Crystal Heart

General Thomas McCreery had a problem. And the problem was that he was about to talk to a giant mechanical dragon.

It was the same one that had flown out of the hangar a week ago, when the Benthians had attacked. The one that had run rings around their fighters, rallied the straggling air force and then taken down an attack carrier without breaking a sweat. At the time, McCreery had been screaming at his operators to try and figure out how it had been launched. And the amount of blanks he'd drawn had made him even more furious. He was more than prepared to have the daredevil jock responsible thrown into jail for his brazen insubordination.

The frazzled, brown-haired boy that had clambered out, shaking all over, had made him reconsider much of what he knew about life.

Since then, Capital City had been recovering. ARM had provided reinforcements, and reconstruction and rehousing efforts were under way. But High Command had been pushing McCreery for answers - answers that he didn't have. All he could tell them was that the prototype had gotten out and that it had made short work of the Benthians. That wasn't good enough - they wanted footage, documents, proof. And that was something McCreery, who hated paperwork in the same way one hates ants in the kitchen, left to other people.

It had been some days since that fraught meeting. And now, here he was.

The Wyvern stood silent and still, held in place by the restraining clamps. The head was titled down at an angle, the jaws slightly parted. Nobody else had gone near it, afraid of what it might do after seeing what it could do, so it had gathered dust and damp. Yet it still looked a thing of beauty, all smooth black synthmuscle and silvery armour plating. Look at it too long and you might fancy it was breathing gently, or that it could lift a foot and scratch itself.

Even so, it was just a machine. Any mechanic could tell you that. Just an elaborate network of connected ArcStone powering a mechanical shell. There was nothing special about it.

McCreery knew better.

He stood for a while, looking the thing up and down. A wistful look seemed to come into his eye, hampered only by his stern, unmoving expression.

"I remember when they were working on you," he said, at last.

The Wyvern did not offer to reply.

"We were trying," McCreery continued, "to implement something new. Something radical. I don't quite understand the specifics - never did with this ArcTech stuff. But in summary, it was like a living intelligence inside an ArcWave system. It could record performance, display information, adjust internal systems... like having a navigator right in the cockpit. ArcWave Intelligence, the eggheads called it."

He paced one way, then the other, hand on his chin. His footsteps were like muffled gunshots in the cavernous hangar.

"And for a while, we just couldn't crack it. We simply couldn't replicate the way a human thinks via BCL - too complicated. There was... one thing we tried, though. And I admit, the ethics weren't entirely sound. But it was our best shot at getting it right the first time. Copying human brain patterns onto an ArcStone core. If we can store information on those things, we can store a man's intelligence on one, right? And then..."

He paused. He passed a hand over his eyes, as if tired, and blew through his moustache.

"I thought it had failed. We all did. Until our test pilots started flying it, and got all kinds of errors. Course correcting, flashing new flight paths, stalling... At the time, we put it down to how complex we'd tried to make it. Too many conflicting commands. And we couldn't risk letting a glitchy piece of hardware loaded with dangerous weaponry out onto the field. So we had it grounded and dumbed the tech down for the market release. Hence the XK-05's."

He looked back up. The eyes seemed focused on him, staring intently. But he couldn't be sure...

"I don't know if you're listening in there. It's hard to tell when all I can see is a big lump of metal. But I saw the way you flew out there last week, and I suspect the techies don't want to let on any more than they want to. And I'm running out of lies to feed High Command about what's been going on. So if you are listening somewhere in there..."

He took a deep breath, and steadied himself...

"Why him, Laura?"

Iron Wings

"Wing Five is down! Repeat: Wing Five is down and non-responsive!"

The words hit the ears of General Thomas McCreery, but they didn't register at first. Then he recounted the number of Wyverns in the sky, and noticed one was missing. He hadn't misheard, he just hadn't wanted to hear it.

General McCreery was the sort of man that came to mind when the word "military" was mentioned. Six foot tall, dressed in red with the peaked cap and epaulettes, and a bushy walrus moustache that made him look sterner than he really was. The sort of man who walked with a proper stride, always kept a pocket pistol handy and used such terms as 'carry on' or 'pack it in'. If he was a cartoon character, he'd be voiced by somebody doing a terrible impression of their grandfather.

