Departure
The six of them sat on plastic chairs on the roof of Kjell's workshop,
Carmilla was leaning back in a plastic chair with a small pile of empty glass bottles on the floor in front of her. She waved over Kian, “Hey, kid, want a beer?” he perked up. “Really?” She handed over a bottle to him, he popped the cap off and raised it to his lips as Rosario walked by with a box under his arm, gift wrapped with a bow on it. He snatched the beer out of Kian's hand. “No alcohol until you turn 20. I need to get you back to Vina in one piece so she doesn't kill me.” he frowned and began sulking, walking back to his chair.
Senarre said, “Can we open presents yet, pa?” he turned to Kjell and said, “Can we open presents yet?” In a playful tone, Kjell hobbled out of his chair and said, “Tell you what missy if we all throw a bottle in the air and you can shoot them all before they hit the ground, we can open presents now.” he gestured for everyone to stand up they all obliged each holding a bottle in their hands he said “on three, one, two, three” they all threw the bottles into the air. Senarre rested her hand on the hammer of her revolver and froze for a second, eyes darting between targets. She fired off five shots, and five glass bottles exploded into a shower of broken glass. She uncocked the hammer of the gun and spun it around her finger, “You know I'm too fast for that.” She slid the gun back into the holster inside her waistline. “Time for presents then.”
Kjell walked over to Kian with a large box. “You're the pilot, so I found it fit that you should have this.” Kian opened the box rapidly and pulled out a helmet with goggles that flip down from the forehead. Emblazoned on the side of the helmet were words that read Kian “Shiroi sora” Parker. The helmet had on the side a motif of plants, and two large golden eyes shrouded by darkness. He placed the helmet on his head and flicked the goggles down. The glass was etched with glowing numbers. “What are the numbers and stuff for?” Kjell said, his arms crossed, “The etching updates in real time its a full heads up display bearing airspeed, altitude, and attitude. The back of the helmet has a cable spool in it, a hardline I added to the instrument panel, which lets you connect it for better control over the craft and some of the newly installed subsystems.” Kian grinned, “Why is there a mark on here that says .50?” Kjell smiled, “I told you I added some slight twists on the old girl; she was in need of a refit, and I just took advantage of the fact that she's a yacht and played around with her weight a little bit.”
They all exchanged pleasantries and gifts. Rosario sat on the other side of the building, watching the fireworks in the city, his legs hanging off the side, a beer in his hand. Senarre walked over to a brown bottle in her hands. She sat down next to him, holding out the bottle. He tapped his against hers, “cheers,” they said in unison. “You get any good gifts lorea?” he pulled over a small white box, pulling off the lid. “Chocolate want some?” She picked one out and popped it in her mouth. “This is pretty good, what is it?” he popped one into his mouth. “Toffee.” He handed over a box with a bow on it. “What's this?” he took a sip from his drink. “Present, I didn't give it to you in front of everyone because it's more expensive than what I got for everyone else. Consider it a token of my thanks for watching out for me with the whole nightmares thing. Truthfully, I owe Paulida and you much more than that, but this is the best I can do with the resources available at my disposal.” She unwrapped the box, and inside was a smaller stamped sheet metal box. She pulled it out and ran two fingers along the side. “What's the longer barrel for?” “An integrated suppression device uses wind runes along the interior to assist in the efficiency of baffles inside the barrel, making it whisper-quiet.” There was a small inscription on the side of the weapon that read ”Per garantire la pace, preparatevi al conflitto.” She ran her fingers along the inscription, “What does it mean?” “No clue, the guy who sold it to me said it was a motto of some sort.”
