoron said.

  “I read primary sources. I’ve spent time with Torruks. And Akuthan was young when Gratharana was ancient. He knew and remembers.” She ticked each point off with her fingers.

  They sipped and talked.

  “If I may, Benedine?” Pavoron said.

  “Yes?”

  “Command didn’t inform us of your, er, conveyance to the Akuthan…”

  “I swam.”

  The young adjutant’s eyes widened with an unspoken question.

  The captain showed no reaction.

  “Within a bubble of air and wind for thrust,” he explained. “Failing that, I could always simply hold my breath and swim the natural way. My strength of body is sufficient to reach these depths.”

  “The sea life didn’t bother you?”

  “They are little threat. But, the ship that brought me above had singers to sing for unimpeded passage. The ranmerbalaen pod that rules this region kept the path to your ship clear. Truthfully, the singers need not have expended their energies. The pod is familiar with me from my seasonal storm work.”

  Naturally, that mention prompted more questions from a curious mind.

  Orulon had no issues sharing.

  He suspected that the captain had read his file as thoroughly as he had hers and this was partially for the benefit of her adjutant.

  Building networks and such.

  He was familiar with the practice and begrudged it not.

  Thus, he described what he did all over the world.

  His primary purpose when not called upon to battle the more powerful invader or wandering monster was to manage the weather.

  It was a delicate operation.

  He could not simply alleviate drought in one region by creating rain lest he create drought in another region. Stop rains in the Iyaniar Basin region before they flooded the lakes, rivers and delta cities and towns, but create a more powerful hurricane for the Saw-teeth Archipelago on the other side of the Wildstorm Ocean from the moisture carried over. Weaken that hurricane and create a hyper-strength one at the end of the season from the accumulated energy that wasn’t expended.

  It was a delicate balance.

  Like a spider’s web.

  Touch one strand and create vibrations that erupted in unexpected ways all the way on the other side.

  He had found it best to not stop the weather, but rather manage it.

  Slow the rains in wet areas to prevent flooding. Take the remnants to dry areas and allow it to slowly alleviate the drought. Guide life-altering hurricanes out to empty oceans or land. Control fires to allow renewal, but not devastation.

  “It’s a delicate balance to maintain between the natural world and our people.”

  “So when a weather mage turns back a hurricane…”

  “I work to minimize negative impacts elsewhere.”

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  “Really? So it’s true when they say that a larflan flapping its wings on the Drapine Plains causes a thunderstorm to blow through Talvarn.”

  “I can’t say that I’ve observed that specific occurrence.”

  Captain Ealal tapped her glass.

  “Adjutant get my General’s Game, please.” She poured him another. “Are you familiar?”

  “I don’t remember the last time I played. But, I have played it enough to still remember the rules.”

  Pavoron returned with a battered wood box.

  Part board, part carrying case for the small, metal L-shaped pieces.

  Half white and half black.

  Old paint chipped to reveal the steel beneath.

  “Ah—”

  “Never played with the physical game?”

  “No, captain. Only on a holo-table.”

  “This is an ancient family heirloom.” She gestured proudly at the chipped wooden board. The square was a grid of smaller squares. Eight by eight for a total of sixty-four. “Thousands of years old.”

  He wondered about that.

  If it was indeed an ancient heirloom he doubted that it’d be allowed out of a vault and onto a ship headed for deadly combat on another world.

  Not that he intended to impugn the captain’s honesty.

  She could simply be mistaken.

  Perhaps the result of an apocryphal family tale passed down through the generations.

  Then again, she was almost 300 year’s old.

  “Would you like to play in the original way?”

  “I’m not familiar.”

  “The holo versions include an automated, impartial referee.”

  He nodded.

  She pointed at Pavoron.

  “Our referee.”

  He didn’t quite follow.

  The referee’s only job was to look at the pieces as they killed one another to determine which left the board.

  The holo versions showed a short, animated battle as the higher ranked piece killed the lower ranked one.

  He supposed he’d just have to use his imagination with the captain’s ancient set.

  “I have no issue.”

  The captain tutted.