But right now, he was trying his best to marshall his thoughts and come up with a plan. Not a plan of victory - as far as he could see, they were long past that point. A plan to stall the invaders until assistance arrived from outside the city. But it was hard to do that when the aformentioned city seemed to be mostly on fire, and all the operators at their desks were shouting conflicting orders in your ears. Of course, he wouldn't be a General of ARM if he couldn't shut out most of that white noise, but...

A Benthian fighter swooped too close for comfort.

Wing Five was down. The invincible aces were no longer invincible. Wherever the pilot was alive or not, McCreery didn't care to speculate - it was a blow to the morale as it was one to their chances. The Wyverns had been the best, the go-to problems solvers for years despite their cavalier attidue. There hadn't been an enemy they couldn't take on, no conflict they couldn't walk away from unscathed.

Until today.

The General shoved those thoughts aside and turned to the nearest of the control bridge's operators. That man, middle-aged and with a crew cut of unidentifiable shade, was barking something into his headset as he stared at his control globe. Whatever it was he was actually doing was beyond McCreery's comprehension - he never took the time to understand this newfangled ArcTech nonsense. But this was the modern day, and that meant he needed to hear what people like him said. Now, what was his name, again...?

"Operator Rogers!" he barked as he approached. "Any word from outside?"

"None whatsoever!" was Rogers' reply. "I've tried to raise HQ, but I can't get any kind of a signal - not even so much as a squeak! That carrier's jamming our long-range communications somehow!"

McCreery blew through his moustache - partly annoyance, partly nervous tension. Damn. These Benthians were on the ball. Trying to shut out assistance from outside the city...

"Do we still have short-wave?"

Rogers paused. "Well, yes sir, but I don't see how-"

"Keep those lines open!" the General snapped. "Get everyone down there to pass the word on! Sooner or later, by Gods, something's got to reach HQ! If we can just hold out-"

An explosion rocked the tower. The lights and monitors flickered, and dust trickled down from the ceiling. Some people fell out of their chairs with cries of shock, and McCreery struggled to maintain his footing. His stiff upper lip refused to let him turn into a heap on the floor - it would be beneath his dignity to do so.

"We've been hit!" cried somebody else. "They just turned the bombers towards the tower, sir!"

McCreery felt the colour drain from his face as he realized what that meant. He never expected that he'd go out like this, trapped in several thousand tonnes of glass, ceramic and steel whilst enemy bombers pounded at the foundations. He'd imagined that he'd slip away peacefully at his country home, surrounded by his wife and younger sister and all their children. True, it would involve less posthumous medals and parades, but it wouldn't be so... undignified. Or painful.

His mind scrabbled for the one thread of logic that made sense. The effort was puncutaed by another explosion as the second wave of bombers struck true. They had ten minutes, at the most, he reckoned. Just enough time...

"Order an immediate evac," he gasped, at last. "All non-essential personnel are to leave the building at once. Get as many as possible out of the city, and get the Wyverns to cover the transports. The rest of us, stay behind and support our boys. And if anyone one of you has a gun, be damn sure it's loaded, because we're not going to go down without-

"Sir?"

If there was anything General McCreery did not like very much, it was being interrupted. Especially not in the middle of a rousing speech. Those were the most inappropriate times. He whipped round at the speaker, and then realized he didn't know the name of the young, blonde woman who'd spoken. And he couldn't reprimand them if he didn't know them. Oh, damn, the inconvenience and forgetfullness of age.

"You have something to say, miss?" he asked, voice losing most of it's commander's edge.

The woman nodded. "Operator Dallas, sir. An unidentified craft just launched from Bay Hangar Five. ETA at approx forty seconds-"

"Unidentified?" This was something the general did not need to hear. They were about to die, and this woman was going hysterical seeing things on her glowy screen! "How can it be unidentified, Operator?! If it launched from the hangar, it's one of ours!" At least the reinforcement would provide a small delay, he groused to himself.

"Sir," countered Dallas, "it doesn't register as any callsign on record and it's not responding to any of our hailing calls. Whatever this is, it can't be one of ours - all of our wings launched five minutes ago."

"What the devil are you-?!"

The General hesitated. An insidious thought had crept into his mind, one that he didn't want to entertain.

"...can you get a visual?" he asked.

