“Fire.” Kassandora did not even bother maintaining War’s Orchestra as she watched her rank of tanks open fire. They were organised in three ranks, with a gap large enough in between the individual vehicles of each rank for a full platoon of soldiers to comfortably fit in between. Those men had taken position and were waiting for the horde to either thin out or close in before they started shooting. The first rank fired and Kassandora watched the endless horde from ahead be submerged for a moment in the vicious orange and black fires of explosion rather than the stable red and orange fires of brought forth by magicians.
The second rank fired just as a soldier caught up to Kassandora. A messenger from the rear lines that were linked up with landlines and electricity cables and had train connections. A camp had been constructed at the closest intersection of two Dwarven tunnels and turned into a fortified supply base in case the troops needed a place to retreat to. Some people said fortifications were worthless things to have and always had been, Kassandora considered herself almost in that camp. Almost. One could wax poetic about costs and maintenance and everything but try assaulting a dwarven hold. Ultimately, there was a reason to fortify.
The third rank fired, Kassandora had managed to trim the fat off the battlefield code of conduct that now, she did not even need to call upon War’s Orchestra to keep her men organised under the chain of command. They just kept their professionality and kept on firing at the endless horde of Tartarus coming from ahead. It looked endless at least, eventually this wave would crash upon the cliff of lead and steel that was the Imperial Army and be cast back into the endless ocean of darkness from whence it emerged. The soldier by her side saluted and Kassandora supposed it would be unprofessional to put him off any longer.
The first rank fired again. Once again, the world shook. Once again, flame and explosion tore apart the demons ahead of them and forced the tide back for just a moment. The messenger saluted his Goddess, his Goddess saluted back. He passed the letter from his hands to Kassandora. It was enclosed with the Imperial seal.
The second rank fired again and once again, the demons of Tartarus screamed out. The overlapping sound of hoof and boot and everything else that made up an advancing army began to crack and transform from a low rumble into rapid drumming instead. They were beginning to run out of steam.
The third rank fired again. She looked at the letter from Arascus. The unbroken wax seal said it was real, whereas seals were far from impossible to forge or circumvent, they were so rare nowadays that it only someone close to Arascus would know the God of Pride still used one. She cracked it open, red and sighed. Just as she had come back down here, she was getting recalled back up to the surface. Iliyal was being sent down to take her place, although it was only for a while.
It better be important.
“Can she do a pirouette?” Helenna asked as she shamelessly poured herself a full cup of wine, her hair went from an annoyed shade of green to . They were getting to the end of the movie, although it still didn’t have a name. That could be put off infinitely though, there had been some argumentation with members of the Imperial Bureau of Culture about this, for how could they properly advertise and prepare the public for a movie they didn’t know the name of? Helenna had always rolled her eyes at that, they would not be coasting off some title, they would be coasting off the fact that it was the personal work of the Goddess of Love.
“What about a barrel roll?” Malam asked, just as shamelessly emptying half a glass of vodka into an oversized mug. Helenna had more or less worked out the woman’s tolerance at this point, as long as she was contained to a bottle every ninety minutes then she would just be pleasantly jovial. Any more than that and she would start being openly drunk and any less would result in her annoying fucking whining about needing a drink. Helenna, without a shred of shame, looked into her own oversized cup of red wine and took a sip. Delicious.
The two pilots of the Raptors turned and looked at each other. Both of the men sat in the flight suits Helenna had personally designed for them. Both with a fashionable leather coat that she had hand-sewn, both with collars of real fur. Both with tall military boots and both with sunglasses that brilliantly reflected the sunlight. They lounged in chairs next to cameras as the rest of the film crew organised the scene. Men and women rushed around on the airstrip Olonia had happily loaned to Helenna. It was some old thing that would have been abandoned anyway, a temporarily set of ugly concrete structures that the film crew had spruced up into looking like the sort of military base Kassandora would scoff at. The buildings were too tall, they had too many lights upon them, too many flags and most importantly there were too many workers. One did not realise how empty bases felt even when they were full. When all the soldiers were in their barracks, there was little difference to a ghost town with guards.
