“You can kill those things?” both girls interrupted halfway through Erik’s story. Erik asked them to hold their questions until the end of the story, and despite their frowns, they did as asked. Ending his story when he arrived at Leicester, the two had no ck of questions to ask him.

  Before that, though, Jessie ordered her sister to buy some beer and bring it back while she made dinner for them. Making dinner, in this case, meant throwing some frozen food into the oven for half an hour, but that didn’t make it less appetising in the end.

  “So you’ve killed Hellbeasts?” Jessie asked before her first forkful of sagna.

  “Five, I think,” Erik said, thinking back before nodding in confirmation. “I think they’re vulnerable to magic, actually.”

  “They’re certainly unkilble by other means, or so I’ve heard,” Jessie said.

  “Yeah. That means you’ll probably be able to witch them to death too, you know.”

  “What if I can’t, though? I mean, we can’t be sure, right?”

  “That’s actually part of the reason I’m here. I got some help from the military stationed between Sweden and Denmark, and some new friends that are at the nearby air base right now. They want me to help them win the war, but I need your help. If you can give it, of course,” Erik said, looking at Sophie at the end. “I understand your family needs you-”

  “I’ll do it, obviously. The moment I got back and learned of the invasion, I was heartbroken. If I can help, even just a little, I have to,” Jessie expined, also looking at her sister.

  “Of course she’s helping!” was all her sister said in response to their stares.

  “That reminds me - what can you do?” Jessie asked, her mouth full of pasta and tomato sauce.

  “Err… stuff? I mean, it’s just a bunch of weird stuff. What’s your power?”

  “Oh! It’s really cool!” Sophie excimed, her eyes practically glowing with pride.

  “Oh?” Erik said, looking at Jessie.

  “It’s multiple things, like you. I call it ‘Call of Nature’, and it lets me cast a spell for each natural element. One fire spell, one water spell, an earth spell and a wind spell. Like Nana guessed, some are offensive and some are defensive,” Jessie expined.

  Nana, who was a fount of knowledge for recently reborn Remnants, had guessed that based on Jessie’s Crest. On her chest were two bird wings, one pointed upwards with sharp feathers, the other with thicker plumage pointing downwards. The left one looked like a predatory bird’s wing, like that of a falcon or eagle, and the other resembled that of an owl.

  The Core was right in the middle, and each wing had one row of circles along the bones, and another along the edge of the feathers. She also had one extra line of circles straight down from the Core.

  Like Erik’s, the first circle in each row was rger than the rest. With the additional row, Jessie had one more row for absorbing powers, and one more major power than he did. Sometimes, the Crests could be used to tell what kind of abilities the Remnant was suited to, and Nana guessed that Jessie’s would either be both offensive and defensive based on the two different wings.

  That didn’t mean that was Nana’s only guess, as it could also mean something like hard and soft, or even up and down considering the directions they were pointing. Erik’s swirl was harder to pinpoint, as it was uniform. That could mean that there either wouldn’t be that much variation in his powers, or that the differences weren’t easily quantified.

  “Can I see yours?” Sophie creaked with enthusiasm.

  After dinner, Erik removed his shirt, letting Sophie see his Crest from up close. She touched his dimly glowing red core with her index finger, following the swirls to one of the ends.

  “Why are your thingies hexagonal?” she asked. This had been discussed in Afterlife as well, but the general consensus was reasons. It didn’t seem to matter at all, but it was always geometrical shapes.

  “Hey, you said the name of your power was Call of Nature, right? Did you name it yourself?” Erik asked, trying to focus on something else than the pretty girl touching his chest.

  “No, it came to me when meditating on it. Didn’t you get that? That’s how I learned what I could do at the beginning,” Jessie expined.

  “I have to say, I completely forgot about meditating. I just did it for a few seconds when I fought that first Hellbeast.”

  “That’s dumb! Nana said meditating is one of the most important parts of being a Remnant. It’s how we’re supposed to grow stronger!”

  “I know, I know. I’ve been busy, okay?” Erik excused himself.

