***Tirnanog, Aerie Flagship***

***Astra***

“You look ill,” I said while I watched Thalia trying her best to keep the contents of her stomach where they belonged. “Is your travel sickness acting up again?”

Her face looked a little paler than normal and a slight sheen of sweat had formed on her forehead, making me worry. I couldn’t help but imagine Thalia barfing all over some poor patient.

The thought made me shudder because it reminded me of the last time I had to help my friend through her travel sickness, also known as cleaning up after her.

It was only lucky that the sickbay wasn’t too busy, even though we had just fought a major engagement. Alas, an airship battle meant people either came out mostly unharmed – or dead. There was little between the two states and command ensured that the few wounded we had were evenly split among the remaining ships after they reunited with the fleet transports.

“Just a little bit,” Thalia admitted.

“I thought you had no problem with airships. The last time you were like this was on the Caravaner’s saherna,” I commented while Thalia began rummaging through a drawer.

Thankfully, I had petitioned to be stationed with Thalia once it became clear that the two fleets were disengaging and nothing disastrous would happen for the next one or two hours.

However, whether it would stay that way was something only Gaia knew. If it was true that there was a large night-terror nest located right in Raider’s valley the coming night would be bad.

Skye would most likely order the fleet to go dark and hope whatever horrors emerged from the nest would go after the remaining Vier vessels first and eat their fill. To wish for other humans to get eaten was horrible, but they were our enemies and had called this upon themselves. It also meant we wouldn’t have to burden our consciousness with killing them.

“It’s not solely the fault of being on something that moves,” Thalia explained her woes. “Whether I get sick or not is about the constantly changing directions. The saherna was bad because of the constant walking motion. So far, the flagship avoided unnecessary manoeuvres, but during the engagement they had the ship moving around like a roller coaster! First here, then there. Just pick a direction and go with it!”

I pursed my lips, slightly amused at Thalia’s exclamation. “Maybe you just need something to distract yourself?”

“If it was that easy,” Thalia said before she found what she was looking for in the drawer, a small pot. She took it and a green paste was revealed once the lid was off.

A minty smell spread in the room as Thalia dipped a finger into the paste and spread a generous amount of the substance on a piece of bandage before she rolled the fabric up and held it under her nose. After a few deep inhales, she already looked a little less pale. It helped, if not by much.

“Where is your better half?” I asked.

She gestured at a curtain which separated a camp bed from the rest of the room. “Sleeping his travel sickness off. And I am the better half between the two of us! How could you think otherwise?”

I grinned. “Don’t get too full of yourself. Anyway, are you sure you should be here at all if you are sick? Shouldn’t you go through the wormgate and sit this one out?”

Thalia huffed and sat down on a nearby field bed. “Even if I perform only at fifty per cent, I am still a better healer than most.”Reêad latest novels at noov/e/l/bin(.)com

We kept bantering in good nature till a warrior showed up and informed us of the lockdown I had already anticipated. The ship would moor with the rest of the fleet to ensure juggernauts could travel between ships without needing drakes. This made it impossible to manoeuvre, but if the worst-case scenario came true, running wasn’t an option anyway. If the nest beneath us had already flying variants, they could easily catch up with us.

Once the ships were linked with each other to ensure nobody got lost in the dark, they would close hatches and windows to prevent light from getting out.

Then the only thing left to do was to hope and wait out the night.

There were no illusions in my mind that I would get any sleep – which wasn’t too bad. My mutations allowed Magnus and me to go with a few sleepless nights. A stupid, lecherous grin stole itself onto my face as I remembered how helpful that was.

Once I realized what I was doing, I quickly schooled my expression.

“By the way,” I steered the conversation in a different direction to put my mind on other things. “We haven’t talked about what you got with your latest mutation! You only gave us a very basic idea, but shouldn’t you know for sure by now? I was under the impression the white monster would improve you a lot. It certainly was a hassle to catch it – even if that Vier ancient did all the work for us.”

Thalia sighed. “No, not really. I mean, there are definitive improvements to our strength and Precognition, but otherwise, it looks like the white night-terror was only just that, an improvement. The only other thing I noticed is that I can eat more and a lot faster without feeling bloated.” She shrugged and took a metal spoon from the nightstand. Then she casually folded the spoon’s cup the other way with an audible ‘pop’ and an inquisitive expression on her face. “I probably shouldn’t complain. I am finally no longer a psychic one-trick molerat.”

I took the spoon from her and tried to bend it back, but didn’t manage to do so with Thalia’s casual ease. I managed it only on the second attempt, using both thumbs.

“Haha!” I raised the spoon, but my triumph was interrupted by a ship-wide alarm, which finally caused Mark to wake up.

He grumbled and got up, immediately reaching for his bow and checking the presence of a spiked club on his belt. “Are they coming?”