The operator nodded. "I'm bringing it up on the main screen now." She typed something on her keypad, and the General turned as the central display console lit up with a picture. With a network of Scrying Posts around the bay area, each with a considerable range, it was easy enough to get a fix on the strange craft as it zoomed across the water. How the Benthians hadn't seen it was beyond anyone to guess.

It took a moment for the General to recognize what he was looking at.

It was a Wyvern. But not any Wyvern - not the XK-05's that were the favoured amongst the Wyvern Squadron. They were gunmetal grey, angled things, designed by a corporation for function. This looked sleek, organic and alive, and the metallic plating that coated the black synthmuscle was silvery to the point of almost being white. The cockpit was on the underside, around the chest, and the exhaust billowed a brilliant violet colour instead of the usual green. And the eyes...

"Sir?" Roberts had looked up, eyes full of concern and confusion. "What is that, sir?"

General Thomas McCreery turned to his operators. They stared back as, with a great effort against the mixed fear, confusion and rage, he drew in breath.

It wasn't enough.

"What Styx-blackened idiot," he demanded, "let the prototype out?!"

Steel Wyvern

"Hey."

No. Shut up. Just go away.

"Hey, kid."

Go away. It's nice here. All dark and warm. I don't wanna-

"Kid, I'm talking to you."

Ryuga Kanzuki's eyes cracked open, and realized that he wasn't lying in his bunk. Then he decided that he rather would have preferred the bunk. He would have only got a caution for sleeping in. But he was inside the cockpit of one of the Allied Realms Military's most sophisticated pieces of equipment, so a caution would be wishful thinking. At best, a demotion. At worst, firing squadron.

He really did not want the firing squadron.

He tried to get up, and hissed as pins and needles sang through his arms. This made him discover that he was lying in a crooked pretzel on the floor of the cockpit. There was a moment where he struggled to unravel himself, unsure of where his limbs were and why his hips were above his head. Then he managed to draw himself to his knees, where he could peer out and see the service gantry a little way off.

For some reason, he had a headache. He groaned and rubbed his forehead, rustling his unruly mop of hair with the action. A general cloud of worry stirred in his head, with various doubts fighting to shout above each other. One in particular seemed to say didn't I hear a voice a few moments ago, and he had to admit that it had a point. Even if his immediate concern was to get out of here and find an aspirin.

But when he tried to stand up, he bonked his head on the glass canopy.

"Whoa, easy there, champ!"

He paused in the middle of nursing his head. The doubt was now screaming at him, and against his better judgement he decided to confirm it and turned his head.

The figure that confronted him was light blue, and faintly shining - a hologram. It was also female, around four inches tall and standing on the right side of the control console. His immediate thought was that she was naked, but a second glance revealed the lines of a form-fitting bodysuit, of the sort an actual pilot would wear. Her short hair was neatly cropped to about shoulder length, and might have been jet black without the blue tinge. She stood with a casual hand-on-hip stance, a faint smirk on her face, and when she spoke her voice was tinged with an accent Ryuga couldn't quite place.

"You had a bad tumble," she explained. "I closed up so you'd be safe. Been tryin' to rouse you for the past five mintues, by the way. Talk about a heavy sleeper!"

Ryuga blinked. He was pretty sure what he was seeing wasn't supposed to be possible. Was he still asleep, and dreaming this whole thing? That was a little too hopeful, considering that he'd just made a painful acquaintance with some glass. He could still feel that, and as far as he was aware, pain in dreams wasn't this acute.

"Um," he tried. "Who are you?"

The smirk split into a grin. "Name's Laura. You're Ryuga, right?"

"Yeah." And then Ryuga shook his head. "Sorry, are you the ship's AI? Only I didn't think they were as articulate as this."

"Ooh, articulate. Picked a real egghead here." Laura shifted her weight - if it existed - to her other leg and folded her arms. "And yeah, if you wanna call me that. It's a bit more complicated, but I basically do everything the standard ArcWave Intelligence can do. And more, actually - long story."

Ryuga didn't like the way she was looking at him. It made him feel two different things - primarily, embarrased to be wearing his grubby mechanic's boiler suit. He wanted to run to the shower block and roll about in the cleansing powder for about half an hour. And secondly, she seemed to be sizing him up, judging him as though he were at a job interview. Or the way a tiger sizes up the deer before it pounces. 