  “Do it now,” Jessie ordered. Erik could only sigh in response, and sat back down on the couch. Sophie stepped back and stared at him along with her sister.

  How was he supposed to just do it, with the rest of them just watching him? It was weird, right? Still, he had to try. There was no way Jessie was letting it go otherwise.

  Almost immediately after settling down, the massive sea that was his magic hovered in front of him, everything else pitch bck around him. He didn’t know this, but his red core was glowing brighter in front of the girls he was with. He tried searching for the feeling he got when touching things his power worked on, but he had to eventually figure out another way to do it since nothing seemed to happen at all.

  He felt the edge of the sea with his hand. It was both warm and cold, wet and dry. It made him unsure whether the pitch bck was actually the sea, not the other way around, but he couldn’t be sure. Eventually, something did come to him, but it wasn’t the name of his power suddenly appearing in his head. It was something else. Someone else.

  “Behold the Titan,” the figure said, growing ever more clear, yet still giving off no real details. It was clearly humanoid, but still seemed blobby. It was red, like the light of his Core, streaked with bck. It unduted as it spoke, but stilled again when observing Erik.

  “Who are you?” Erik asked. He ran through several other questions, but none of them made more sense to ask at this moment.

  “Behold the Titan. Carry the Cross,” it responded.

  “I don’t know what that means.” Erik tried reaching out to the figure, but despite its apparent closeness, he couldn’t reach it at all.

  “Carry the Cross. The Titan is reborn.” The form faded, all signs of it gone in a second. Erik woke from his meditative state.

  “Unexpected Arsenal,” he said, not sure quite where those words came from. He felt like he knew a whole lot about his power now, but that too seemed to fade, though slowly.

  “What else?” Jessie asked. Her voice was hard to hear, like he heard it through jelly.

  “Zero. Zero?” he said, more guesswork than knowledge.

  “Same as mine. I think it means the rank of the power. You remember?”

  “Yeah. Nana said there were different scales for tiers and ranks all over the universe. So tier zero, rank zero?” he guessed.

  “I think so. We agreed to call that Iron-tier, right? So what does your power actually do?”

  “I feel like it goes something like ‘Manifest spiritual power.’ and a bunch of limitations, but I forgot all those already. That’s weird.”

  “So how have you used it so far? I don’t know what that means. Mine expins the different effects of the different spells, though specific details elude me, too,” Jessie said.

  “I get a sense of what certain stuff can do when I touch it. When I infuse magic into the thing, I can activate it, and it does that thing. I have a pstic frisbee that hovers in mid-air and extends an invisible shield a few metres around it. I have screws that turn into lightning bombs,” Erik expined, slowly getting all his senses back in order after his meditation. It wasn’t supposed to feel like this, right?

  “Cool!” Sophie excimed.

  “That does sound cool,” Jessie agreed.

  A little ter into the evening, Erik told Jessie his pns for getting stronger, including how the military and his new friends, Ange and Emma, could hopefully help. The details would be gone over ter that night at the air base, but he was pnning to get a good supply of gemstones to expand his repertoire quite early on.

  It was especially recommended to at least get his major powers down first, as they would be the base of his powerset. If he filled out an entire row of one major and two minor powers first, the rest of his major powers could be slightly skewed towards fitting with the minor powers instead of his core and major powers. That wasn’t necessarily bad in any way, but could force him into a path of development he wouldn’t be suited for.

  As his powers evolved, meaning going up in tiers, they would develop based on his usage of them and how he meditated on how to improve with them. It was easier to make all of his powers go in one direction if they all started at base, rather than skewed towards a certain thing.

  One example Nana gave was if he had a spell-based major power, with one fireball minor power and a firewall-power, his second major power would be slightly skewed towards either spell-based or fire-based powers, rather than mobility or strength-based powers.

  That wasn’t bad, but it limited his growth to that direction, practically making him a mage-type Remnant. Supposing he started with the spell-based major power only, his second major power could just as easily become a strength-based one, giving him a better chance at developing into a swing-and-fling archetype.

