Chapter 309 – Atmospheric Reentry

“I’ve located and marked The Federation’s observer squads,” Lethia declares as the fleet drops from lightspeed a few hundred thousand kilometres from Ulea, her voice coming clearly from the bridge’s speakers. “All of them look to be using rudimentary cloaking tech. It’s nothing to our scanners, but if they put these watches in place to guard against our return…”

“There may be overwatch guarding and using them as bait,” Emily finishes the thought for her, peering over Wilder’s shoulder at his data readout and memorising the four sets of spatial coordinates the synth sends through. “Good job. Mensacus and I will deal with them. Everyone, hold your positions until we confirm it’s safe to approach.”

She turns to her children and apprentices standing at Silvia’s side and gestures Mensacus forward.

“We’ll be back shortly,” she says, casting Blink and carrying the two of them out of the ship.

They reappear in the vacuum, floating in front of what appears to be an empty patch of space. Emily increases the machina flow to her mechanical eye, switching through a few of the filters until a small ship, somewhere between the size of their fleet’s single-pilot fighters and their medium carriers, flickers into clear view. Its outer hull is coated in a layer of tiny, linked screens and cameras playing an active feed from the opposite side of the ship to keep it hidden from the naked eye, and Emily can feel that most of its powered systems are inactive, including its shields, to help it remain undetected.

She reaches for the space inside with barely a thought, stepping forward and pulling her and Mensacus into the ship’s cockpit, where two second stage mechanics are sitting in the control seats, flicking through video feeds showing different scenes of Ulean cities. As the two react to the sudden presence and turn, Mensacus opens his third eye, bathing them in cold light that seeps through their natural mental resistance and ensnares their minds.

The mechanical chimaera begins casting a litany of spells to pry their recent memories from them while Emily releases Harriet and her machina to take over the ship’s systems. It only takes a few moments for her to locate their backlog of files from their spying on Ulea, and she sets several cores to crunch through the data while those remaining continue to look for how they’re reporting their mission progress.

“Mother,” Mensacus says after a few minutes, “their mission is just-”

“Watching the planet. I’m aware. Their mission parameters are logged in their files, and it doesn’t appear that there are any more Federation ships nearby. This is just a low-priority planet watch; they assumed the Heavy-Blade Pirates wouldn’t return.”

“That… makes this easy, no?”

“That it does. I want you to apply a perception lock to those two for now. Have them ignore our presence and continue reporting as usual. I’m having Hariet invade their systems, and I’ll leave her here to make sure none of their cameras collects evidence of our arrival.”

“Understood.”

They complete their task on the ship, and Emily warps them away to the next to do the same. The four watching ships are closer to the planet than their fleet, but still tens of thousands of kilometres apart, so it takes a couple of minutes and a fair portion of her mana to slip between them unnoticed.

They still return to The Mothership less than half an hour after leaving.

“Okay, we’re good to continue,” Emily says the moment she reappears on the bridge. “The ships Lethia found are the only ones, and I’ve got my familiar shielding us from their cameras.”

“You got it, boss,” Wilder chirps, engaging the ship’s thrusters and glancing over his shoulder. “Where do you want us to put her down? We landing or staying orbital?”

“Landing. There have been some… interesting developments since I left, and I think it would do us well to make a show of our arrival. We should head for Chroni – I’m sending through the exact coordinates now – and put The Mothership directly above the palace. Some friends will come out to greet us. Have the rest of the fleet land outside the city, and Lethia, I want you to take The Blade and head to the base where you met me. There are a few there who should be included in what’s to come, and it will speed things up if you could collect them for us. I’ll send Silica to guide you and let you in if they don’t come out to meet you.”

“Understood,” the synth replies without complaint.

Emily turns to her eldest daughter and sets a hand on her head, scratching behind her ears as she prepares a warp spell to send her over.

“You’re looking for Silver and Gem,” she explains, rolling her eyes as the fox tilts her head in confusion.

“The old man, fourth circle water mage, and the fourth circle ice mage with him.”

“Got it!” Silica beams as she vanishes from the bridge.

“You wanna go visit your parents?” Emily asks Pod.

