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lily-of-rabanastre · 2 months

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Ascilia, Chapter 15—Scene 01

God, it feels good to be done with this dream sequence. Since I'm a glutton for punishment, I'll immediately begin another. Thankfully that one will only last a single chapter, and will be blissfully free of fight sequences, so I can keep things brief. Anyways, enjoy this teaser. Hopefully I'll have the rest done over the weekend.

As she entered the Founder’s Deck from the Dalriada’s loading dock, Rubedo scanned the area. Though she knew Ahewann was deeper within the airship’s bowels, some part of her hoped she would find him and his captor sooner. But there was no sign of any living creature, only a half-score of unpiloted magitek warmachina—Reapers, Predators, Helldivers, and even one of the Gabriel prototypes, its gilded alloy plating glistening in the deck’s low lighting.

A sense of dread creeped over her as she glared at the unmoving Gabriel, recalling the charges she’d heard had been laid at the feet of Sicinius mal Vellutus—the IVth Legion’s Senior Engineer, and the machine’s creator. The provisional government in control of Bozja claimed that he had used prisoners of war as test subjects, extensively modifying their bodies with magitek and brainwashing them to serve as pilots for his creations. This process had been dubbed ‘hypertuning’ by the Resistance, who also claimed that further modification would transform the victims into hulking monstrosities.

The matriarch Brunyasch had laughed it off. Of course they would levy such ridiculous claims against the man whose genius had laid low so many of their soldiers. But as rumors spread amongst their fellow deserters, and new voices lent credence to the claims through personal accounts, the charges became ironclad proof of the IVth Legion’s corruption and depravity.

“There’s no future for us here,” she’d told Rubedo that last night in Valnain. “Landis, Bozja, Dalmasca—they’ve no mercy left in their hearts. And why would they? If everything they say is true, our souls were damned long ago.”

Quelling the dread in her heart, she turned away. The matriarch had been wrong. Even if no one else in the world could forgive her, Galbana Lily—her sister, her own flesh and blood—had done so. More than that, she had given Rubedo hope that the same held true for others who’d been among her number.

Deeper within she came across another peculiar room. At the far end stood a lengthy terminal adorned with lights and monitors—this was the Dalriada’s central security system, she reasoned. Approaching the terminal, she analyzed the various displays, using what little knowledge she had of such systems to determine what, if anything, she could do with it.

What she managed to find was the Dalriada’s internal layout, down to the finest detail. A product of her sister’s impeccable memory, or so she believed. Along with that, there were unusual readings in a hold much deeper within the airship, in a hold that apparently contained a powerful allagan relic. With this in mind Rubedo deactivated the terminal and glanced about the room, noting two paths leading towards the hold. Picking the one on the right, she marched forward.

Just as she entered the corridor beyond the Dalriada’s security powered on of its own accord, as if the airship itself had determined her to be an intruder. Three laser barricades erected themselves in the path between her and the deactivation mechanism in the room beyond. Two additional lasers, about the size of a magitek reaper’s aether cannon, began powering up. As there was no telling how long it would take for them to fire, she did the only sensible thing and pulled back, only to find that the corridor had sealed shut behind her.

Then, without hesitation, she threw herself down in the middle of the hallway, pressing herself as flat as possible to the cold metal floor.

She counted the seconds before the giant lasers fired, thanking the Sisters when they both narrowly missed her. Pulling herself to her feet, she assessed the situation. She’d counted to six, and though she suspected it would take longer for them to fire, it was better to play conservatively with her “life” on the line.

Rushing forward, she stopped just shy of the first laser barricade and hit the deck, then counted up from six. At eight seconds, the lasers fired—she’d been right. Swiftly getting to her feet, she deftly darted through the first barricade, covering half the distance to the next before hitting the ground again.

She repeated this process again with the second barricade, dropping down right as she exited it to safety, then again just before the third barricade. Finally, after slipping through it, she rushed to the exit and leapt inside. Therein she found two more terminals—the closer of the two was the command console that, from the layout she’d seen, would deactivate the Dalriada’s security.