  “In the original version of the rules the referee wasn’t necessarily impartial. It was meant to mimic true warfare where there were rules… but not really.” She grinned like a land wolf that had just caught the scent of a lost grelding.

  “I see…”

  It was a lesson then.

  From an old soldier to a young one.

  Not just a game for fun and time wasting.

  “I’m your guest. I’m in you hands.”

  “The old way it is! Don’t worry! If it’s not to your liking we can play with the child rules!”

  Tokyo, Japan, November 2056

  Hiroki stood behind his ramen stand, going through mental checklist.

  Three nights a week and one Saturday.

  Same as always.

  He had a prime spot outside the combined government and self defense force HQ.

  Had it for close to five years.

  Won a lottery and somehow kept winning each it year.

  He liked to think that it was the quality that kept people coming back.

  Some regulars he saw every night.

  There was pride in that.

  To know that those responsible for the nation’s continued survival came to him for dinner each night.

  A smiling foreigner waved behind the line painted on the sidewalk.

  There were more of those in recent days.

  Some came from an ambassador’s team, while others came from those flying ships that passed through.

  The one somewhere above the city at the moment had stayed longer than ever before.

  At least that was the gossip he got from his diners.

  Checklist completed, he beckoned to the first people in the growing line with a greeting and a bow.

  They were rangers judging by their attire, probably as security for that ambassador.

  Form-fitting dark gray clothing with sleek armor covering their torsos.

  He guessed that the small bags around their waists held weapons and more armor.

  He looked at them wistfully for a moment.

  So small and sleek.

  His only bag of holding was an old camping backpack that was starting to fray.

  Not that he minded the repair and re-enchantment costs since it had belonged to his mother.

  It was one of the last few precious items he still had from his dearly-missed parents.

  The pretty, young woman waved again and smiled wider.

  “Thank you for the meal!”

  He blinked.

  Ah, yes!

  The automatic translation system had its quirks.

  The old man with the young woman cleared his throat.

  “Slow, I think you’re supposed to say that after you eat.”

  “Oh! What was the phrase we’re supposed to say before?”

  “I think it’s…” the old man nodded at Hiroki. “Apologies in advance if I screw it up, but I believe it’s ‘itadakimasu’.”

  “Very good! You said it perfectly!”

  Indeed, Hiroki had heard it as if another Japanese had spoken the word.

  There wasn’t that obvious, but nebulous sense of wrongness with an automatic translation.

  “I humbly accept!”

  The young woman tried and that’s what mattered.

  “What would you like?”

  Her eyes widened.

  “But, I heard you only make one thing?”

  He grinned.

  “You heard correctly.”

  They shared a laugh.

  “I’ll have one of that!”

  “Same for me, please.” The old man nodded before taking a seat at the small counter.

  “Right away!”

  Hiroki got to work.

  It was really more of an assembly operation.

  He had done most of the cooking down at the old restaurant kitchen just across the street behind him.

  Most of the stall operators did the same since there were plenty of unused restaurants that the government maintained if only to keep them from turning into monster spawners.

  Broth, noodles, braised pork belly and a few vegetable things for garnish.

  Only the noodles needed actual cooking at his stand.

  “Itadakimasu!”

  The young woman got it on the second try.

  “Enjoy your meal!”

  He handed the second bowl over to the old man before beckoning the next person in line.

  The work was comforting to Hiroki.

  Practiced, automatic.

  He listened to his diners conversing in between slurps, listened to the quiet of the encroaching night.

  The day had been sunny, but the temperatures had been cool, which made for a pleasant outdoors.

  The old grandpas and grandmas had always reminisced about how different it had been in the past.

  The empty streets of today packed with cars.

  People crowding the sidewalks going from their offices to dinner only to return to work instead of going home.

  It sounded like a hellish existence.

  Broken old salarymen pining for the days and nights when they worked nearly everyday of the week for twelve to sixteen hours. After which they had to go drinking with their bosses until late into the night only to wake up at before the dawn to repeat the process.

  It was a reminder that his existence was quite good despite his inability to pursue his true dream.

