Draconic Concerns

“Different rebellion on different worlds in a different time,” I pointed out. “And this isn’t the ending, it’s the beginning.”

“You say that with such confidence,” Noona said with a sad smile.

“I say everything with confidence. Helps compensate for the abject terror.”

She snorted softly.

“I do have a question,” I said. “The Admiral of the Sixth Fleet, Colette Frontenachii, is your mother, yes? Did you ever…?”

All warmth fled Noona’s face.

“Meet her?” she finished for me. “Talk to her? Share a meal? Catch up on my… time bubble life spent with her dryad copy?”

“Yeah. Before the whole ‘starting a rebellion’ thing?” I waved my hand in the air. “Does she know you as a person?”

“She does not… My real mother is dead. I watched her slowly turn into coral for years, held her and wept as she stopped breathing and moving forevermore. Admiral Colette carries the same name and the same face, yes… But she’s NOT my mom. Colette Frontenachii designed the whole horrific Dryad duplication tree inside time bubbles as Lead Agromancer. I was probably one of her initial test subjects. Gestated-and-abandoned…”

Noona exhaled, recomposing herself.

“When I came out of the bubble, I was… incredibly furious. A twenty-year-old Omnid dragon full of grief and rage. Mad at everyone. At the Frontenachii for growing me as a weapon outside of time. At their system for grinding up mothers and daughters alike. At my dryad mom for… leaving me. For loving me so fiercely and then being… gone.”

“Did Colette know?” I asked. “About the duplicate surviving?”

“I don’t really know. She… called me,” Noona continued bitterly. “After I emerged from the bubble. Multiple times. V-cast requests, V-mails, even handwritten letters delivered by kobolds. I ignored, deleted… rejected them all in my rage. I didn’t want to hear her words, nor to accept her as my mother. She abandoned me, imprisoned me with a slowly dying copy of herself for twenty years and I didn’t want to hear her excuses or rationalisations for such.”

“Understandable,” I said.

“My real mother grew a wondrous coral garden for us from prad bones. In my mind, the Admiral who plants world trees across dominated worlds is her… sister, mirror, a muddy echo. She never raised me. Never held me. Never sang me to sleep nor fed me fruit she grew. My dryad mom regretted not standing up to her friends more in the final days of her life, gave me the knowledge to break kobold blood bonds she helped design herself. She asked me to stay strong for her.”

A faint, sharp-edged smile crossed her features.

“I wasn’t that strong. I ignored Colette’s V-calls and eventually she stopped trying to reach out… I spent decades pretending to be a loyal Frontenachii Commander, climbed ranks, earned trust, mapped every weakness in their vile Empire. I saw the system the Frontenachii had built… The Entertainment and Pleasure Decks filled with male kobolds in decorative collars. And I thought of my mom teaching me to shape water and saying, ‘Noona, the ocean doesn’t obey anyone.’ When I planted enough pact-disrupting memetic seeds in kobold heads, I made my move… and liberated over ninety thousand blood-bound kobolds in a single day.”

“And held against the Empire for nineteen days?” I repeated the words from Nexxali’s song.

“It was naive of me to think that rebellion within their system would change anything.” Noona looked at me with sad eyes. “The Wendigos are devious bastards. Ixthia is the worst of them, the voice of the Empire, the House Speaker of the Legate Council.”

“You think I’m going to lose then?”

“I think things will rapidly turn terrible for everyone involved. The Frontenachii can grow, build and plan in accelerated time at a pace far beyond the rest of the Omniverse thanks to Citadel Zero. They have far too many warships and Seekers in reserve, more than I had ever accounted for. Ixthia turned my entire rebellion into bound weapons and laughed about it, calling it ‘poetically amusing justice’.” Noona’s long tail, capped in white gemstones, lashed against the floor.

“She sounds like a real piece of work,” I commented.

“She is,” Noona lamented. “All of my rebel-controlled citadels fell to the Seekers dropped from orbital warships gated above each free world. All of the Seekers I had… were devoured by bigger Seekers.”

I nodded.

“I led the largest rebellion in Frontenachii history,” Noona ranted. “I was the most dangerous insurgent they ever produced. I was brilliant and ruthless, thought myself the immovable tree that would strangle their Empire with my roots. I had ninety thousand capable soldiers at my command… and still failed catastrophically.”

She rubbed her hands.

“Whatever you think you’re doing, whatever resistance you think you’re building here, understand this: Wendigos like Ixthia are patient predators who enjoy the chase more than the kill. Your rebellion is just as doomed as mine was, and is permitted to exist only because it feeds their desire for fear. You cannot overcome the Frontenachii numbers and magic power no matter how hard you try because they simply have more time than you ever will.”

“Probably,” I agreed with a shrug. “But I’m stubborn.”

Noona blinked.

“I crashed their capital ship into the moon yesterday,” I said. “Excessive human stubbornness is my primary qualification.”

“I took down many of their ships,” Noona revealed. “Ixthia knows how to sacrifice pawns to win the game. Every damned variable I thought I controlled, she had already priced into her models. Alliances I forged became a lever she pulled. The worlds I liberated became a resource she harvested extra-ruthlessly after I fell.”