Though there was no danger present in the room itself, Rubedo hurriedly entered the proper code. After a two second delay, however, the machine spat out an error. Thinking back over the schemata she’d seen, the opposite corridor ended in an identically sized room, which also appeared to serve the same purpose.

At this revelation, she silently swore. No doubt the rooms and their respective consoles were linked. Without someone on the other side to operate their console, access to the hold beyond was nigh impossible. Unless there was a vent she could crawl into, she was trapped.

Just as she began to scan the walls and ceiling, however, she heard a familiar voice over the Dalriada’s intercom. “You there, whomever you are. Follow my instructions. Activate your console on the count of three. One, two…”

A chill ran down Rubedo’s spine as she acquiesced, inputting the command as swiftly as she could. The door to her left immediately slid open, revealing the area ahead of her. On the opposite end she saw a similar looking door do the same, and out from the room beyond strode a figure wearing a pristine white suit of armor marking her as an Imperial Officer—armor that rightly belonged to the Witch of Dalmasca, not the woman wearing it now.

“Name and rank,” her sister’s doppelganger demanded, its face firm in its contempt.

Every creation of Ahewann’s mind they’d met thus far had attacked them on sight. That this one, bearing her own sister’s face, had not done so couldn’t be a coincidence. And so Rubedo stiffened her back and gave a proper salute. It was best to play along for now, or so she hoped.

“Rubedo kir Valnain!” she answered, loud and clear. “Senior Medicus of the IVth—”

“I know which legion you belong to, cur!” the doppelganger spat, coming within striking distance of her. “Gabranth and his mongrels have no place aboard the Dalriada any longer. On what grounds are you here? Answer me!”

Racing for a proper explanation, a thought occurred to Rubedo. All of Ahewann’s previous defenses had been subverted—turned against their master by the demon Alastor. Despite the clear and visible difference between them, they had all converged upon the Tower of Zot, silently impeding her party’s progress.

Yet this doppelganger was different. It was… passably the person it appeared to be, and remarkably reactive to its surroundings.

“Noah van Gabranth has heard of His Excellency Lord Varis’s ambitions,” she began, taking a rather bold risk. “Accordingly, he has dispatched yours truly to serve as an intermediary between the Ist and IVth Legions.”

“And why would he send you?” the doppelganger asked, narrowing its eyes. “Surely Menenius, that Bozjan spy, or Lyon—no, never mind. Just answer the question. The sooner you’re out of my hair, the sooner I can get back to our ‘guest’.”

“Perhaps my voice alone is not enough,” Rubedo suggested, removing her visor. “But makeup aside, surely you remember this face.”

With an audible gasp, the doppelganger stepped back, covering its mouth. “Krjn? What are you—how, why?!”

Rubedo took a moment to unpack that response. It knew her name, and knew the face that name belonged to. It also seemed disheartened to see her in uniform. More evidence supporting one of Mikoto’s observations—like the Tower of Zot’s presence and the macabre museum of her sister’s past, this creature was as much shaped by her party as it was a product of Ahewann’s mind.

Or at least, that was what she’d assumed. But it was dangerous to run off and act on an unproven assumption.

“That is a rather long story,” she admitted, trying to control the conversation. “But there will be time for stories later, dear sister. You mentioned a ‘guest’ just now—might I surmise that they’re the former satrap, Ahewann bin Alzadaal?”

“Former is right,” the doppelganger replied, an air of derision in its tone. “After all, what’s a king without a kingdom?”

Rubedo did her best to hide her discomfort. These were not her sister’s words. But still, such disdain was a topic worth exploring. “His Excellency, Lord Varis, must be pleased with this turn of events. As are you, I take it.”

“After he turned his back on Dalmasca, and handed me over to the Garleans for speaking out against him? You’re damned right—” The doppelganger stopped suddenly, its expression plainly one of confusion and shame. “I… no, I remember… I was exiled. Were it not for Lord Varis taking a liking to me, I wouldn’t even be here today.”

