Someone finds himself here unexpectedly.

He's actually asleep to begin with, and so has no opinion on this development.

He is human in appearance, very short, wearing clothing in an unfamiliar style, and has a strange silver web shining under his skin, glowing strands peeking out from beneath the long sleeves and high collar of his linen tunic.

A fifteen foot tall spider-thing stomps straight through what was left of a nearby house, its shiny black carapace broken up by ominously glowing red hexagons. That's probably loud enough to wake him up.

It is!

He is confused and alarmed!

It slows, stops, rears back...

...And shoots out a beam of searing red light that hurts to look at, towards something atop a cliff in the distance. The cliff is lighting up with little flashes of light and smoke. Something impacts but glances off the black-and-red thing, whistling metallically.

Now may be a good time to mention the similarly-themed and much larger creature flying off that way. And the red beams it fires a volley of every five seconds.

Tiro stands up, for the small improvement in vantage this gains him. What the fuck is happening?

To all visible effect, some kind of battle. With a lot of very loud ranged weapons.

Two human figures, each riding... Something, dive out of the sun and drop a pair of bombs on the spider-thing. It shatters into glowing white debris that fades quickly. Pieces of shrapnel pelt Tiro.

And one of the monster's friends following behind it takes a potshot at the flying pair, which gets blocked by a glowing circular shield.

One hand and a chunk of shoulder are torn away in sprays of glittering shards by the shrapnel impacts. They regenerate in seconds.

The scene is... confusing. And alarming. He is confused and alarmed. Again. But rather than get out of the way of further shrapnel, he climbs some rubble for a better view.

There's a whole column of those spider things advancing from the right. To his front is an ocean, a ways off. There are plateaus with flat areas between them to his left and behind him, all laced with what looks a lot like fortifications of some kind, but he's far enough away and there's enough smoke around that it's difficult to tell. The other side apparently has weapons that can send projectiles flying at rather insane speed, judging by the continued crack-whoosh and clangs of them flying past or ineffectually hitting the spider-things.

If he stays here long he's probably going to attract a red beam or get hit by a misplaced projectile.

Also, the giant flying thing? It's one of three. And if his vision is sharp enough, there are more human-figure-riding-things here and there. The bright blue 'shield' is pretty distinctive. They're mostly keeping low and out of the way, maneuvering for position.

Eh, all right then.

The silver lines under his skin glow, and he rises into the air.

This is an attention-getting course of action. Spider-things attempt to hit him with red beams that would go straight through rock walls given time. And they're used to faster targets.

Figures.

The beams smash right through him, fountaining bright glassy shards across the battlefield. He grits his teeth as crystal spars reach across his torso and reconnect, weaving themselves around the silvery net that still holds the shape of his skin even without any skin to shape it. And he zips straight up, just shy of the speed of sound.

There's a whisper in his ear in a foreign language. "Hey you, with the glass. You a civilian, or what unit are you from? Either way get out of there!"

This does not give him a lot of vocabulary to work with, but it does give him: "What?"

And he keeps gaining altitude until the spider-things look small.

"Just- Ugh, can't keep talking to you, I'm comms for the whole Tobruk Task Force, just fly toward the fortifications."

They're much more obvious and impressive from above.

In the absence of any clue what the fuck is going on, that seems like pretty reasonable advice. He flies toward the fortifications.

He's pretty clearly not a Neuroi. The cannons and machine guns aimed up at the sky don't shoot at him.

On the other hand, the Neuroi do shoot at him. He's hit straight through the chest by a lucky shot from one of the giant flying things on the way over.

A tight formation of flying people breaks off from the patrols flying around, and approaches. The use their blue shields to shield him from incoming fire once they get close. Curiously enough, they're all women.

One of them comments, "That is an interesting curse."

He nods. He doesn't really have the vocabulary to explain, and also his lungs are currently falling to the ground in a cloud of gleaming pieces. (Ow.)

The magic on him... is definitely interesting. It is highly unwitchlike in flavour. There is a thing that makes him able to understand the meaning of any words spoken in his presence, and the thing that makes him shatter and regenerate the way he does, which is very insistent that he should be able to regenerate from even the tiniest fragment of himself; and then there is the silver web that lets him fly and move quickly and accelerates his healing. The silver web is magically recognizable. It's impossible to confuse it with any other object, because it is so extremely and definitely itself.

She wants to poke at all of it, but there is other stuff to worry about. They keep flying towards the fortifications. A city is visible in the distance beyond them.