“How did Ixthia even figure out every variable?” I wondered.

“I suspect that the answer for such is Citadel Zero’s Seers and Datamancers,” Kawathra answered. “The Empire’s hoards of ships, personnel and Citadels are packed with Quantum Entanglement linked keystones and monitoring hexes. Everything magical they own is being observed at all times. Thanks to accelerated time, Citadel Zero’s Datamancers have the time to calculate the most likely outcome. Sixth Fleet is already making plans to cover this Earth with a great number of such keystones carried by their Dryad Avatars.”

[Sneaky predestination bullshit,] the ghostly Arctic fox pressed his cute spectral nose against the side of my head.

“Right,” I noted. “So as long as we don’t allow them to plant their future-data-gathering keystones all over we should have an advantage.”

“You do not hold an advantage now,” Noona stated. “I’ve gone over all of your current resources in magic and personnel that Datamancer Kawathra provided. Ixthia could crush your rebellion in a blink. The fact that she does not means that she intends to use you in some way.”

“I am observing that you’re being rather somber this morning, Lady Noona,” Kawathra turned to the Benzaiten Omnid. “Varying from the pep talk you gave your girls in the server last night. Where’s the extra-motherly, supportive Noona?”

The white dragon’s gemstone-tipped tail swayed, ears tilting back. “I wanted my girls to feel safe and they would not remember our conversation regardless. I made them believe they had futures worth dreaming about, for however briefly such dreams survive. On the other hand, I owe the Emperor of Mankind honesty. He is walking the same road I walked.” She looked at me. “You… deserve to know where rebellion leads.”

“Appreciate the honesty,” I said.

[She’s testing you, I reckon,] Sage whispered from Arctus. [Poking your resolve to see if it bends. Classic mom energy. I should know, my mom does the same thing except with passive-aggressive baking.]

[Your mom stress-bakes?] I asked.

[You bet your ass she does. She ‘prolly stress-baking real hard now on tha’ account of the whole invasion-ness.]

“I get it,” I said aloud. “The Frontenachii have a boatload of precogs and are clever and old. Ixthia specifically is playing twelve-dimensional chess while I’m over here trying to remember how the horse moves… Here’s the thing, though.” I added. “I don’t need to win their chess game. I simply have to flip the board.”

“Flipping the board is how rebellions get crushed,” Noona warned.

“Rebellions within the system, sure. But I’m operating outside it. I’m a weird little human on a weird little linear planet surrounded by weird friends who do weird things for weird reasons. Ixthia can model armies, fleet movements and political alliances. Can she model non magical humans? Did your rebellion include eight billion humans in it? Did it have any humans at all?”

“No,” Noona said. “Nullborn humans have no possible way to oppose the Frontenachii Empire. Magic is might.”

“That sounds like a bad guy quote from Garry Cotter,” I said.

“The more Deathmoth gaters, warships and Corpse Seekers one has, the more unstoppable they are,” Noona insisted.

“Hrmm. Statistically, Noona’s rebellion failed because it operated within Frontenachii power structures. Military hierarchy, territorial control, Seeker versus Seeker fights, fleet engagement,” the Datamancer stated. “From my observations the Emperor’s human rebellion operates through parasocial attachment, cross-species romance, meme warfare, and aggressive snack distribution. The Frontenachii prediction models are calibrated for conquest dynamics. They have zero training data for… whatever he does. The local Earth is inexplicably linear, gradually consumes and decays all magic. Even with a billion precog keystones sprinkled about, the Empire will have trouble seeing ahead.”

“Weaponized Florida energy,” I supplied. “Or ‘space-orc vibes’ like my best friend would call it.”

[Ooo, Fox-Trademark pending!] Sage cackled.

Noona studied my masked face with gold, weary eyes.

“Fine,” she said. “I’ll believe you. For now. But I reserve the right to say ‘I told you so’ when Ixthia inevitably reveals that all of your actions were actually her century-long plans.”

“Noted.”

“Speaking of plans unfolding on schedule,” Kawathra interrupted. The holographic displays around her expanded, filling the Seeker’s interior with a sprawling tactical overlay. Fleet positions, ship silhouettes and thousands of small hexagonal portraits. “I have an update of strategic significance.”

“Yes?”

“The Frontenachii Legate Council has convened an emergency session. All three thousand four hundred and twelve registered Legates across the entire Frontenachii Empire. This is the Empire’s full legislative body outside of Citadel Zero, Emperor. The session will take place in Commander Sillicia’s warship, the Abyssal Sorrow, with the Legates attending as V-cast projections from across their fleets and colonial holdings.”

“Quite the party.”

“Yes. The Stabalist Concordat has formally and cordially invited you, the Emperor of Earth, to attend this summit as a recognized sovereign representative of the local population.” Kawathra added.

[Tha’ invitation was relayed through official diplomatic channels routed via the Stabalist warship’s communication array addressed to the Fox Archmage of the Emperor,] Sage said. [They basically blasted the message at the tree on the moon in hopes that I’ll hear it n’ forward it yo’ way.]