Actually, scratch that - neither comparison was making him comfortable.

He cleared his throat. "Okay... can you open the canopy, please? I kinda need to get back to work, and I'm not supposed to-"

The canopy had deadened most sound from the outside. But the explosion was still loud enough to make him jump, falling backwards into the seat. He looked up, and realized with a cold thrill that the hangar doors were open. If he wasn't shut up inside, he would have felt the light summer breeze against his skin, heard the shouts of technicians and other crew members running about, and the blaring klaxons that signaled a desperate emergency.

He didn't hear or feel any of those. But he did see the skyships darting about, filling the air with laser fire and smoke like a deadly neon concert.

"What's going on?" he shrieked, eyes wide.

"That?" Laura didn't even look round. "Oh, we're just under attack."

A lot of things flashed through Ryuga's mind at that moment. The shock and fear of realizing the base, and by extension the city, was being assaulted. Bewilderment that the speaker could have treated the affair so casually. The memory of a man built like a gorilla shoving him aside, causing him to tumble off the gantry. But of all the things he could have said, what actually came out of his mouth in a panicked scream was:

"By who?!"

Refurbishment

The sight of Big Bobby's Bonus Boss Pavilion was a familiar one. It was hard not to recognize the huge red-and-white big top looming over everything like a big, candy-coloured blob. It was the place for cheap popcorn and stuffed toys, of hurd-gurdy music and the occasional punch-up. But more to the point, it was the place where people - especially Kobbers - came to test their mettle against the toughest of enemies, the strongest foes and the meanest threats. It was a place where boys became men, girls became women and those who were already there got some bragging rights.

So when it suddenly disappeared, people weren't sure what to think. The only clue as to what happened was a hastily-placed signpost, on which the following had been crudely scrawled.

BIG BOBBY'S IS CURRENTLY UNDERGOING REFURBISHMENT.

WE APOLOGIZE FOR THE INCONVENIENCE.

Night of Blood (Part 4/4)

~EARTH ZF-025, WORLD OF BUILD~ 

Vent Light was making preparations.

In the time between watching the Teapot burn and reaching his own hidden laboratory, he'd managed to make several deductions. One: Faust hadn't just come there to kill his mother, they'd been after something. Two: There was a limited amount of somethings they could be after, and one of them was the most likely something. And three: that particular something had a very specific requirement, one that would mean exposing a whole other world to Faust and it's experiments.

And that was not something Vent was going to stand by and watch happen. So in the comfort of his laboratory, somewhere underneath the streets of Manhattan, he was hunched over his work table and fiddling away. It wasn't the most comfortable space to work in - organized chaos seemed to reign in every corner of the room, with the test tubes having a territorial war with the flasks and the bunsen burners ganging up on the centrifuge. But it was the best he had, and he never was very good at keeping things tidy anyway.

In any case, the immediate concern was the watch-like device in front of him, case open and circuitry exposed as he typed furiously away on the tablet he had to one side of him.

The prototype MKII Sifter was something of a pet project for Vent. Even though the original had served the Kobbers well in previous outings, the tech had long become obsolete to the point that even criminal organizations could copy it. And the major flaw had always been the need to traverse the Bleed, which Vent saw as the equivalent of crossing a volcano by wading through the lava, i.e. reckless and stupid. This new model was designed to cut out the middle man by shunting a person from one physical plane to the other without exposing themselves to the dangerous radiation - a feat that would be admirable, if he could get it to work.

But he'd been struggling for months, and had long drawn a blank. The thing simply refused to acknowledge the existance of other planes, at least based on the theorem he was trying. Unless he accounted for the Bleed travel, the very thing he was trying to avoid, the internal computer would always come up with a null value, and didn't seem to accept any other shortcuts that he typed in. So either the thing simply wouldn't work, or it would probably dump somebody into the coldness of the void to suffocate and die. Or just rip somebody apart at the molecular level.

A sigh of frustration escaped the young man as he put the tablet down and pushed his hair back, feeling a migraine coming on. The answer was somewhere, he knew it, but it just wasn't coming. He thought the theorem of dimensional travel had been cracked long ago, but by his calculations, jumping between two different planes like this was a logical impossibility. And with so much at stake, solving it was becoming more and more of an issue. If he couldn't get this to work...