"So. You randomly appeared at the site of a battle between the United Defense Force and the Neuroi. As far as we can tell Neuroi want to exterminate all humans." A volley of lasers hits the suddenly-appearing wall of shields as if to punctuate her words. "We kill them when they attack, occasionally even take back some territory, but can't make any progress on figuring out where they come from. Scratch that we know where they come from just not how. You're a civilian so unless you want to volunteer to fight our job right now is to escort you to Tobruk Refugee Center." She observes his reaction to this prospect.

The 'civilian' shrugs. His lungs finish regenerating.

"I - can't make any progress - volunteer to fight," he says, hoping that if he echoes her exact words she'll get the hint about what's limiting his communication.

She observes his magic for a bit, then, "I you they we him her go stay yes no the a all some none stop wait-" Several people contribute to the word-stream.

He smiles and nods gratefully, then listens to everyone until he's caught enough vocabulary to put together what he wants to say:

"I would volunteer to fight, but I don't know how much use I'd be and the middle of a battle seems like the wrong time to try to figure it out unless you're losing badly. I can fly, move fast, the glass thing, understand words, that's about it."

"The real fight hasn't even started yet. We're doing hit-and-run as they move into position. The flying ones are the problem, really. Gonna slam into them with a combined attack from above and below once they're in range of the fortification's guns. Can you carry much, flying? It's a bit vicious and probably painful but we could give you bombs to deliver to the spider-heavies."

"Actually, understanding words could be useful," Someone speaks up. "The ground forces speak ten or twelve different languages. The officers mostly know English and know their jobs but it's a big headache for them apparently."

"I can carry bombs and understand languages. Takes time before I can speak languages though, I need the words."

"Okay, either's an option. But here's the thing. If you're going to join our hit-and-runs I would need you to know our signals and such. Large scale coordination is a huge part of our fighting style here. I really don't think you can help immediately, we're better off having you learn the ground forces' ten languages and helping coordinate there. I really wish we had smaller radios."

He shrugs. "Okay."

They start flying down past various fortifications and weapons. There's a railway line running almost right up to the largest set of walls. The redheaded one eagerly and rapidly explains the concept and operation of things as varied as trains, artillery, signal flags, and dive-bombing as they descend.

He is delighted by the explanations and follows along very well.

"Quick study! Maybe you could help on attack runs. You're faster than us, which could be big, but I'm leery of making you the centerpoint of some crazy bold plan without getting to know you and what you can do more, and vice versa."

"Yeah, makes sense. I'm happy to hang back and learn things first. Oh, and - my name's Tiro."

She nods at him. 'Still flying' is not an ideal situation for handshakes. "Gren."

(Her nametag says Grendyne Nylund. The others also have tags, on closer inspection.)

He nods back. (The nametags will have to wait until he learns to read.)

They fly into a very large building full of hundreds of little cradles designed to hold their flying-things and are directed via flag to a particular set.

"Chatterbox just told me, if you're willing to not get in the way the generals will let you stand near all the other aides in the telephone building, listening. Since there's not any obvious better place for you to try and learn ten languages at once."

"That sounds good."

Huh, that smile. She doesn't often see, well, anyone in a context that registers 'cute guy: possible flirting or romance'. Goes to show how much of her has gone into the Witch Wings.

No time to think about that.

"Alright then. I'll lead the way while the rest of my squad goes on rest for the big strike. And sorry for the rough welcome. I want to talk to you some more when we're all less, hm, busy."

"That sounds good too!" he says cheerfully.

She doesn't have places to be other than 'resting up for the big attack'. And flying over to the telephone building doesn't have to be as fast as possible. They can make way for other air traffic even when it's not strictly necessary.

"So, I can sense magic, and sometimes copy it, can break curses once in a while. So far you're inimitable but I might get something similar if I stare at you for long enough." What a choice of words. "Er. Where'd you get cursed, or am I bringing up bad memories by asking?"

"A - I don't know the word - an athra did it," he says. "I don't even know if you have athrai here. You have way different magic, it looks like."

"We're Witches. Here, sometimes, randomly as far as anyone can tell, little girls turn out to have magic. We all get a basic package- flying, shields, blasting things- and one specialty. Mine's copying. Chatterbox can speak at range, you heard her earlier, Sparky does lightning... All sorts."

"Athrai aren't human or much like humans. They can be any shape they want and they have lots of magic. Sometimes they curse people, sometimes they - opposite of that, sometimes they make magic things like this thing I have for flying. But they almost never kill anybody. Someone tried to trick an athra into killing me with a curse, and instead, this."

"That's... Strange. Opposite of curse would be a blessing, I suppose? Possibly charm or enchantment? Those words don't come up outside fiction, here. Magic items, though, that's interesting. Witches can't make magic items, there's a few old legends about them and my old commander insisted that her clan banner gave battle-luck, but nothing provable."