“I think that’s impossible.” Douglas replied and looked at the huge plane. Helenna and Malam, who stood tall over the two men, turned with them. Helenna sipped her wine as she looked at that monstrous abomination of technology that no one could really figure out. Even the platoon of engineers that Helenna had brought in from the military to do maintenance on the vehicles were only here to load it with fuel and re-arm after scenes of it performing live-fire.
It was always like this. Helenna would make a suggestion, one of the pilots would predictably try and argue and claim there was absolutely no way it was possible, and eventually they would acquiesce. “I’ve seen it do pirouettes already.” Helenna’s fists landed on her hips as a young girl came with a bottle of wine from the pantry, opened it, and left it by the one Helenna was drinking.
“And barrel rolls.” Malam echoed and then took a swig from her cup. She slammed it down on the table to say it was empty. The man in a red shirt assigned to refilling her drinks looked to Helenna. The Goddess of Love shook her head, not yet. He had poured Malam far too much that time and the Goddess of Hatred was an endless hole for alcohol.
“But I don’t know how I do them.” Douglas said and Helenna raised an eyebrow. What a fucking pilot. Before her, some of the other actors were in formation on the runway as one of the photographers was taking heroic images of them walking down the tarmac with the endless blue sky above them. Everyone was beginning to feel the beginning of the end approaching now that they were filming the climax.
“What do you mean you don’t know how to do them?” Helenna scowled.
“Exactly young man, tut-tut-tut.” Malam said so unseriously that even the film crew laughed. She wagged her finger at the two pilots sitting on their chairs.
“Shut the fuck up.” Helenna said. From the moment she called Malam, she knew that the woman would be terribly annoying and she had resolved not to acting high and mighty just because there were humans about. “Now why do you not know how to do a barrel roll? We have it on film already. You just do this.” She mimicked making a tight turn with a steering wheel.
The two pilots looked at each other. Douglas made a stupid smile. “It’s this.” He said and mimicked pulling on a stick between his legs.
“I don’t care what shaft you’re holding onto in there as long as you fucking spin it around.” Helenna said and Malam burst out in laughter. The immediate assistants to the two Goddesses did too and some of the technicians working on an arm which was supposed to hold a camera in place looked up to see what the noise was about. Helenna’s hair went to a glorious red when she saw that even the two pilots liked her joke.
“But we can’t.” The other pilot, Erik said. He spoke in a far more diplomatic tone.
“Why can you not exactly?” Helenna asked.
“Because the planes aren’t built for that.” He replied. “It’s just impossible. You give that to any theorist and they’ll just say that the plane will rip apart.” Helenna looked to Malam. The neatly styled eyebrows above those pitch-black eyes inclined themselves up. The face that was as pale and perfect as polished marble, framed by snow-white hair smiled hopefully. Helenna made a tiny inclination towards the man. That was the call for assistance from the other Goddess.
And Malam took it wholeheartedly. “Aren’t you a pilot?” The Goddess of Hatred asked, her voice slow and inquisitive as if she was just confused.
“I am.” Erik replied immediately. Helenna noticed he didn’t meet Malam’s eyes.
“How do you like your job?” The man blinked, looked to the other pilot and Douglas shrugged. The fair on his leather coat bounced with that shrug as the film crew in the immediate vicinity began to pretend not to be interested in what was happening.
“I’m…” Erik stammered out. “I apologize but you can’t fire me.” He said.
“I can.” Malam declared. “Do you think Kassandora would take your word over a sibling’s?” She let the question hang for a few moments. “But I’m not going to fire you boy, I’m just asking, do you like your job?”
“I do.” Erik said.
“And you?” Malam asked the other man.
“I do.” Douglas replied.
“What do you like about it?” Malam asked, although it was a rhetorical question. “Because it must be good, you’re such manly men, you’re here, girls swoon over you, I wonder which of my little alcohol enabler servant girls you’ve not slept with yet.” Helenna’s hair turned pitch black. This is why Malam was only pulled in when she had nothing to say. When the woman started speaking then it was apparently her mission to hit as many targets as possible. The man who was tasked with refilling her alcohol only looked as if he wanted to be anywhere but here. “It’s prestigious, isn’t it? You two are just great hunks. I’ve seen you on the news, so cool and mysterious.” It was obviously sarcastic with the way Malam spoke. “After all, pilots are very manly men, they’re not weak-willed skinny limp-wristed nerds who will sit here in clothes their mother has sewn for them and talk about how things are theoretically impossible.” Helenna wished she could control her emotions and that her hair did not turn pink with embarrassment. She was not their mother!