  Erik found all this easier to consider if he thought of it in RPG-terms and he thought he understood it fairly well. He could still get all his major powers as spell-based powers out of the gate, but he was assured his personality and soul had at least some part in what powers he got. He was only scared he got really evil powers, as that would say a whole bunch about him he didn’t even know himself.

  Jessie wanted to join him to the air base ter that evening, and Sophie gave them no choice in the matter whether to bring her or not. She was going. Erik didn’t mind either way. In fact, he enjoyed Sophie’s company. She had a bubbly personality he felt like he really needed right now, all things considered.

  The next few hours, the three talked about new beginnings and pns for the future until an army convoy churned through the streets outside the ft.

  “I’m guessing that’s our ride…” Erik said, getting up from his seat to look out the window. “I thought we were supposed to be low-key.”

  Luckily the convoy didn’t exit their vehicles with megaphones. Emma left the frontmost vehicle, looking around. She noticed Erik through the window on the third floor and looked at him apologetically.

  “Guess we’re off?” he said to the worried girls behind him.

  Out on the street, Erik went straight towards Emma, but was all but manhandled by a couple of soldiers, being pulled towards another vehicle than Emma’s.

  “Let go,” Erik said, calm as a ke on a still day.

  “Come with us, sir,” one of the soldiers said, trying to pull him further. When he noticed a couple of other soldiers doing the same to Jessie and Sophie, the weather around said ke changed.

  “I promise you, you will not get me into that car without my consent, soldier,” Erik said, his demeanour completely different. The other soldier grabbing him let him go, but the one who had ordered him around still kept his hands on him.

  “Don’t make me taser you, sir,” the soldier said, reaching into one of his back pockets, pulling an electrical device out.

  “Try me,” Erik said. He did.

  The device clicked several times as the soldier pushed it against Erik’s torso, but the Remnant barely flinched other than a repeated twitch on the corner of his mouth. A few seconds ter, the device stopped, and the soldier looked nervously at Erik’s eyes. Erik then pushed the soldier back with his hands, the soldier practically flying back until he hit the car three metres or so behind him. Erik looked at Emma, who looked equally as annoyed as Erik.

  “What’s going on?” he asked her.

  “They don’t know what to do in a case like this. Cut them some sck. They promised not to hurt you,” Emma said, though whether she believed her own words or not weren’t obvious.

  She looked Jessie and Sophie up and down, before nodding in greeting at them. Jessie nodded back, but Sophie only looked nervously around.

  Erik went over to the car they wanted to put him in, gesturing to the driver, still in the car, to drive the window down.

  “Room for four?” Erik asked, leaning into the car through the window.

  “Uh, yes?” the driver said. Erik smiled and thanked the man.

  “Emma, Jessie, Sophie, you’re riding with me. Shotgun!”

  Erik then entered the car in the front passenger seat, eyeing the soldiers around the rest of the girls as the girls wandered off towards his commandeered vehicle.

  The soldier he pushed gave Erik a violent stare, but got into another vehicle with the other soldier. Soon enough, they were driving off.

  “What was that about?” Erik asked openly in the car. The driver was really busy focusing on the road in front of him.

  “They’re just nervous. I don’t know the details about the missive from the general, but it cracked some shells, so to speak. The convoy is under Colson’s command. The guy you pushed,” Emma expined.

  “The guy who tased me, you mean?” Erik asked in a corrective manner.

  “Yes, the guy who tasered you. The rest of them don’t know anything, but he’s putting them all on edge. Don’t give the rest of them a bad time, please.”

  “I’ll try. So do they know?”

  “They know some, I guess. Like I said, I don’t know the details of the missive Ange gave the brigadier.”

  “Do they know we can kill the Hellbeasts?” Erik asked, and the vehicle they were in swerved back and forth, almost crashing into an oncoming car.

  “Well, he does,” Emma said with an annoyed tone. Erik looked at the driver, who looked incredibly tense.

  “Hey, you can keep a secret, right?” Erik asked with a calming voice.

  “I, uh… Y-yessir?” he responded, having got the vehicle under control once more.

  “Great! Anyway, Emma, meet Jessie-” Erik said, gesturing towards Jessie. “- and Sophie, the bubbly little sister.”

