Ravens of Eternity

406 The Galaxy Ablaze

Five Years Later

Towering flames engulfed nearly a quarter of the city. Its once-beautiful skyline had become jagged and uneven and blackened with soot. Many of its tallest buildings had been turned into its largest piles of rubble instead.

More critically, many of the city’s blocks had been utterly flattened by crashed warships. There was a cruiser, a handful of destroyers, and a dozen frigates all scattered everywhere. Each of them tore up massive swaths of the city and left huge craters and trenches wherever they fell.

Their hulls were split open and exposed, which revealed the shattered and mangled interiors. It didn’t matter if the ship was from the Hegemony or the Empire, the result was the same.

Also scattered throughout the city were the wrecks of hundreds of fighters and mecha. They too had been wrenched apart by weapons fire along with their pilots.

Nearby were columns of hovertanks, which had also been torn open and blasted to pieces. Some were even still aflame. Scattered around the destroyed hovertanks were power armored soldiers.

Or at least, parts of them. Some had been blasted to pieces with such force that their heads or arms or legs were flung far across the city itself.

And then there were the regularly armored combatants – the common soldiers. Usually, the kind that was conscripted or enlisted. They had taken the brunt of enemy weapons fire, and were brutalized to such a degree that many were mangled beyond identification.

Their limbs had been blasted to shred and torn away. Their chests had been ripped or burnt or blasted wide open. Their guts and their brains intermingled openly on the streets, and swam in the blood of countless others.

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Some had been completely burnt, scarred, or turned to ash. A few had been cut in half with their midsections completely disintegrated.

Regardless of how they died, all of their faces were fixed with unfathomable pain and horror.

These machines of war were far from the only casualties that littered the city’s streets. In and around the many destroyed buildings, and in numerous underground facilities and tunnels beneath the city were the bodies of hundreds of thousands of civilians.

All of whom were buried under tons of debris and rubble. Some completely, others partially.

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Many had also been torn apart by wanton weapons fire, and their body parts were scattered in numerous directions.

Their blood was everywhere, some of which clumped up after absorbing the many piles of dust and debris. It streamed down the cracked and shattered and mangled streets. It didn’t matter where it came from, whether it was drogar or human or combatant or civilian or old or young.

They all pooled into bullet holes and beam scars and craters big and small, everywhere.

Though most of the city was on fire or blasted to pieces, a small section of it was still mostly upright. Now that the fighting had mostly stopped, civilians left their hiding places, took to the streets, and ran for their lives.

For any who survived, getting away from all that death and destruction was the only goal worth having. And no-one could blame them.

Well, except perhaps for those screaming and yelling for help. The ones partially trapped under rubble, or knew others who were trapped. Some had no idea if the others buried with them were dead, and some were slowly crushed with every breath they took.

Though most kept on running past, some stopped to help. Some threw themselves down on their knees and began to dig those people out with their own hands. Some ran out and called for help or tools or a doctor or anything.

Mostly, they found others in the same boat, and were helping others trapped or buried or crushed. They too needed more help and more tools and more doctors and more anything.

Sometimes, others came to help.

Sometimes, others came to chide them.

“Wait!” said a panicked civilian. “If you dig too fast, you’re gonna make it all fall down on top of us! Think about what you’re doing!”

“Yeah? Well all the more reason to dig faster!” screamed one of the others.

“Are you insane? Are you all gonna kill yourselves just for one or two people?”

Angered by the panicked civilian’s words, one of the ones digging with his hands leapt up and grabbed him.

“So what?!” he yelled into the man’s face. “We all think it’s goddamned worth it! If you’re not gonna help, then get the hell outta here!”

He then threw the panicked civilian to the ground, down to his hands and knees. Then he immediately went back to helping the others dig out whoever was trapped in the rubble.

The panicked civilian looked up in horror and watched as they pulled away more debris until they revealed the top half of a woman. She was covered in a thick layer of gray dust, some of which was dark from her blood.

The woman seemed only half-conscious and was muttering for help as she feebly waved her arms, or at least attempted to.

And when her rescuers pulled the large chunks of debris off her legs, found that they were completely shattered. Bone splinters punched through her muscle and out her body so gruesomely that it gave everyone around her pause.

Everyone was completely shocked at the sight, and stood around her for a few moments, unsure of what to do.

“What are you all waiting for?” the panicked civilian cried out. “Get her out of there!”

He then pushed past the crowd, then lifted her up by her shoulders.

“Well?” he continued.