“I think Mum would kill me if I didn’t.” The young man shrugs, though the glimmer of anticipation in his gaze is obvious.

“Okay.” Emily connects to one of the fleet’s medium fighters with a stream of machina. “Slippy, McCloud, I’m sending Pod your way. Take him where he wants to go, please.”

“Someone’s excited to be returning home,” Silvia teases, slipping an arm around Emily’s waist as she finally turns to face the bridge’s canopy, watching the distant planet rapidly growing to fill it. “What did you find that’s got you taking charge with such purpose?”

“A brewing rebellion,” Emily replies with an amused smirk. “It would appear I underestimated the reaction the planet’s highest-circle mages would have to being asked to align themselves under a greater force, though I have a sneaking suspicion it has more to do with how the hunting party that was chasing you introduced them to the idea. We’ll understand better once we have a chance to speak to the leaders of said rebellion, but how would you like to snatch a planet from under The Federation’s nose?”

“Haha, you want us to lay claim to the planet? Despite their apparent refusal of The Federation’s control?”

“I’m not a foreign force.” Emily shrugs. “And maybe. We’ll have to gather more data first, but worst case, if they’re going to start a fight anyway, why not fan the flames a little and help increase their strength? If we can get The Federation to send some high-level combatants or ships to crush them, I’m sure we can make a pretty penny killing or stealing them.”

“You… want to use your home planet as bait? How cruel. What next? Should I be worried about our crew’s safety?”

“Hey, I’m not suggesting we throw them to the wolves or anything: I’m just considering the possibilities if they refuse the price that comes with asking for more direct help. I happen to like a fair few of those living on the planet, but they appear to be pitting themselves against The Federation already, and that’s not a fight even we can win yet while trapped within their territory, as Ulea is.”

“You… have a point.”

“Haha!” Wilder barks with laughter, glancing back with a mad grin as the ship slips into Ulea’s atmosphere, a combination of gases bursting into flames against its barriers. “She’s crazy! I’m glad she’s on our side, right, boss?”

“Exactly.” Emily nods, matching his grin for a moment before turning her attention to Ivor’s conflicted gaze.

“Do you… know where our friends are?” he signs.

“Only Dante and Enzo, and they’ll come to greet us in Chroni the moment news of our arrival spreads,” Emily signs back. “They’re the only ones involved enough in the rebellion for The Federation’s observers to be watching. Juliana was briefly involved, but she stepped away years ago, so I’m unaware of her current location.”

The silent alchemist nods and steps back, chewing on Emily’s words.

The fire covering the canopy finally clears, giving them a clear view of the desert and grasslands stretching out far below, along with a distinct, sprawling mass of silver and grey in the centre of the green patch: Chroni. Emily can see The Glade on several of the ship’s rear cameras, the mass of trees and storm clouds a touch closer to the city than she remembers.

As they approach the city, the fleet’s sensors pick up several pulses of energy dotted along its walls, and they can all see a faint, shimmering barrier wrapping around it, trying to prevent them from getting too close.

“Huh, they’ve upgraded their defences,” Emily mutters, earning a curious glance from the vampire at her side. “I did some work on their barrier the last time I was here, and they certainly didn’t have reinforcement nodes along the wall at that point. I wonder if they found the bypass I added in…”

The ship slows to a halt a kilometre above the highest point of the shimmering dome of mana, and the rest of the fleet spreads out, heading off to touch down and surround the city.

“You certain they won’t fire on our ships?” Wilder questions, flicking through his controls to switch the grav-drive into a mode designed to draw in atmospheric mana and keep them afloat.

“They may consider it,” Emily admits, pushing outwards with her mana and letting her presence wash out through The Mothership and reach down to the palace below. “But I’d hope they know better. I made it clear a long time ago how kindly I’d take to firing upon my ships.”

“Your trading fleet?” Silvia enquires, receiving a brief nod.

“We may not bear the mark I established as my own, but I’d be seriously disappointed if they’ve forgotten my mana signature.” Emily feels several fourth-circle signatures pulse in response from within the palace and smiles, drawing her mana back up to The Mothership alone and using it to whisper questions to the branch-leaders on board. “Looks like I have no reason to complain; we’re being invited in. Wanna join us Wilder?”