  Sophie smiled at Erik, then greeted Emma. Jessie shook Emma’s hand, as the two were seated next to each other. Sophie and Emma were seated on opposite ends.

  “You’re the other one?” Emma asked Jessie, eyeing the driver as she did.

  “I suppose I am. We should talk when we arrive, I think,” Jessie said, getting a nod of approval from Emma.

  Ten minutes ter, the convoy stopped outside the gate to the air base, and soon moved on through the opening gate. A line of soldiers were waiting for them outside a hangar they stopped in front of.

  Erik, not much for waiting for orders, casually stepped out of the vehicle, stretching his arms into the air. A middle-aged man practically reeking of authority walked towards him, only temporarily stopping to share a few words with Captain Colson, who still looked quite angry. The brigadier soon stopped in front of Erik.

  “Good evening, Mr Fried. I’m Brigadier Bumley, in charge of the Leicester air base. I hear you’ve already had an exciting first meeting with the British Royal Army… I apologise for the captain’s behaviour. I hope we can start over in a more agreeable way for both parties.”

  “Well, what’s a little light tasing between future friends, am I right?” Erik said, looking over at the captain, who merely grunted in response as he walked away.

  “Quite… General Mathisen’s missive has been both eye-opening and quite cking in details. I hope you and I can talk more in a less public arena?” the brigadier asked.

  “Of course, Brigadier, that’s why I’m here. I want Ange, Emma, Jessie and Sophie to join, if that’s not too much to ask. I realise my whole squad is me and a bunch of girls, so you can bring in a couple of guys if you like,” Erik answered. The brigadier took a few moments to respond to that.

  “Of course, Mr Fried. I would like to bring Captain Colson along, if you wouldn’t mind too terribly.”

  “My mind is nothing if not malleable, Brigadier. If you trust the man, I’ll give him a chance,”

  “Much appreciated. Shall we?”

  The group were led into the hangar, immediately turning left to climb a narrow staircase. They followed a catwalk across the hangar and into a meeting room on the opposite side of where the hangar gates they entered from.

  The meeting room featured an old-fashioned bckboard, a CRT TV and a collection of desks and chairs. The desks were pushed together to form one rge table, with the chairs pced all around.

  “This looks like ancient school-equipment,” Jessie commented, and Erik agreed. It was like he was back in first grade.

  “The invasion has stretched our resources quite thin. This is only a temporary camp, after all, and there’s only so much fancy equipment to go around. We have modern computers and radio equipment, of course,” the brigadier expined, gesturing them to sit down in the chairs of their choice. Captain Colson and another man entered the room a minute ter.

  “We should start by officially welcoming our guests and greeting them appropriately,” Bumley started as everyone had seated themselves. As you know, I’m Brigadier Bumley. It’s a pleasure to meet you Jessie, Sophie.”

  “Sorry to interrupt, but where’s Ange?” Erik asked, only slightly worried.

  “She’s communicating with General Mathisen at Bridgefort. She’ll be along shortly,” said the hitherto unnamed third UB soldier in the room. Erik nodded to him. “I suppose that makes me next. I’m Major MacLeod. Pleased to make your acquaintance,” he continued.

  He got several nods of greeting in response, but silence reigned absolute for the next short while, only interrupted by the major’s clearing of his throat. It was clearly directed at Colson.

  “Captain Colson. Pleasure,” the angered man lied.

  Erik’s group was next, and they all introduced themselves one after the other. Emma didn’t use her military rank as she did, which didn’t escape the notice of the other major and the brigadier. Ange entered the room during the introductions, and she ended by introducing herself to the room, mostly for Jessie’s and Sophie’s sake. She, too, avoided stating her rank.

  “Introductions out of the way, I would like us all to now talk about this missive, handwritten by General Mathisen of the SEMP. I will begin reading the most critical part,” Bumley said, before reading a part of the missive. “For the sake of the future, and any chance of us winning this wretched war, I beg you to assist this civilian contractor, Erik, and his team, in whatever way you can. Understand that this is not a request for aid, nor reinforcement. This is to be considered a personal request, avoiding any and all usual channels. Let it be known that I, General Mathisen, hereby pce any and all responsibility for the actions of this team on myself and my rank.”