Having dealt with Thavnair’s immigration office after smuggling herself into Radz-at-Han, Rubedo was aware of the law the doppelganger spoke of. In accordance with Garlemald and under the decree of Ahewann bin Alzadaal, all first generation immigrants from Garlean colonies were to be deported back to their respective lands. In practice, however, Thavnair had enabled numerous loopholes to create the illusion of compliance with their own law. And with the Empire’s collapse in the wake of Varis zos Galvus’s assassination, it was swiftly stricken down.

And yet this fictitious creature believed itself a victim of that selfsame policy. More curiously, Rubedo noted, it attributed its current standing to Varis of all people. And it wasn’t difficult to imagine why.

“But now you are the right hand man of our future emperor,” she suggested, following up on a detail the doppelganger mentioned before. Through this, she hoped to bait out yet more information, or perhaps find a new avenue of attack. “You mustn't sell yourself short. No doubt you have earned your place at His Excellency’s side.”

At this praise, however, the doppelganger’s mood only seemed to worsen, its tone a mix of fatigued and embittered. “I am rather good at killing for him, if nothing else. But I digress; Return to your duty, and leave me to mine. I’ve a prisoner to break.”

Rubedo’s muscles tensed up as she watched the doppelganger depart for the Greater Hold. Her sister was a Viera, both young and able. Sneaking after her would be impossible. Still, she couldn’t just let her go. “Hold a moment, sister. I will come with you.”

“Does Lord Varis not require your aid?” the doppelganger asked, glancing back rather hastily.

“His Excellency has the current situation well in hand,” she lied, keeping her expression neutral. While it would certainly make it easier on herself to redirect this creature elsewhere, she wasn’t going to take the chance of it backing up the voidsent Alastor. “In fact, he has given me orders to assist you. My chemist’s handgonne is equipped with a multitude of formulae—with it, I can render Ahewann pliable with the pull of a trigger.”

The doppelganger stared silently at her for a moment. Etched upon its face was a confluence of emotions—confusion and anxiety being chief among them. Once more Rubedo found herself provoked, wondering what elaborate fiction had gone into creating it. Ahewann, Alastor, and their party combined… with such disparate contributors, what would happen should she pull upon the thread of its existence?

“You would bloody your hands for my sake?” the doppelganger asked, breaking the silence.

“Without hesitation,” Rubedo replied. “My sister would do the same for me, after all.”

There was a peculiar shift in the doppelganger’s bearing as it suddenly smiled. It almost seemed to Rubedo that it had remembered some intrinsic part of itself. With this change in bearing, however, came a dreadful chill in the air itself as it assumed a fighting stance. “Thank you, Krjn. But for the sake of my lord, I can’t let you pass!”

This sudden shift in atmosphere caught Rubedo off guard, and by the time she’d unholstered her handgonne her foe was already upon her. Rather than try to shoot from the hip, she instead put every onze of effort into dodging. The blade on the back of the doppelganger’s gauntlet sliced through the air as it swung a lethal right hook, and though Rubedo had sidestepped just in time to avoid it, the gun barrel built into the back of the wrist fired a blast of aether, tearing into her shoulder.

Wincing, she tried her best to put some distance between herself and her foe. But the doppelganger was relentless, and for every step she took it launched another attack. It quickly became clear that evasion alone was not going to cut it, and so when it suddenly went for a haymaker, Rubedo was ready to intercept. Ducking beneath her foe, she slipped between its legs before spinning about to catch it off guard.

She fired a burst of aether from her handgonne, the shot piercing her foe’s armor as it turned to face Rubedo. Scrambling to her feet, she tried to back away and fire a second, but a red-violet aura engulfed her foe as it charged forward. To her eyes it seemed her foe moved twice as fast just then, and before she could even react the doppelganger had come at her from the right, slashing through her arm with a left hook before clamping her steelclad fist around her neck.

A wordless, silent scream was all Rubedo could muster as she raised the bleeding stump of her right arm. From the elbow down, it was gone—an injury that, even if she weren’t having her windpipe crushed, would make fighting back all but impossible.

“I’m sorry for this, Krjn,” the doppelganger told her. “But as a Radiant, my lifesworn duty to the satrap comes before all else.”