They're almost to the telephone building.

"Athrai make magic items sometimes! Not a lot, but sometimes! My family has a bunch, my - country - has a bunch more. I, uh, borrowed this one, from the family, I wanted to try flying. Slept in a tree, woke up on the ground with the spider things. No idea what happened in between."

"Too bad I wasn't there to see it happen. Spontaneous world-hopping sounds like some strong magic. We do have teleporters who can maybe find your world, but they're in immense demand by the war effort. We'll have to see if we can get one for you. Anyway, here's the place."

She talks to a guard briefly, and the guard then turns and asks Tiro to follow him to the main hall of the building.

Tiro is happy to follow the guard.

Here is a large room full of at least a hundred uniformed people, mostly young men, talking in the advertised ten languages! Mostly transferring status updates, connecting phones to each other via massive boards of wires, relaying new orders. It's a busy place and the atmosphere is tense, but everyone knows their job and the overall effect is that of a well-oiled machine. Tiro can stand in the red-outlined area, where a bunch of people are assigned to stand and wait for someone to ask for something, typically fetching parts.

Tiro is small and does not take up very much room. He tucks himself into a particularly out-of-the-way part of the red-outlined area and shuts his eyes and listens as hard as he can and drinks in all the languages.

...Soon, all the orders coming through are variations on 'aim at this place, prepare to enter full battle at the signal, good luck'.

He wishes he could help, but - this is how he's helping, learning ten languages is useful.

Things become a lot busier over the next few minutes. And the slightly distant thumping of artillery swells into a steady rumble without pause. There's probably an opportunity to use his newfound language skills somewhere... 

Like that phone operator desperately trying to explain something in English because the only Ostkav-speaking man in his section is busy trying to convince a panicked second-in-command officer to hold the line despite the loss of his boss.

...yep. Tiro can help with that.

He darts over and says, "I speak Ostkav."

"Who are you? Nevermind, ask why he's not in position-"

Tiro's so helpful. A few more chances to help like this spring up, but nobody's looking for him knowing he can sort-of speak ten languages.

And he only sort of speaks ten languages, and he wouldn't even know how to start actually advertising this capacity even if he felt comfortable enough in the skill to do that, but he stays in the red outline and listens and listens and every so often he hears someone needing a language and goes over to help.

The fact that most of the vocabulary he does know is military in nature helps with making military communications.

Perhaps an hour into this, there's a piercingly loud sound halfway between the metallic screeching from earlier and a bell ringing. This triggers a brief round of cheers before getting back to business.

That's, uh... good? That sounds like it was probably good.

That was good! It was the death-cry of one of the big buggers. They can deal with ground Neuroi easily enough, the flying ones were always the concern.

Of course, there's two more.

Yeah.

Tiro listens to languages and helps with translation difficulties.

The battle doesn't last that long.

Two more Neuroi death-bells follow soon, and then a lengthy mopping up of the ground forces. Most of the telephone traffic during this period is coordinating Witch dive bombers onto grounded Neuroi that nothing on their side is currently shooting at.

That sounds very promising!

The mopping-up will last a while, but everyone here can clearly handle it.

Gren comes back and comes inside looking for him. "I think we're pretty much done, relatively few casualties too, so I came to get you. How'd learning languages go?"

"I learned languages," he says. "A lot of them. Helped out a bit when someone needed one they didn't speak."

"Good! I don't know if you want to stick with this long term, or what you want to do, but 'translator' is an useful option to have."

"It is! I'm better at it than I expected. I speak two languages at home but I've never really had to translate for anyone."

"I'm glad... I want to know more about athrai. If they're as incomprehensible as you say maybe we'll have difficulty, but if they're as powerful as you say the generals want to try to get one aimed at the Neuroi."

"The way the Neuroi go around killing people, it shouldn't be too hard to convince an athra to do something about them... athrai are weird, though, it's hard to tell what they're thinking. If I see an athra I'll try it."

"About that... I'm in a sort of special position. I go around assigned to many different things and taking on unique tasks, mostly because of my unique flexibility and abilities of analysis, but this doesn't necessarily translate into political power. They don't want to let you try to go home through a teleporter either until several weeks from now if nothing more urgent comes up, or if there's something at least a little more concrete than maybe getting an athra ticked off at the Neuroi."

He shrugs. "Sure, as long as I've got food and somewhere to sleep until then. And maybe some new clothes, these ones have been shot a few too many times." His shirt is indeed in pretty bad shape.