  The room was completely silent, but Colson’s face was almost audibly red. He had quite likely read through this himself, along with the major and the brigadier, but having someone in the room to direct his feelings towards only made matters worse. Meeting the stare of the brigadier, he calmed himself slightly.

  “I don’t think I need to tell any of you what this reads like,” Bumley said a short moment ter. “What I wonder is, why would a highly decorated general of the SEMP write this, if not forced? Bear in mind, I do not think anyone forced her hand. This has the tone of a career suicide note, and even despite the goings on in the world right now, this is highly unlike the general I know quite well,” he continued, expecting some kind of response when he finished.

  “So long as it stays in this room, at least for now,, I will expin her words as well as I can,” Erik said, receiving a nod from the brigadier. “Having escaped from Norway and crossed Sweden, I found Mathisen’s regiment at Bridgefort. As a civilian refugee, they let me in, but when they discovered my baggage, Mathisen herself interrogated me. I guess, with her being on the frontlines, she saw the slightest chance of turning this war around, and made a decision no one in her position would normally do. This war isn’t normal, though.”

  “What was your mysterious ‘baggage’, Mr Fried?” MacLeod asked.

  “The head of a Hellbeast,” Erik expined. The brigadier and the major nodded solemnly in response, likely already thinking something of that note. The captain, on the other hand…

  “Like hell! Those things can’t be beat! They can’t die. They won’t die, no matter what we throw at them! There’s no way you could kill one, no matter what you’ve led the general to believe!”

  “Captain!” the major shouted. The captain calmed himself, but he made no sign that he was finished with this.

  “She decided that I, and by default, Jessie here, would give this world one final chance to actually win this war. Former Colonel Ashleigh and former Major Svensson were dismissed from duty, and given the chance to join me in this endeavour. Blindly, they accepted. Later that night, two beasts attacked Bridgefort. Mathisen trusted me enough to let me prove my cims to her or die trying, and the two beasts were quickly dispatched. You should be sad you missed the following party, Captain,” Erik said, facing the captain at the end.

  “Lies!” the captain said, knocking his closed fists into the desk in front of him as he stood up. Erik had waited for just that, and pointed a stick at him. Before anyone could react, a greying white goo shot from the tip of the stick, quickly enveloping the captain from the torso down. The goo solidified quickly, stopping his movements. The major and the brigadier both rose from their chairs in surprise,

  “Mr Fried, what are you doing?” the brigadier yelled.

  “Proving a point,” Erik responded, unconcerned about how the brigadier and the major were reacting. “Don’t worry, it’s temporary.”

  “The fuck is this?” the captain screamed, visibly straining against the concrete-like substance.

  Erik pced the stick on the desks in front of them, and it turned to fine sawdust as everyone stared at it. A few tense moments ter, Bumley sat down, eyeing the captured captain with worry. The major followed suit in exactly the same manner.

  “Magic is real. I realise how that sounds, but that doesn’t argue the fact. What’s important for you to understand, is that magic is what can kill those monsters.”

  The discussion stopped after this, at least temporarily. The brigadier wanted to show Erik’s group something, but demanded that the captain be released before that. Erik rose for the first time since sitting down, He walked closer to the captain, and everyone, even his group, tensed up.

  Erik lifted a finger to his ear, and the room somehow turned even more quiet. The concrete surrounding the captain made a slight crack sound, and Erik clenched his fist, punching the concrete at the base near the captain’s legs.

  The material violently broke apart near the area of impact, and the captain could move his legs once again. He then struggled more, slowly breaking out of the rest of it. Erik easily stopped the fist flying straight at his face with his own hand.

  “Easy, Captain. If nothing else, he’s proven that he has some means that we don’t. Whether that be technology or magic doesn’t matter right now,” the major said, clenching the captain’s shoulder tightly with his hand. Eventually, the captain ceased struggling. “Take five, Captain. Meet us in hangar three,” the major said, then led the rest of the group out of the room, then out of the hangar.