This creature was a Radiant now? It seemed to Rubedo that she was right after all. In sharing a moment of sisterly camaraderie, she’d altered the doppelganger’s very existence. But that was hardly a consolation at this juncture. What was, however, was the sleepy look in its eyes.

“Ghk…” she gurgled, gritting her teeth and clenching her left fist.

“Stop struggling,” the doppelganger replied. “This will… all…”

With a loud yawn, the doppelganger relaxed its grip on Rubedo’s throat, earning it a fierce blow to the jaw. As it flew to the floor, she scrambled to pick up her handgonne, aiming it squarely at her foe and firing a second shot, piercing the doppelganger’s armor just as the first one had.

“Seems sleep won’t suffice,” she said, gasping for air as she fired a third shot at her rising foe. “Petrifaction it is!”

“You would turn your own sister to stone?!” the doppelganger remarked, charging towards Rubedo.

“For roughly one hour,” she answered, backing away from her foe. “More than enough time to awaken Ahewann.”

With every step the doppelganger took, its movements began to slow. By the time it was close enough to strike at Rubedo once more, its armor and skin had turned slate gray, and the dark aura overflowing from within it had faded entirely. Dodging its punches and kicks proved trivially easy, and as Rubedo effortlessly sidestepped an agonizingly slow haymaker, she unloaded one last shot directly into her foe’s exposed face.

“My…” the doppelganger gasped, freezing in place as her momentum ground to a halt. “... lord…… Ahewann……”

With a shake of her head, Rubedo holstered her handgonne. Then, lifting the bloody stump of her right arm, she uttered a word of power. She had expecting a light wind to kick up or droplets of water to spawn near the wound, as a conjurer’s healing magicks oft relied on water or wind-aspected aether. But to her surprise a number of tiny white flames appeared instead, dancing around the stump before sinking into her arm. Rather than causing her even more harm, however, the flames seemed to have the opposite effect, mending the damaged flesh until her stump had stopped bleeding altogether.

“White flames?” she said aloud, realization hitting her as she spoke. “One of mother’s spells—the power of an Elementalist!”

Suddenly a massive tremor shook the whole of the Dalriada, and though Rubedo held her footing, her attention was drawn towards the room’s ceiling as it began to smolder. Black and gray smoke filled the air. There was no time left to ponder her newfound discovery—the airship itself was coming undone, and Ahewann’s unconscious mind was on the verge of turning.

With a solemn nod, Rubedo bid farewell to her sister’s doppelganger, then hurried down the hallway to the Greater Hold. The floor and walls ahead of her had already begun to decay; Every few strides presented a new hole into the airship’s guts or worse, a lethal drop into the sea malms below. Yet she bounded across those gaps with ease, moving forward at a decent pace. Before long, she had reached her destination.

In sharp contrast to the tight corridors preceding it, the Greater Hold was utterly massive. Violet lights lit the room from below, while light from the outside beamed down through burning holes in the walls and ceiling. A torrential downpour from the sky above had torn clean through the airship as well, slowly flooding the hold’s lower levels. And at the far end of the room was a massive magitek slate, upon which rested the body of Ahewann bin Alzadaal. His arms and legs were restrained, and his eyes were tightly shut. Cuts, burns, and bruises dotted his skin—the handiwork of Alastor and the doppelganger’s torture, no doubt. Black and gray smoke swirled about him, and with what little movement he could manage, the man appeared to be trembling and weeping.

“Ahewann!” Rubedo shouted to him. “Your Excellency, can you hear me?!”

“It’s all gone,” Ahewann muttered aloud. “My people, my home… it’s all her fault…”

Clicking her tongue, Rubedo rushed as close to the edge of the platform as she could. Water sprayed across her face as she did, and an idea came to her. Raising her left hand, she uttered a word of power, then gently motioned from the falling water to Ahewann. On cue a spout of water split off from it, softly spraying the man’s face.

Sputtering for a moment, Ahewann opened his eyes. “By the sisters, what—who are you?”

“Rubedo of Thavnair,” she replied, utterly relieved. “A refugee from Dalmasca who has made a new life for herself in your fine nation.”