“When were you going to forward this to me?” I asked.

[Soon,] Arctus covered his face with white paws. [Sorrykins. I got… distracted with stuff… I get easily distracted with shiny ideas to chase.]

“I received this message as it was cast on all open channels.” Kawathra brought up a full digital document which I quickly read over. [By the Authority of Captain Argon Nova of the Stabalist Concordat Diplomatic Corps. Quote: ‘The Concordat recognizes the sovereignty of Earth’s designated representative and extends formal invitation to participate in proceedings regarding the ongoing integration dispute.’]

“Integration, hmmm?” I said.

[Omnid political jargonnery.] Sage commented. [They basicleh see you as their inferior.]

“If we were to send them evidence of Frontenachii crimes against Earth, how would they react?” I wondered.

“They’d be very annoyed at the Frontenachii,” Kawathra stated. “But even with an endless list of crimes against humans and pradavarians, the Concordat wouldn’t act decisively. Omnid Omnicorps are… legally permitted to own humans and other lower races. The Quetzicortals of Yucatan own entire human-filled citadels.”

“What about… Noona’s splicing into a warship’s core?” I asked.

“Now that’s a truly monstrous action,” Kawathra said. “The sort of a horrific crime the Frontenachii would not be able to dance around nor bribe their way out of. A splicing and imprisonment of an Omnid soul for a century would definitely get the Legates in hot soup with Omnithornia. The Concordat delegation would have to examine Noona’s Fractal Engine heart in person though, as v-cast evidence would not be enough.”

Noona swallowed nervously. “I… I definitely don’t wish to bring my boxed-up heart to a Frontenachii warship. They’d hoard and rebind me on the spot.”

“The Stabalists there wouldn’t stop the Wendigos from publicly re-harvesting your core?” I asked.

“N-no,” Noona trembled, shaking her head. “I have no faith in Omnithornia. They did nothing at all to help my rebellion a century ago, considering it a Frontenachii Omnicorp internal issue. Ixthia likely already factored your meeting with the Stabalists into her strategy.”

“Then we will invite a single Stabalist to gate to Cascade… from where Kawathra will take them to Darkfall in a cloaked Seeker,” I said. “Then Sage can guide the Stabalist rep to your core where they can examine it and confirm the Frontenachii crimes against you.”

[I like this plan,] Sage commented from the fox on my shoulder. [Das’ a good plan cus it involves foxes.]

“I’ll gate Yaga to Cascade now then. The summit begins in three hours and forty-eight minutes,” Kawathra said. “I recommend you attend in person to look honest in front of the Concordat, my Emperor. Commander Wattica and her Division soldiers can serve as your military escort…” She hesitated, glancing at the white dragon.

“And Noona can walk in there by my side with her gun-unit body looking like her old self and make three thousand Legates collectively shit themselves.” I smiled.

“I…” Noona fretted.

“You’re the Frontenachii’s worst nightmare: proof of their crimes, a rebel who stood up to them, walking and talking and very much alive. You can tell the Stabalists your story and…”

“And Ixthia will fuck it all sideways,” Noona interrupted. “She’ll probably reframe my liberation as a Frontenachii internal matter. She’ll call it a ‘gesture of progressive reform’ or a ‘scheduled rehabilitation milestone’ or some other sneaky bullshit. She’ll turn my freedom into her victory and serve it to the Stabalists as evidence of Frontenachii benevolence. She will present Admiral Colette as the healer that’s going to fix all suffering and death currently happening on your planet and they will all clap like happy seals and allow it to happen.”

“So we account for such. We don’t walk in expecting to catch Ixthia off guard. We walk in… to make her react to us instead,” I said, internally frowning at her pessimism. “Noona. I need you in that room by my side. Your presence as an Omnid that was spliced by the Frontenachii matters more than any clever speech I could make. I think that it will destabilise the board and force the Frontenachii to act… in a very bad light. Plus Admiral Colette will see you. It will mess with her, maybe slow down her planet-terraforming plans.”

“You don’t know how she will react,” Noona said. “You don’t have a legion of precogs at your side whispering the future into your ears!”

“Eh. I’ll improvise,” I said. “Go with the flow. I don’t expect to win the war today, only to understand my enemies better, try to get them to make mistakes. Maybe when Colette sees and talks to you, we’ll be able to secretly sway her to our side. If she called you lots after you emerged from your time bubble, she definitely cares about you.”

“Why would she slow the terraforming?” Noona asked. “That’s literally her primary job and an obsession of such magnitude that she didn’t even bother raising me herself!”

“The problem is that the gathered Legates would simply demote and reassign her elsewhere if she stops doing her job effectively,” Kawathra added.

“If she’s anything like your dryad mom, then she will understand you, I think,” I told Noona. “Just try to get the message across to her without being too obvious about it or at the very least attempt to connect with her… to later press her on about slowing down the terraforming.”

“Very well,” Noona said, clearly not looking forward to speaking with her Omnid mother.