  As the group, Colson excluded, wandered the base towards hangar three, the major walked alongside Erik, obviously struggling to find some words to say to the man. Behind them, Ange and Emma were making acquaintances with Sophie and Jessie. The brigadier walked further behind them, deep in thought.

  “Out with it, major,” Erik said. Anything was better than the tense silence.

  “Was that real?” MacLeod eventually asked.

  “Which part? Also, yes.”

  “That was magic? It looked like a stick?” The st sentence was stated more like a question.

  “It was. See?” Erik answered, pulling out another stick from his trusted backpack, handing it to the major, who grabbed it instantly.

  “It’s a stick…”

  “Yeah,” Erik answered. It really was.

  “And you can do that with this? Is it like a wand?” the major asked, staring at the stick he kept rotating in his hands, trying to figure out the trick. Erik chuckled at that.

  “Not a wand, no. I can do weird things with weird stuff,” Erik expined in his own mysterious way.

  “Can you do it now?” the major asked.

  “Quite a few people around, but… I can show you another trick?” Erik said.

  “Of course!” The major gave the stick back to Erik with enthusiasm, but was slightly disappointed when the man put it back in his backpack. The maybe-magician pulled out a frisbee in its pce, gaining him a confused stare.

  “This one’s less fshy, and shouldn’t cause too much of a commotion in the evening dark,” Erik expined, and tossed the frisbee in front of them. The frisbee stopped in mid-air, rotating to an upright position.

  “It hovers?” the major asked, walking slightly faster to reach the magic frisbee.

  “Among other things. Sophie, Jessie, check it out,” Erik said, getting the girls’ attention and pointing towards the frisbee.

  “Oh, that’s the shield?” Sophie asked, running past Erik and towards the frisbee. Just then, the major looked at it closely, attempting to walk around it to look at the other side. He bumped into the invisible wall it projected with a thump.

  “What?” he asked no one in particur. Sophie approached, touching the empty air all around the frisbee.

  “Woah! How far does it go?” she asked, also to no one in particur, as she ran to the side of the frisbee, her hand touching the wall along the way. She got three metres away from the centre, and her hand slipped past. The major did the same thing, only in the opposite direction.

  “Woah…” was all he said as he reached the end of the wall, walking around it and towards the centre again. “Why a frisbee?” he asked, just as the frisbee fell to the ground in front of him. He checked the wall again, but it was gone.

  He then, with all the gentleness he could muster, tapped the pstic frisbee with his foot. He looked up at Erik when nothing more happened. Erik snatched the frisbee from the ground, drawing a cross on the front and back with a marker from his backpack, then returned both things to the pack.

  “I ask myself that every single time, mate. Every time!”

  The major, now much more enthusiastic with his questions, couldn’t keep his mouth shut until the group reached hangar three. The people in the front waited a short while for the brigadier, who had also seen the frisbee-wall, but hadn’t been able to touch it himself. He looked even more deep in thought after that, and he had inadvertently walked slower since then.

  “So what’s in here?” Sophie asked, looking to the major and brigadier both.

  “Let’s wait for Captain Colson,” the major said, and after a few minutes, the group was all together again, not everyone as happy about that as they could have been.

  “Ease up, Captain. I think you’ll regret antagonising these people,” the major told the still-flustered captain.

  “Yes, sir,” Colson answered, but didn’t seem genuine.

  The major sighed, then showed the group in. This hangar was locked tight with both physical locks and digital ones. It seemed to require two different hand-prints, which the major and the captain gave by pcing their hands on a medium-sized screen on the side of the gate.

  The personnel in the vicinity stared at them when the gate opened, but no one came closer. Erik wasn’t sure if they knew what was in here, or if they weren’t allowed near.

  The answer to that came quickly as the group entered to a loud roar and thumping, the ruckus easily overheard by most of the base. It rapidly became obvious what they were keeping in there. The light gradually lit the inside of the hangar as it turned on, revealing a rge steel cage with a lone Hellbeast inside.