“Nice,” I got you something else, too. “It's not expensive or anything, but I felt like I should give you something as a thanks for the castle shenanigans,” she handed over a small cardboard box. He pulled off the lid and looked inside. He pulled out a pink scarf with pompom tassels. “Look i know it's ugly, but you know I think practicality is better than cosmetics, and since we're heading back north it's gonna be cold again real soon, so I picked something that looks like it's warm.” he wrapped it around his neck “thanks i'll use it tomorrow when we head out since it should only take a day or two to get back north since out coolant lines are fixed”
The six of them stood in front of the former 17-02, the plate that once held the numbers held a new name, “Brujeria”. Kjell scratched his head and said, “I think she needed a name, so I gave her one befitting of what she's become, A witch.” They climbed the scaffolds and went into the main cabin. The control panels had been completely reworked. Kian ran over to one of them “IS THIS WHAT I THINK IT IS?” Kjell smiled and nodded “this is an Empress Heavy industries portable shield generator this thing is expensive as shit, how did you get this thing to run with the power on the system old man?” Kjell stroked his beard “I ran it through the dynamos by supplementing engine power with the mana rich coolant from the system basically the mana rich hot coolant is run through a radiator and the thermal energy recaptured there is used to in turn power the shields but do be warned it's not an infallible system the dynamos on this girl aren't strong enough to support it full time so use it sparingly” Kian ran over and pulled on the helmet and plugged it into a port on the control panel Kjell laid a hand on his shoulder “hit the throttle a lil” Kian flicked some switches and pulled on the throttle lever a whine could be heard from the engines in the back of the ship, “you put a supercharger on them?” the dwarf smiled and led everyone down the stairs leaving kian in the pilots seat examining the buttons.
Kjell pointed to the table “Added compartments underneath allow it to fold out into a reloading bench” he pressed a button and the table opened up he pressed a button and it folded again to its original state “Your records were terribly outdated so i added some new ones to your collection consider it a gift” Paulida pulled one off the shelf and said “Dwarven metal classics?” Kjell laughed and said, “It's a classic, trust me.” he walked over to the hallway that led to the bedrooms. “I reworked the paneling in the walls in the rooms, allowing for a place to store your weapons in the master bedroom.” He walked over to the glass-domed observation window. “Coated it with some anti-shatter sealant and added this,” he tapped his foot on the floor three times, and a small handle popped out of the ground. He pulled on it, and at the same time, two barrels exited the underside of the ship, peeking out beneath the viewport's peripheral ”twin .50 machine guns synced to the pilot's helmet as well as auxiliary control from this handle.” he turned the wheel, and the barrels rotated in correspondence “also added one on the rear of the top deck although it's not optimal to use it in flight but the lock track system means you could if you needed too”
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Everyone climbed back onto the deck. Carmilla and Kjell walked off onto the scaffolds. Paulida tossed over a large duffel bag full of paper money to Kjell. “Thanks for the help.” Kian ran under the deck and started the engines. “Be seeing you then, Kjell. Hopefully, the next time I can stick around longer than a couple of weeks next time.” Senarre and Paulida went back into the cabin after saying their goodbyes. Carmilla said to Rosario, “Be seeing you then.” “You're not coming?” she smiled and said, “I've no business anywhere, so I might as well just stay here.” Senarre's voice shouted from the door, “Lorea, get down here, we're getting ready for takeoff.” he shouted back, “I'm coming, gimme a sec.” he turned back to Carmilla, “If you've no business elsewhere, why not come with us? We don't have a healer in our lineup. “I can hardly be classified as a healer,” Rosario said to her. “You're a doctor, I guess, not sure if a medical license is valid after a hundred years, but I trust you.” A voice shouted from the open door, “Lorea, get in her,e we're moving.” The ship began to lift gently off the ground. “Come with us when this whole thing blows over with Ryvr and the queens guard we can go to the family cemetery, don't know if you're interested, but maybe we can take offerings to your branch on the next Festival of souls,” a voice shouted from within the ship again, “Lorea.” Carmilla smiled and said “you're a persuasive one just like your namesake” she jumped the large distance onto the deck landing on her two feet she turned and waved and Kjell who was now standing on the scaffold alone.