  The clang of his left leg against a spare gas tank reminded him of that.

  It also caught the young ranger woman’s attention.

  “Um? Excuse me? Do you have a metal leg?”

  He grinned sheepishly and felt his face grow warm.

  His greatest shame, yet for some reason he stepped back to let her see as he lifted his pant leg.

  “Oh? I see.”

  She looked perplexed for a moment, then her brows furrowed in what he thought was anger.

  “Leave him alone, Slow,” the old man said.

  Hiroki sensed the other diners, his regulars, bristle, ready to jump to his defense for some reason.

  “Why does he have an old fake leg when all those cyborg soldiers have all their robot limbs?” the young woman jabbed chopsticks at the old man. “Tell me that, Grandpa?”

  This confused Hiroki.

  The two didn’t at all look related.

  One had long, blond hair and fair skin while the other was black and bald.

  “You’re my senior, but maybe it’s a culture thing?”

  Another bit of confusion.

  The old man had said that.

  “Well, we should ask.”

  “If it’s not offensive.” The old man looked to the other diners then to Hiroki.

  “What is there to ask?” he replied with a smile.

  “I’ve seen their armories,” the young woman said. “They have a lot of cyborg parts just laying around.”

  “I’m sure the JSDF needs to save those for the brave ones that defend us.”

  “They have literal rooms full. They’re not going to run out if they give you one. Doesn’t even have to be a brand new, top of the line model. They’ve got a ton of old ones just laying around for spare parts.”

  Hiroki shrugged.

  He didn’t really have an answer.

  So, he remained silent and pretended the broth needed seeing to.

  The reprieve didn’t last long as the young woman reached a hand over in a very foreigner way, what with their difficulty at respecting his reserve and personal boundary.

  “I’m sorry, I never introduced myself.” She continued to hold her hand out with a wide smile. “Ranger Slowtime, but my real name is Laker, you can call me Lake.”

  The other diners looked mortified for him, but she was pretty and she looked to be about his age, so as a young man he was obligated to make physical contact.

  “Lake-san.” He shook her hand with a limp grip because he suddenly realized he didn’t know how to shake a woman’s hand. “I am Ando Hiroki.”

  “Oh! I know this! So, that means I call you Hiroki-san?”

  He nodded.

  “Awesome!”

  “This is Ranger Grandpa.”

  Ah!

  A proper man’s handshake.

  Familiarity brought comfort at the uncomfortably forward interaction.

  “Don’t be insulted, he’s paranoid about the whole real names thing.” Lake rolled her eyes. “He’s my rookie!”

  “Interesting?”

  “Not much to say about that,” Ranger Grandpa said. “My wife died a few years back. Our kid’s old. Grandkids are having their own kids. Don’t think they need much from an old man like me. Was a pretty good athlete back in high school and college before the world went to crap, thought I’d do something active and give back to the rangers.”

  “So, you joined an elite fighting force?” Hiroki felt that there was much missing in the old man’s story.

  “At my age? Sure!” The old man had an easy laugh that Hiroki couldn’t help but like. “But, the spires giveth even as they taketh away. Got a few Skills to help with the old man body. Recapture High School Glory Days and Recapture College Glory Days. Had to go heavier on the body enhancing passives though. Since the boosts are multipliers. With all that, I can be beyond what I was back then. For a time.”

  Hiroki nodded at the pride and wistfulness in the old man’s words.

  He had been obsessive with how much stronger Skills could make him back in his younger days before the terrible loss killed his dream.

  Sometimes he missed searching and plotting out those synergies.

  Not that he didn’t do so in the present.

  Taking his ramen cooking to its heights just didn’t quite ignite his passion in the same way.

  “It must be hard taking orders from those young enough to be your grandchildren.”

  “Not really. I’m having too much fun feeling like a young… er… younger man again.”

  “Then, I’m happy for you.”

  “What about you? That’s got a story.” The old man nodded at Hiroki’s metal leg. “If you’re okay sharing. I don’t want to pry like my senior here.”