  “You captured one?” Jessie asked with a grimace.

  “Yes. We’ve been experimenting with ways to kill them. I’m guessing most bases have one captured by now, as that really isn’t the most difficult to do,” the brigadier started to expin.

  “The difficult part is, as you know, killing them. We’ve tried everything from fire, to acid, to bombs shoved down their throats, but nothing works. Even radiation is completely ineffective, making us wonder if even nukes will be enough,” the major continued.

  “What they want you to do, is kill it with your tricks,” the captain intruded into their conversation. A few seconds of silence followed the statement, only interrupted by the brigadier’s throat clearing up.

  “Well, yes. You cim to have proved yourself to General Mathisen, and while I don’t want to doubt her words… I would want irrefutable proof. I trust you can give us this, Mr Fried?” Bumley said, clearly interested in what Erik would say next.

  “Why?” Erik asked, meeting only confused silence from both his own group and the UB officers.

  “I’m sorry?” Bumley asked.

  “I mean, why would we show you? What’s in it for us? Will you agree to help? Keep in mind, we’re nothing but a rogue outfit, and we’ll strive to keep it that way. We’re not military, nor will we be. Mathisen has promised all the help she can give, even the resources she isn’t technically allowed to give. Will you do the same?” Erik said.

  “You have shown us enough that I can answer that quite clearly, Mr Fried,” Bumley started, but was interrupted by Erik’s next words.

  “Please, call me Erik.”

  “Of course, Erik… Yes. If you can show us you are, in fact, the real deal, my regiment is under your command. We’ll-”

  “What? You can’t be serious?” Colson excimed.

  “Shut up!” the major interrupted, having finally had enough. He pulled the captain back a few steps.

  The brigadier took the opportunity to finish, saying, “We will, of course, keep to Mathisen’s pn. You will all be kept strictly off the books, until such a time as you feel it is okay to enter the military and the public’s eye. We’ll strive to keep everyone else off your backs, though I can sadly make no guarantees that it’ll work for long.”

  “That’s acceptable, Bumley. Jessie, would you do the honours?” Erik said, turning to Jessie. “We still don’t really know if you can kill them, so two proverbial beasts with one spell, right?”

  “I’d be honoured to,” she said, stepping forwards, carefully inching closer to the massive cage keeping the monster separated from the rest of the group.

  Bumley seemed surprised that another person would cim to be able to kill the beasts as well. Erik stepped up to her side as he was as interested in seeing this as the rest, though the rest didn’t step any closer, simply keeping their eyes firmly pced on the cage.

  “I’ve got two offensive spells, earth and fire. Anything particur you want to test first?” Jessie asked with a grin.

  “They did say fire didn’t work right? How about we prove them wrong?” Erik said, giving the captain an obnoxious smile.

  Jessie’s hoodie lit up from the inside, giving off a deeply red light. The light flickered and moved like a lit candle in the wind, but it didn’t go out. Erik was more interested in her than the beast right now, and was surprised when Jessie’s eyes glowed as red as the light from her Core.

  “Inferno!” she said in a deep voice, reaching her hand out towards the beast. The monster was suddenly covered in weirdly crimson fmes that spun around its body quite rapidly. Erik temporarily lost control of his breath as he watched the magical fme.

  The fmes started melting the thick steel bars of the cage, and it would be easy for the beast to knock the bars away from the rest of the cage at that moment. Still, it didn’t do anything but roar in pain as its own flesh melted much faster than the steel around it.

  The smell of barbequed meat filled the hangar in an instant, and after three full seconds of blindingly bright fmes and intense heat, everything went dark. The intense light the fmes gave off disappeared, and while the lights lined on the ceiling were still lit, no one could see much of anything for the next ten or twenty seconds, as they had all stared wide-eyed at the bright fmes.

  “What the fuck was that? You have four of those spells as your Core power?” Erik yelled at Jessie in a high pitched tone. “I make frisbees hover!”

  Everyone except Jessie and Sophie stared at the melted cage with the ashen remains of a monster within with gaping mouths. Everyone was in awe, including Erik. That spell was way more powerful than any item he could use! And she had four of them.