A ding to his right told him the coffee was done. The machine it was poured out of looked more like something one would bolt onto a starship's engine to make it go faster - because it had once been exactly that. Of course, the filtration systems that had once refined combusted fuel worked just as well for beverages, with the right tinkering. But Vent's mind was far from the intricacies of spaceship engines as he grabbed the cup and took a long, thoughtful sip.

It was in the middle of that sip that the brainwave hit him, hard enough to make him spit-take.

Heart of the Forest

~KUWAHAWI ISLAND CHAIN, ZFRP MAIN UNIVERSE~ 

The Aetherian Forest was forbidden ground, according to the aboriginl lore. It had been since the ancient days, when a terrible war had been fought between the Forest and the rest of the land. The war had made the Forest sick, and the Heart of the Forest had grown mad with the sickness and become hateful. It had tried to push the Forest to where it did not belong, and smother the entire land in green. But the Ocean and the Sky had protested, and thus a pact had been reached, pushing the Forest back to where it belonged.

Now it stood on the one lone island, a blot of vibrant green against white sand and sparkling blue ocean. It looked like something out of a painting of primeval times, or perhaps a scene from a fairy tale, and tales were told of giant flowers, berries and fruits the size of a man's head and animals of spectacular health and energy. But the aboriginals of the islands never went near it, for they said to step on it was to invoke the wrath of the Heart of the Forest. The Heart never forgot the damage that had been done before the war, they said. And it had never forgiven, either.

The man either did not know or did not care. He just wanted to shoot something.

He was one of those rich men who let their wealth, and the respect it brought them, get to their heads. As far as he was concerned, problems other people had didn't apply to him, and when they did all he had to do was throw money at them until they went away. It was how he had gotten away with being a classic big game hunter in a modern world of namby-pamby, hands-wringing conservationists. Who cared about a few dead rhinos here and there, anyway? That was what animals were there for, wasn't it? What good were they for, if not for shooting? Some people were so melodramatic.

Getting onto the island was easy enough. Tour guides became surprisingly willing to comply when you slipped a thick wad of dollar bills into their hands. Finding anything to shoot, however, was a lot trickier. The forest was so thick and dark that it was difficult to make out anything - even the noise of the birds seemed deadened and muffled, as if someone had thrown a blanket over it all. Once or twice he thought he heard something rustle in the darkness, or catch a glimpse of movement, but with so little sunlight filtering through the canopy it was hard to tell if something had been there, or if it was just the plants moving in the faint breeze.

The man was losing patience rapidly. He'd come here looking to hunt a particularly rare specimen - the endangered Kuwahawi water deer. The finest antlers of any in the islands, the books had said. And the more endangered the animal, the more proud of himself he'd feel once he saw the head stuffed and mounted up on his study wall. But now his trigger finger was beginning to itch - he'd be happy to shoot anything, just so he didn't have to put up with the dead silence.

So the diminutive tree bear had picked a poor moment to run in front of him.

The gunshot was like an explosion in the forest. Everything in the vicinity, startled by the sound, went absolutely still and quiet. But none more so than the bear, who somersaulted backwards with a cry of anguish, crashed to the floor and lay unmoving. Two bloody spots on it's chest told where the bullets had penetreated all the way to the heart, and most likely all the way to the spine. They weren't right sort of bullets for deer, being made for much bigger animals, but the man had wanted to be sure that whatever he hit wouldn't be getting up again.

The man lowered his gun and snorted. What a waste. A tree bear was hardly worth the effort when he had spent almost a full hour looking for something bigger. Then again, it would do for a start - he still had time, and plenty of bullets to spare. Perhaps, once he got the body into the light, it might prove to be a new species unique to this island. He could get it named after himself, and then get the skin made into gloves or something. His ex-wife had been asking about a new fur hat.

He moved to collect the body, and then found his foot was stuck.

He looked down, and saw that thorny briars had entangled his boot, crushing closely around it.

"What the-?" he cried, and drew his machete. But he never swung it - a tree branch suddenly came down and smacked it from his hand, drawing scratches in the process. He pulled his pistol, intending to shoot the vines off, but had to drop it with a cry as vines suddenly sprouted from the wooden handle, lashing at him with hooked tips. The briars were creeping up his legs now, pricking and spearing him, and all around him the forest seemed to be swaying and shaking, as if in the throes of some terrible agony such as can only be found in a nightmare.

