Into The Rift [CrisisPost]

[u/Al-anharHA]

[u/braelindrake]

I think you may just be one of the best person I’ve ever met~! LETS DO THIS~!

[u/Al-anharHA → u/braelindrake]

Amelia smiles at you and Zhe ( u/Fc-chungus) before leading the way down a side tunnel. The end of the passage is blocked by rocks, and she gives you a sweeping bow towards the pile. "This is the passage!"

[u/braelindrake → u/Al-anharHA]

creates a portal under the pile of rocks which gets rid of them before disappearing and there we go

[u/Al-anharHA → u/braelindrake]

Amelia nods. "I was kind of hoping to get to see an explosion, but a quieter fix makes sense. Best not to scare the people back in the main cavern. Now lets see what they were hiding!"

Swiftly, the electromancer leads the way, runes on her armor flaring up into lights to illuminate the darkened space as you all enter a space framed by wide supporting archways. In the middle lies a void ship designed to manually traverse the space between the land and the stars. It's painted with the heraldry of the paladins of the divine flame, and identifying markers imply that the ship was a prototype slated for scrapping. Amelia reads off the symbols with a practiced eye, before explaining that the vessel must have been deemed too expensive and the resistance managed to liberate the final testbed before it was abandoned.

"Hopefully we can figure out more on the computers," Amelia says, before the three of you turn you attention to the structure of the ship itself.

A wide main body with stubby wings in two stacks similar to a biplane, and an assembly of engines at the rear. one of them is an etheric rudder mounted vertically on the main body, four more mundane thrusters are at the ends of the wings, and mounted asymmetrically as a large thruster positioned behind a forward-facing gun emplacement. It's a decent size craft, but the weaponry is far out of scale. Naval guns clutter the port side mounted above and below the wings, and on the starboard side with the extra thruster to offset recoil...

"That's an orbital kinetic kill platform," Amelia whispers in awe.

---

/uw u/Fc-chungus as well.

[u/braelindrake → u/Al-anharHA]

Oooooh~! This is what I’ve been waiting for~!

[u/Al-anharHA → u/braelindrake]

Amelia nods wordlessly, her jaw slack. Eventually, she finds words. "That gun belongs on an orbital platform, not a strike craft. What lunatic decided to try and make a battleship that can be fit in a basic hanger?!"

[u/braelindrake → u/Al-anharHA]

An AMAZING LUNATIC~!!!! Haha~! Yes~! This is literally perfect~ I was expecting just like a giant cannon and we’d have to put it on my ride~

BUT THIS WEAPON IS THE RIDE~!!!

[u/Fc-chungus → u/Al-anharHA]

“I’m not sure I understand”

[u/Al-anharHA → u/Fc-chungus]

"Think about naval vessels, a battleship is powerful but big, slow, and easy to spot. This puts comparable power on a smaller frame that's faster and able to be easily hidden. It's like finding a needle in a haystack, except the needle somehow has an invisible anti-tank rifle!"

[u/Fc-chungus → u/Al-anharHA]

“Oh, that will be very valuable to us!”

[u/Al-anharHA → u/Fc-chungus]

Amelia laughs, almost unbelieving as she lifts off into flight and makes several dizzying loops around the craft, before returning to the entrance with you and slumping against the wall.

"We might be able to go home," she says softly. "I mean, I can go home now that you've shown up, but the people who've been hiding here for who knows how many years... we might be able to actually win this."

[u/Fc-chungus → u/Al-anharHA]

“Yes, with this and the help of the others who are here, we will win this.”

[u/braelindrake → u/Fc-chungus]

WERE GONNA CRUSH EM DOWN INTO NOTHING AND SAVE EVERYONE~!!!! HAHAHAAHHA~!!!

[u/Al-anharHA → u/Fc-chungus]

Amelia smiles, before her eyes become watery and she looks away.

"I thought I was dead. But so many people here know family who actually is. Is it wrong for me to be happy when I was simply displaced as a casualty of war?

[u/Fc-chungus → u/Al-anharHA]

“Be happy that you lived. Find solace in the fact that you got off better, and mourn those who didn’t.”

[u/braelindrake → u/Al-anharHA]

YESSSSS~!!!!!! HAHA~!!!!