  “Don’t make me mark you up, Rookie Grandpa. But… I would like to hear your story, Hiroki-san,” Lake said. “If it’s okay with you.”

  “There’s not much to it.”

  He told them.

  Easier with foreigners than his people.

  Whether his regular diners or those in his neighborhood.

  For some reason, the shame of it wasn’t present with the two rangers.

  It wasn’t a particularly special story, nor a rare one.

  A young man a few weeks shy of his eighteenth birthday.

  Monster attack.

  Some would say he had been lucky to only have one leg slowly eaten by the tentacled monster.

  He had even passed out so he hadn’t seen and felt it unlike the others with him that night.

  When he had woken up a beautiful shinigami with long hair as white as the moon’s light stood over him with her soul slayer drenched in the monster’s vivid ichor.

  “That’s rough,” Lake said. “What I don’t get is the matter of your missing leg and foot. Back home you’d have gotten your pick of replacements practically right away. Well, except for a full regrowth. There’d be a waiting list for that in the event of a mass casualty event. Not that many healing types that can do that more than once or twice a day. Then there’s their recovery time to factor in. But, if you wanted an artificial one you could have it as soon as the doctors said you were ready. Days, if not hours. Then you could wait and see if you wanted to do a regrowth. Plus, there’s this woman that does steampunk versions and I think a circle of druids that’ll do nature prosthetics, but they have weird rules you have to follow and you have to be compatible or it won’t work.”

  “Sir, I think he doesn’t need a hard sell,” Ranger Grandpa said.

  “Point is, Hiroki-san, you can take a quick vacay to sunny So Cal and get a much better prosthetic than that ancient bit of tubes and plastic.”

  “It’s not so bad. The sleeve fits around my thigh, which means there’s no pressure on the bone. My first few ones it sat right on the padding. I couldn’t use it for long without pain.”

  “See!” Lake gestured at him while eyeballing Grandpa. “Why don’t you do that?”

  “Do what?”

  “Go!”

  “I— I don’t know how.”

  How did one travel across the ocean?

  The flying ship?

  “I think I can get you a ride on the Rayna’s Hammer. Not sure when she’ll be flying back though.”

  Hiroki didn’t now what to say.

  The possibility had never occurred to him.

  What she had said about healing sounded legitimate.

  There was a healer in the government’s employ that was capable of regrowing a limb, but she could only do one a week, if the rumors were true, and such a valuable ability had to be saved for more important people than him.

  He could be whole.

  “I… thank you… but I can not pay for this service you offer.”

  “It’s free. At least the basic magitech model. The installer wouldn’t turn down a tip, but it’s not expected. The regrowing thing isn’t free, but there’s a program that’ll pay for it, so it’s basically free.”

  “But, I’m not one of your people.”

  Lake shrugged.

  “Like that matters. Listen, if there’s a problem, I know a guy. My friend’s dad is kind of a big deal.” She nudged Grandpa. “You ever meet Goldenspoon?”

  “I don’t recognize the name.”

  “He’s a childhood friend. Him and his girlfriend. Which is to say, I’ve got connections!” She grinned at Hiroki. “I don’t want to overpromise, but I can’t see any way this doesn’t work out. Tell you what—” She pulled out a sleek device that looked too thin to be a phone like the one in his pocket. “Are you on the Omninet? What’s your Omail? Omessenger?”

  “Um… we can access the Omninet, but we don’t have those other things.”

  She rolled her eyes.

  “Tch… governments. Am I right? Doesn’t matter. Here, hold out your phone.”

  Numbly, as if not in full control of himself he did as Lake asked.

  A beep and a message.

  “There. Just reply and I’ll have your contacts. It’s all up to you, of course. Even if you decide not to, I’ll put in a word with my guy. There’s more people like you, right? Your government being stingy with?”

  He nodded.

  “Dude! It’s messed up that you have to put up with substandard stuff when perfect ones are so easy to get.”

  Ranger Grandpa opened his mouth then shut it.

  Hiroki suspected he knew what the old man had been about to say.

  He wasn’t naive, nor ignorant.

  One couldn’t simply leave the country without permission.