“It was a fine nation,” said Ahewann, his tone bereft of hope. “But the Empire has laid waste to it. Not a soul remains, save you and I.”

“I cannot fault you for believing that,” Rubedo began. “But you must understand that what you fear has not come to pass.”

At this, Ahewann furrowed his brow. “What do you mean by that? Are there more survivors…?”

“What I mean is that none of this is real,” she clarified, motioning to the water flooding down from the sky. “The isle of Thavnair has not been invaded by Garlemald. The city of Radz-at-Han is not destroyed, and the people so dear to your heart are all alive.”

“Your words are well meant, but they are still lies. I have seen the ruins of Thavnair with my own eyes.” Ahewann forlornly turned his gaze towards the torrent of water. “See how the rain falls upon us? Even the heavens lament the passing of our people.”

As she tried to interject, a thought came to Rubedo. An idea. Guiding the flooding water once more, she sliced through the ceiling of the Dalriada’s hull. The burning steel collapsed nearby, tearing a massive chunk from the platform she was standing on as it sank into the rising water below.

“You are correct about one thing,” she declared as she pointed to the sky. “There is indeed water falling from above!”

Staring into the boundless ocean above them, Ahewann opened his mouth yet remained silent. Slowly, his gaze fell back upon Rubedo. “... I’ve my own suspicions, but it cannot hurt to ask. Rubedo, what exactly is happening to us?”

“You are having a nightmare, your excellency,” Rubedo answered, flashing a hopeful smile. She had been worried the direct approach would prove dangerous, and yet it seemed she’d made the breakthrough they needed. “Four months ago you lost your arm to a terrifying monster, and fell into a coma. Only tonight has this dreamless slumber begun to lift—were it not for the demon posing as Varis Galvus, you might well have awakened already.”

“A nightmare, you say…?” Taking a deep breath, Ahewann turned his attention to his right arm. “I remember a day when the sky turned black and the stars fell upon us. When my own people were transformed by terror and sorrow into unspeakable monstrosities. I fought to defend a man who’d witnessed his own son turning, and…” Shaking his head, he turned back to Rubedo. “All else is a blur of teeth, steel, and unholy flame. My fate was sealed—how is it that I survived?”

“You have my younger sister to thank for that. I’m told she and her allies, the Scions of the Seventh Dawn, put an end to the Final Days.” Noting the confusion and growing panic in Ahewann’s expression, Rubedo raised her arms in an attempt to calm him down. “Remember that this is a dream! That woman who tortured you on behalf of ‘Varis’—she is no more real than this corroding airship, the malms tall plateau upon which Radz-at-Han resides, or the weeping sea above our heads.”

“And what if you’re wrong?” asked Ahewann, his head sagging in shame. “Even if that woman is a figment of my imagination, who’s to say she wasn’t right about me? It was my decision that inspired the cruelty she fell victim to, that drove her from Thavnair so many years ago.”

Once more, Rubedo found herself reaching for the water flooding into the Greater Hold. Drawing forth a tide from the rising depths below, she formed a staircase of solid water between herself and Ahewann. Then, carefully striding up to meet him eye to eye, she made her reply and offered the stump of her right arm. “I don’t know the history between you and my sister. But I do know this: Galbana Lily—the real Galbana Lily—has done everything in her power to save your life. Even now, she suffers for the sake of protecting your soul from harm.”

Ahewann seemed to consider her words, falling deathly quiet. His gaze drifted towards her arm, then to his own, before finally chuckling and shaking his head “I know it’s customary to use your right hand for a handshake, but in cases such as ours, there’s no shame in using the left.”

“Of course, your excellency,” Rubedo replied, bowing her head and offering her left hand instead.

Gritting his teeth and straining his muscles, Ahewann seemed to slip right through the matter of his bindings as he stepped up onto the watery staircase Rubedo had made. By her estimates the man was just over seven fulms tall—enough that she needed to step back and tilt her chin up just to meet his gaze. Taking her left hand with his, he gave it a solid, vigorous shake, then clapped her on the shoulder.

“Thank you for coming to my rescue, Miss Rubedo,” he beamed. “Now, how exactly do I—”

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