A few others then went in and picked the woman up from all around her, an act which caused massive amounts of pain to shoot through her. She began to scream loudly even as they carried her to the relative safety of the open street.

They brought her to a relatively open section, where others who had also been dug out had been carried. Some were still alright and alive and conscious, but severely shaken. Some were broken and battered just like that woman, or worse. Some were already dead or all but dead, and nothing could be done but give them their peace.

As they set the woman down among the others, a vast shadow flew over all of them. It halted some of them in their tracks, and made them look up into the sky above.

A few of their eyes widened as they realized what was above them.

“Hegemony ships!” he cried out. But before he could finish his sentence and tell everyone to run for cover, those on the ship announced themselves.

Sonic emitters from countless drones simply told the people, “Citizens of the Empire, please don’t be alarmed. We’re here for search and rescue duties and mean no harm. Please stand by as we deploy our Civil Defense Force to help the wounded.”

Many drogar were confused and had no idea what to do – above them was a Hegemony warship. It was clearly bristling with destructive weaponry.

They couldn’t help but watch as the Raven’s Refuge floated high above. The ship was encircled by dozens of fighters, some of whom went out and patrolled around the city itself. More importantly, hundreds of ambulatory hoppers flew out of the destroyer’s hangar bays.

The hoppers spread out all over the city, and landed as close as they could to the numerous emergency sites all around. And the very moment they touched down, teams of four sprang out of the hoppers and immediately helped whoever was closest.

The drogar citizens were completely astounded at what they were seeing – it wasn’t just because humans were helping them directly. It was because there were also drogar alongside them.

They too wore the same uniform, and had the same tools. They worked together and quickly dug out anyone else who had been trapped under tons of debris. And they did so with absolute ease. As they cut apart the rubble with highly precise plasma cutters, antigrav drones would immediately lift out and carry any that fell.

Even the medtechs didn’t hesitate to help.

They often got right in the mix and began treatment the moment they could, even as the others dug out the injured. And as they scanned for lacerations and broken bones and bruising and bleeding, they called out whatever wounds they found to their teams. In turn that made their cutting and digging that much more careful.

As the countless teams worked all over that corner of the city, the Spirit of Amelia herself came down to the streets. The corvette was just small enough to fit in the wider streets, though she had to do so very carefully.

She swooped down towards an open square, and landed in an area with the least amount of intrusive rubble. Vents all over her hissed as interior and exterior atmospheric pressure normalized, then her cargo bay lowered down.

On it were a handful of hovering medical beds, each one with an eager medtech manning it. By their sides was a companion wolf, meant to be both comfort and protection. Hovering around their heads were medical drones to help assist.

Leading all of them was Azrael herself, who directed each of the teams towards the various emergency sites around the square itself.

She joined one of her teams and headed for one of the sites, where a number of people had already been carried.

One of the drogar was attempting to resuscitate a woman whose legs had both been broken. But he was too frantic and panicked to be of any real help. In fact, his flailing made others feel that he was being more harmful than not.

“May I try?” asked Azrael in drogar. Though her accent was rough, they could easily understand her. It shocked a few that she would even speak it.

The panicked civilian nodded, then backed away from the woman. At which point Azrael took his place.

She scanned the woman’s body with her medgun, which noted that the woman was suffering from both pulmonary edema and cardiac arrest. And of course, shattered bones, punctured scales, and lacerated muscles.

Azrael quickly injected the woman with one of her more potent cocktails. Countless nanites flooded the woman’s pain receptors with painkillers while others carried pure oxygen straight into her lungs. Those same nanites then carried her blood back out into her bloodstream.

Still others infused her body with micronutrients for a small boost of energy while the rest sealed up any open wounds. Especially those in her legs.

Then, one of her drone arms swung out and over. Its pointed tip moved over the woman’s chest even while Azrael moved her hand to the woman’s upper ribcage. She adjusted it very slightly just once.

The woman choked and gasped as a quick electrical charge shot through her heart momentarily. At nearly the same time, Azrael pushed down on one of her lungs and emptied it. When she let go, it automatically inflated and drew in air on its own.

Although pain would have quickly shot through the woman, she felt very little in that regard. In fact, she seemed so out of it that the world seemed warped and surreal. As though she had been dug out of a deep, dark pit and revealed to the sun for the first time ever.

It was then that Azrael put her hand on her shoulder. Its warmth felt great.

“You’re gonna be okay,” Azrael told her.

And despite the fact that it was a human who told her that, she felt it was absolutely true.