One of the pilots coughed in embarrassment. The other’s cheeks went as red as a tomato. Malam kept on going. “So if you’re going to sit there so smugly and talk to me about theory then you can leave my filmset.” Helenna saw strands of her hair turn red. It was her filmset, not Malam’s! “Because I want proper inspiring pilots who are the sort of manly men that will hold up the fucking sky if told to because that’s what pilots do. They don’t fucking sit here, put on their glasses, put a finger up.” Malam mimicked the motion and raised a finger. “Erm excuse me this action you’re telling me that I’ve already done, please consult the theorists.” And Malam returned her tone to normal. “Understood?”
The two pilots were obviously embarrassed about what had just transpired. The film crew went silent. Helenna silently reminded herself that she should have not asked Malam for help. She thought of what to do about this silence. Ultimately though, a little bit of embarrassment would do well to remind the men their place. She had been too nice to them recently and now they were getting openly argumentative. “It’s not that.” Captain Erik finally spoke up. “The plane does it itself. I know we’re in there and I know we’re piloting, but we’re not…” Erik stammered out.
“It just does it itself. I know when a turn is too tight but I just feel like I can do it. In training we fly slower than in open battle. I don’t know why that happens but it does. She exceeds her specifications when there’s danger about.” And he shrugged. Helenna had mandated that the planes be called She
rather than It to work along with the ultimate reason for this entire escapade, which was to deify them.“Once we put in a new type of fuel and it would not start at first, but then it just did.” Erik interjected sadly. This was one of the pilot’s favourite stories that they always mentioned. Malam looked to Helenna. Helenna looked to Malam. Maybe the Goddess of Love was being stupid, she thought she was. Kassandora would probably be able to break these men into doing what she wanted. Love did not operate that way though, when Love saw a solution then Love charged at that solution with all its might. Plan B and C and D did not exist in matters of romance. And Helenna saw the solution immediately.
“We put them in real danger.” Helenna said and Malam smiled.
“What about Neneria?” Malam asked.
“She would never.” Helenna said. “And she’s in the underground.” For now at least, the woman would have to leave sooner or later.
“She has a ghost dragon apparently.” Malam said. “That would make a good showpiece.”
“It’s not about the showpiece. We want the focus to be the planes.”
“Elassa then.”
“It’s about the payoff!” Helenna shouted. “Not about that! It’s not some spectacle and we have spectacle enough already!” And her mind started to work as she angrily shouted. The film crew around her started to slowly peel away, the pilots who must have been used to Divines at this point just kept on sitting on their chairs. Douglas brought out a cigar case and offered one to Erik.
“Then what do you want?” Malam asked.
“Elassa will make the scene about herself, as will Neneria. People won’t be awed by the Raptors, they’ll be awed by the disaster.”
“Mmh.” Malam said. “How troublesome.”
“How troublesome indeed.” Helenna agreed. She had planned for the film to be a semi-documentary. How could they not have a payoff? Unless it wouldn’t? Already it was strongly implied in the film that the planes were Divine, only an idiot would miss the subtext. They could…
It was a damn disaster they did not have anymore footage of the Raptors during Anarchia’s assassination. Or during the Epan war. Or during the Kirinyaan invasion. Helenna shot her shot. “Kassandora doesn’t have footage of Anarchia’s battle, does she?”
Malam snorted in humoured contempt. “Do you even know my sister?” She asked and tapped the mug. “Pour me a drink little alcohol-servant man-boy.” From the look on his face, Helenna saw that was more offensive than if Malam had just called him a slur. Helenna gave permission and the man poured as Malam kept on talking. “Of all people, you Helenna should know that my sister can be summed up in three Ps. Prepared, Proactive and Paranoid.”
“That’s a yes then?” Helenna said.
“I’m more baffled as to why you haven’t asked yet.” Malam said.
“Is that a yes or a no?!” Helenna’s hair went black as demanded an answer.
“She has it all in professional video.”