I checked the UI, but there were no new updates. “No. We are to remain in position until ordered otherwise.”

Having three juggernaut-classed individuals guard the sick bay was overkill as far as I was concerned, but those in charge decreed it so. They likely wanted to ensure that the injured had a safe evacuation spot.

“Where is Magnus?” Mark asked once he had checked his messages, his eyes flicking around in that typical manner of people interacting with their UI.

***Tirnanog, Aerie Flagship***

***Astra***

“Stay back!” I screamed and drove my spear through the hole in the door, causing a shriek of pain from the other side before the spear was grabbed and a tug of war ensued. It ended when I electrified the weapon, causing another indignant shriek.

There were three of the monsters on the other side. If the reports in the UI were to be believed, they went to us in a relatively straight line after breaching the hull. The smell of blood in the sickbay had probably attracted them.

An arrow whisked past my head, followed by another shriek as I flinched away. “Watch it!”

“Sorry!” Mark apologized as he drew another arrow on his monster of a bow. I didn’t know the draw weight, but it had to be a lot since it was a custom product made especially for Mark. “Just don’t make any sudden movements and you will be fine. I am still working on this Precognition thing.”

“Just don’t shoot while someone is between you and your target! Gaia curse it!”

A creepy arm reached in through the hole and tried to undo the heavy-duty beam lock on the door, so I stabbed it.

The arm withdrew and a moment later the entire door caved in as something huge threw itself against it from the other side.

I steeled myself and was ready when a night-terror came crashing through the door. Aiming carefully, I caught it right through the mouth as it charged into the sick bay with no concern for injury. It must have been dead as soon as the blade of my weapon severed its spine, but the monster’s momentum kept driving it forward and into me – throwing me back.

Mark’s arrow caught the second creature charging into the room right through the eye, ending it instantly.

The third entered the room uncontested, its intimidating size forcing Thalia to move a step away from her spot next to the door before it turned to her and roared terrifyingly, spittle flying all over the place.

My friend’s expression turned quite strange as she got a whiff of the night-terror’s breath, her short sword already raised to chop something off the enemy. For a moment, it looked like Thalia would keep it together before she spectacularly lost the fight.

Bending forward slightly, she hurled out an impressive spray of strangely black stomach contents, covering the two metres between her and the monster. It looked like improved musculature also increased the pressure build-up when vomiting.

Vomit went everywhere. The monster’s face, mouth, and upper chest were generously dosed, startling the monster and causing it to inhale some due to the shock.

The moment of mutual surprise ended when white vapour began to rise from the creature’s skin and it let out a pitiful howl of pain. It dropped, rolled, and clawed at itself in an attempt to get off the stomach acid. All the monster tried only made it worse as it spread the black, oily substance around. The wooden floor also hissed and blackened rapidly. A mere droplet was enough to cause a violent reaction.

A second later, an acrid smell reached my nose, forcing me to retreat as far as I could.

The medical team who had retreated to the back of the room reacted. Some doctor cursed and quickly ran over to the ventilation system while covering his mouth and nose, turning it to full power. Another scrambled to get over to the wall with emergency equipment, choosing something which looked like a fire extinguisher but had a chemical hazard label on it.

She aimed it at Thalia and the monster before dousing both with a generous amount of some kind of foam which also blackened and sizzled upon contact with Thalia’s vomit, neutralizing each other.

The night-terror was only a twitching body on the floor by that point. Its torso was a wasted mess covered in black, bubbling sludge.

“What the fuck?” I exclaimed, still unable to breathe through my nose because of the sting.

“Fluoroantimonic acid!” Thalia exclaimed while looking down at her ruined clothes. What little vomit ran down her chin had dissolved her shirt and created a quite risqué V-cut. Thalia’s well-endowed chest was consequently celebrating its newly won freedom.

“What?” I kept repeating myself.

“Fluoro-” Thalia began before the doctor with the fire extinguisher sprayed foam right into her face, not allowing even the slightest remnants of acid to remain untouched.

“No talking! Get into the shower and throw away the clothes afterwards! We have to clean this up! Don’t you dare vomit a second time!” The doctor sounded quite serious.

“What is going on?” I asked once more.

The other doctor turned to me. “I don’t know for sure, but it smells like Fluoroantimonic acid. One of the strongest known acids and quite toxic.” He pointed at the quite dead night-terror. “It’s not as dangerous as deathnut oil, but we still have to check everyone in here whether they can withstand it.”

I looked around. “Seems like everyone is still up.”

He shook his head. “We just inhaled a bit of the vapour. That might be enough if someone can’t metabolize it. As with everything, the amount makes the poison. And if your body can’t deal with it, you could still bite the dust hours later.”

“Ah…” I tried to see something positive about this. “Looks like your mutation wasn’t just a ‘mere’ improvement.”

Thalia groaned. “Fuck my life.”