“Hell, why not.” The cyborg shrugs, detaching his neural link and pushing himself out of his chair with his metal arms. “Been a while since I stretched me legs.”

Emily reaches out with a wisp of spatial mana to grab hold of him, doing the same with Silvia, Ivor, and her children. Several more strands of mana attach themselves to other crewmates elsewhere in the ship, and with a light tug, Emily warps them all outside to stand in thin air on a platform of her mana only inches from the city’s barrier.

“Let’s see…” Emily crouches down, pressing her flesh hand to the surface of the solidified mana and letting her energy flow through it to the core deep below The Dome. “Ah-ha! There you are.”

She takes control of the array and splits open a crack to lower them down through. She can feel the mana of several mages connected to the defence array’s control core quiver in shock, already halfway to opening the door for them and now searching for her backdoor in a panic.

“Did you just… hijack their barrier?” Elwaine asks, a hint of judgement in their tone as they stare at Emily’s back.

“I was curious.” Emily shrugs. “Besides, now maybe they’ll actually look closely at the improvements I made. I can’t believe they’ve left the areas I worked on alone with all their own recent additions. That’s just careless. Gaius should know better.”

She lowers them down towards the palace’s steps, her mechanical eye scanning across the city and spotting hundreds of civilians staring up at them and the colossal ship high above, some pointing and others ducking into alleys to hide, feeling a mixture of unease and fear.

They touch down at the top of the long stairwell stretching up from the mist to the palace’s large front doors to a familiar sight: Arthur Modo the Second waiting to greet them, his back straight and his chest pushed out proudly. Emily doesn’t need her son to say anything to notice the tension in his shoulders and the caution in his eyes as he takes in their procession, several of them visibly inhuman and nearly all of them stronger than him by a sizable degree. His gaze jumps from Rotwin and Rotlith’s unreadable furred faces to Elwaine’s cold stare and Wilder’s mad grin, before finally reaching Emily, her children, and the vampire smiling at her side, her fangs on clear display.

“Welcome, Emily, it’s been a while,” he finally says, his voice a tad strained despite trying to sound genuine. “We were almost starting to believe you’d abandoned us.”

“You did receive my message, did you not?”

“Yes, but it’s been nearly four years since, and we’ve been a little… on edge since you called attention to our planet.”

“That’s understandable. I’m sure the existence of greater powers was a shock to you. Though, I hope by now that you’ve realised it was an inevitability.” Emily smiles, and Arthur visibly starts, staring for a few moments before letting out a tired, resigned sigh and relaxing the tension filling his body.

“Yes, we have. At first, I admit, many of us blamed you – myself included – but once we got access to The Federation’s Terminals, we realised our induction was guaranteed from the moment you broke this world’s mortal barrier. So, who are your friends? Would you care to introduce us?”

“Proper introductions will come in due course, but surely this is a conversation we should be having at the very least with Gaius and your shadows?” Emily responds, pointedly glancing over the king’s shoulder at the fourth circle mages trying and failing to hide themselves in the darkness at the edge of the entrance hall. “I’ve already sent a ship to collect Silver and Gem from my factory, and I take it you’ve sent word to the rest of your allies to inform them of my arrival.”

“I have, and you’re right, my apologies.” Arthur steps back, giving them a polite nod before turning and gesturing for them to follow. “Please, come in.”

They follow after him, most of the pirates looking around the hall with disinterest, the attempted displays of wealth and rich history paling compared to the things they’ve seen.

“You know,” Silvia whispers into Emily’s ear with a brush of her qi, unheard by anyone else. “I could get used to you handling all our public relations.”

“In your dreams,” Emily responds, raising an unimpressed brow at the woman. “Isn’t it the captain’s job to handle this sort of stuff?”

“Yorn didn’t seem to think so.”

“If you aim to emulate that man in any way, I’m leaving the crew.”

Silvia chuckles silently as they step into the throne room, completely ignoring the stares of the hiding mages following them.