They walked into the cabin Kian was sitting in the pilot's seat. “Air traffic says an electrical storm is rolling in to the north, so I'm thinking we follow the coastline northwards and stop for dinner in Waterfront, and then head inland once the storm passes.” “Why can't we just fly through the storm?” Senarre said Kian, upping on the halfwheel in the pilot's seat, said back without looking at her, “There's no problem with flying through an electrical storm cause now we have shielding, and even if we didn’t, airships usually get struck by lightning in the air. The problem is the electromagnetic interference with the systems. Visual contact only, which inherently wouldn't be a problem if we had a domed cockpit, cause i would be able to see in better angels around us, but i don't, so I need the instruments to compensate for blind spots and i also don't have access to the military lighthouse beacons so playing it safe is better than flying face first into a mountain at 300km/h”
“Let's talk the future then,” Paulida boomed out. “We stop for dinner, then wait out the storm. What after that, I want to put Marw out of his misery, and Lorea likely wants to work towards finding out why he was framed for the mess in Dreynas.” “I think my brother may have spies in Morriak, but it's mostly a university town, so we would have to lay low there's also not likely to be much work in the area, the other choices would be returning to Dreynas which would likely not be ideal due to as of the most recent contact from the city i still have the target of being a number one suspect on my back, I think heading to my brothers territory could be a viable strategy but that would also likely push us farther away from Marw but then again we don't know jack shit about where he's hiding or how to lure him out again, speaking of how'd you find him in the first place Paulida?” Rosario looked over to him. “That man in the tophat appeared to me when we were at the bandit camp, told me he wanted to make a deal, “and what was the deal he was talking about?” Paulida crossed his arms and stroked his chin. “wanted me to kill an undead mage.” Rosario scratched his cheek. “Something doesn't add up. That guy also told Senarre and I that you were in danger, and when she fought him, she said he disappeared into black smoke when she dealt a supposed killing blow. The same goes for when he disappeared at the bar in Forge.” he rubbed his temples. “That means we're likely dealing with a nonhuman humanoid, and he didn't have any beastfolk traits or elven ones, so it means he's likely some sort of Djinn or, arguably worse, an Archdemon.” Senarre cut in, “What's so bad about an Archdemon?” Rosario crossed his arms and said, “Well, the Djinn is the favorable outcome, but the Archdemon approach is what scares me because frankly, we don't know how many there are; most of the ones around now are likely first generation or perhaps directly were around during the Great Demon War, so if we’re dealing with a Archdemon we either target their contract holder assuming the demon is working with someone else in this case i think maybe Marw but i'm not sure why the demon would reach out to us assuming his master is Marw” Senarre looked lost in thought and said out “Hmmm, do you think Senarre slayer of demons or Senarre Devil killer sounds better? I'm trying to figure out a title for after I put that freak in the ground. Also, how do I put him in the ground?”
Rosario frowned and said, “I don't know, none of us are members of the church, much less highly ranked, and even more obscure, none of us are exorcists.” “Judging by your tone, that means we’d have a real hard time dropping him then,” Senarre said Rosario walked over and sat down in one of the jumpseats “preciscely which is why if Marw is his contract holder we kill him and he has no reason to stick around, most demons are notrouiously selfish especially since a lot of them are very much bitter of the fact that they lost the war 374 years ago, killing an undead is just eaiser to kill than an Archdemon” Paulida interjected “alright weve lined up a target but how do find it” Rosario rubbed his chin “We could head north to after Waterfront to Quercus i could try to leave a deadrop there asking my brother for information to see if any of his spies have a bead on Marw” Senarre looked at him curiously “Why would you brother have a bead on an undead mage” “Because part of his His duties as first fleet commandant admiral were to manage intelligence gathering in his faction, but he adopted a more unconventional strategy, he has a knack for sniffing out powerful mages and warriors and half of the charisma needed to win them over to his side, but thats irrelevant if hes intending to go to war hes probably looking for powerful soldiers if any of his spies have found a powerful undead mage they would likely relay the info back to him as a potential candidate”
“Alright then, that settles it. Well, head for Quercus after Waterfront and probably have to wait a couple of days there to get a response back.” Paulida turned to Rosario, “Lorea, I want you to also ask your brother if he has any information about your situation when it comes to clearing your name.” Rosario nodded and said, “Will do.”