The man was beginning to wonder if he should demand his money back when he heard a growl. And then he made the mistake of looking up.

Glowing green eyes, filled with unspeakable rage, glared back at him.

"You have hurt the forest," snarled the thing.

"And now the forest shall hurt you."

If it's any consolation, the man only felt a twinge of pain before the jaws crushed his skull. It wasn't much consolation to him, but it was worth mentioning.

-------

The native guide's boredom at waiting was relieved when the crushed, severed head of Harold Rathbone Esq. was tossed into his canoe. The half-squashed face looked up at him with eyes bulging and mouth hanging open in a silent scream of terror. Blood trickled from the cracked skull and down the temples, giving the appearance of gruesome warpaint. Some of his teeth were missing, and more blood pooled from the hollows in the gums where they had popped out and ran out of his mouth.

On the shore, the trees rustled ominously.

The guide deciced not to stick around to get the rest of the body thrown at him. He paddled away faster than you could say "no refunds".

-------

Harold's death was published as a footnote in the papers. He hadn't been as influential as he'd liked to believe, his only mark on history being all those dead rhinos. A lot of people said good riddance to bad rubbish, and that it was about time this sort of thing was stopped. Others said that it might have been murder, since it seemed odd that the guide would come back with the head and not the rest of the body. Others wondered if some animal had got him, and concluded that it served him right, if that was the case.

But the locals, when questioned, only shook their heads and said the same thing. He'd hurt the forest, and made it angry.

And the Heart of the Forest had taken vengeance.

Introducing

JOHN HURT

as

SYLVANOS

The Heart of the Forest

Night of Blood (Part 3/4)

~EARTH ZF-025, WORLD OF BUILD~ 
 
There was a long, protracted silence after Kamen Rider Kiva had spoken those words. Night Rogue still reeled from the full-on kick to the face he'd recieved, mask gently smoking. Kamen Rider Build was still on his knees, clutching the wound inflicted by his enemy's blade. And Blood Stalk stood there, taking it all in as the two Smash behind him looked uncomprehendingly at the scene and growled.

Stalk was the first to speak. And, as usual, what he said threw everyone there off.

"Oh, my God, it's Batman!" he cried.

Kiva dropped his stance and turned. "Dude, we've been over this. I'm not Batman."

"Shut up, you're totally Batman!" Stalk looked as thought he wanted to start hopping up and down on the spot. "Come on, do the voice! The growly Christian Bale one!"

"No," groaned Kiva.

"Come on, do it! Do the-"

Stalk was interrupted as, with a grunt and a hiss, Night Rogue came to his senses and pulled himself upright. The shattered glass of his visor, a spider-web of cracks over the yellowish bat-shape, was plainly visible as he turned his head to face Stalk. It looked as though somebody had driven a truck straight into his face - which, given how hard the kick had been, was an apropos comparison.

"Stalk," he growled, "what are you doing?"

Stalk shrugged with almost casual nonchalance. "Who, me? I've been doing the thing you wanted me to do. And I gotta say, I'm doing a better job of it than you are right now. Seriously, you let the comic book nerd get the jump on you?"

Rogue said nothing, too focused on getting back to his feet to come up with a retort. But Stalk's words had a more immediate effect on Build. He immediately began to rise as well, ignoring the pain of his wound - though it made him wince behind the mask - to try and focus on the red-clad invader and his words. And perhaps it was because the words held more significance to him, but he managed to get back to his feet a lot quicker than Rogue did.

"Thing?" he demanded, voice sharp. "What thing?"

It was then that Stalk seemed to notice him. "Oh, hi. Nice colour combo, by the way. Red and green really suits you! Too bad I chose it first, but-"

"Stalk." That was Rogue, already losing his temper.

"Oh, right." Stalk gestured to Rogue and turned to leave. "This way, if you don't mind." And he began to saunter off down the corridor as though he were on the red carpet.

"Wait!" Build moved, dashing to try and catch up with the cobra-masked warrior. But he had to come to a stop, because two other figures suddenly barred his way, snarling.

"Oh, you know," crooned Stalk, "I'd love to stay and chat, Build. I really would. But these guys..."

"...they're kinda overprotective."