  It wasn’t impossible that Erik could find a thingamajig with the same kind of potential power, but he hadn’t yet. A task for his new friends, perhaps?

  Erik looked back at the people they were proving themselves to, and Jessie did the same, her eyes having returned to normal again. Bumley and MacLeod had no words, but their expressions could write entire novels. Colson, on the other hand, fell to the floor, nding on his knees and hands. He sobbed, and tears started to drip to the floor beneath him.

  “We’re saved… We’re saved,” he repeated over and over until he instead cried harder and louder.

  Everyone turned to him, but were just as speechless at the sight of the crying man as they were the magical inferno they witnessed a moment earlier, again with the exception of Sophie, who bent her knees down in front of him, pcing her hand on the crying man’s shoulder. She said nothing for the first dozen or so seconds, but the man was calming down.

  “They’ll win. I know they will. But they need us as well, you understand?” she eventually said as the man had returned to only sobbing and heavy breaths. Colson looked up at the angelic face of the young girl, and nodded. Sophie returned the gesture with a smile, and helped the man up to his feet.

  “I need to apologise-” he started, but Erik stopped him.

  “You don’t. Have you lost anyone, anything, Captain? In this war, I mean?” Erik asked, sounding out his suspicions. The man only nodded in response.

  “The captain’s brother and sister, both exceptional officers, were among the first to die as defenders of the shoreline of Engnd,” Bumley expined, getting the captain’s grateful gaze in return. “Many have suffered terrible losses these past few months. Like Captain Colson, I suspect many have already given up, and will prove resistant to the hope you will eventually bring. As agreed, you will have our full cooperation and discretion. I will talk to the men stationed here and root out the ones who won’t be part of this desertion. I will have them reassigned elsewhere. I hope you will trust the men and women who remain with the truth, so we can better assist your endeavours?”

  “Of course, Brigadier,” Erik said after seeing Jessie’s affirmative nod. “We’ll trust your judgement.”

  “Excellent. Give us a few days. In the meantime, you should y low, and likely stay away from the base. I’ll take care of your accommodations until then,” Bumley said.

  “Sounds good. We have some stuff to take care of as well. A few days will likely do us some good,” Erik said. The brigadier nodded, and turned to leave the hangar, the major following suit.

  Colson remained, and the brigadier turned around a dozen steps ter to see what was keeping him. The captain walked up to Erik and Jessie, his red moistened eyes showing a determination Erik hadn’t previously seen from the man.

  He stopped a few steps in front of them, raising his hand to his head in salute. A good distance behind him, Erik saw the brigadier and the major replicating this action. Erik acknowledged this with a nod, and stretched out his own hand towards the captain.

  “Happy to have you on our side,” Erik said, giving the captain a genuine smile.

  Colson looked down at Erik’s hand a moment, not wanting to break the salute off, but eventually did, grasping the given hand tightly. Without another word, the captain joined his superior officers as they left the hangar.

  Minutes ter, Erik and his gang were ready to move out, having been given a transport back into Leicester proper. MacLeod returned to them, informing them of their accommodations at a hotel, three rooms booked in Erik’s name. They drove off in their transport a moment ter.

  “Who’s up for drinks?” Ange burst as they had crossed the gate of the air base.

  “We should be ready early tomorrow morning. Drinks can wait till the war is over,” Emma responded.

  “Don’t be a spoilsport,” Sophie compined, Ange nodding in agreement to her words.

  “I’ll gdly join,” Jessie said with a grin. Emma looked to Erik for a fraction of a second until she realised how doomed she really was.

  “Bed at midnight, at the test! I’ll personally rouse you all at 0600 hours sharp!”

  “Yes, ma’am!” Ange saluted with a devious grin.

  “Are we sleeping at the hotel as well?” Sophie asked her older sister with puppy-dog eyes.

  “If Ange and Emma are okay sharing a room, then there’s a third room avaible, right?” Jessie asked the group. Ange and Emma confirmed. It would make it easier for Emma to get them all out of bed that way.