"Is a uniform vest acceptable for now?" She starts walking out of the building to where her flying thing is sitting on the ground, and hops on it. "You might be able to borrow someone's civvies but they'll be sure to have thousands of uniforms in a box somewhere."

"Sure, why not."

So she flies him over to the quartermaster and requisitions a standard kit - a big box full of uniforms, soap, a tin cup, and a bunch of other things regarded as necessities. But no weapons.

The quartermaster isn't happy but it's not like she's asking for an artillery piece, she has enough authority for this.

And now Tiro can put on a shirt that doesn't have any holes in it! Hooray!

"Thanks," he says.

Yes, horray, he was getting a lot of odd looks what with not being in a uniform and being half-shirtless. And the gossip mill is already turning about the 'curse' of absurdly fast flight, regeneration, and shiny silver glowing veins.

"I have someone asking around for a place for you to sleep. D'you have any more questions? I certainly would, in your position. Want to go find a mess hall?"

"I'm sure I'd have plenty of questions if I had any idea where to start. Mess hall sounds good."

"Sure, this way. Oh, don't attach any unit or rank insignia to your shirt. You're not in a unit and don't have a rank. Yet, maybe."

"Makes sense!"

Fly, fly.

"You know it makes me wonder - what life is like without the Neuroi War. I've been in it one way or another since I was, what, eight? Nine?"

"There's no Neuroi in Rythe but there's no telephones either. Our worlds are really different."

"Telephones are new. The history books say everyone got their act together when the Neuroi didn't just go away. The Unity Agreements- Well, I feel like we'd have a bunch more wars on our hands if the Neuroi disappeared tomorrow. But we've had ridiculous extremes of technological advancement in the last thirty years."

"It did sound like a lot of the interesting stuff was really recent."

"There were interesting things before, but... More Athrai-style, sort of? A singing field of flowers. Leagues of witches controlling government from the shadows. I was friends with a yellow talking fox once, didn't even seem to be a cursed human. There's a purple spring in Liberion. Turns anyone who drinks from it purple for a few days. Of course, the war's more important than any of that."

"Yeah, that does sound... athrai-style. Well. Maybe I can get an athra to deal with the Neuroi."

"Maybe you can. In the meantime, do you prefer rice with fish, or rice with pork, or potatoes and butter? Isn't rationing fun?"

"I'll try potatoes and butter!"

Potatoes and butter: Is surprisingly tasty!

Gren has rice and pork and hands over a little paper ticket marked 'L' to acquire a mug of coffee on top of that. "Tasty, tasty caffeine."

"What's that?" he asks, about the paper.

"A ticket for 'Luxury rations'. Coffee, tobacco, candy, eggs and milk. Higher ranks get more of 'em."

"I should learn to read at some point if I'm going to be here for weeks."

"...You don't get reading from listening to people, of course you don't. Well, I'm no teacher but... The Romangan alphabet is used by most of the languages you'll hear around here. Pronunciation's tricky though." She pulls out a pencil. "A, B, C..."

Literacy! Yay! He follows along delightedly.

The lesson will be a bit slow, being squeezed in between sips of coffee and bits of porkrice.

And Gren is almost managing not to consciously think about how she's socializing with a cute not-forbidden-by-military-regulations guy.

The cute not-forbidden-by-military-regulations guy is really happy about learning to read. Even if it's slow.

...And even though her religious and moral views on the whole thing have mellowed out, the overall standoffish maybe-later attitude has inertia. She'll pick at it later, maybe. For now she'll keep teaching him the basics of reading, and that's it.

Their food is gone soon enough. "I want to go see if Juno's found you a bunk yet."

"All right," he says agreeably.

So they fly back to her hanger and rest her flying-thing in it and walk to go find Juno.

Juno has two options: A tent that Tiro can set up in the unused-but-still-enclosed-by-walls area somewhere, or a slot in a bunkhouse full of fifty soldiers. Well, probably only forty-five or so after today. Maybe he can swing something better tomorrow, but it was kinda short notice.

Eh, he'll go for the tent, thanks.

And now Tiro has a tent, and Gren has paperwork to do. "We're on a rest cycle for the next three days, so come find me tomorrow if you want something and don't know who else to talk to."

"Will do!" he says cheerfully, and he goes off to find somewhere to set up his tent and then spends some time listening to passing conversations.

Passing conversations are very soldiery. My insane commander's so strict, did you hear what Samril from 13th did? I miss home/booze/my family/my girlfriend. If I find contraband on you again you'll be cleaning the latrines for months!

His vocabulary expands, as does his understanding of the situation. It's useful.

There's also a fair amount of mourning going on, and worrying about friends in the hospital now.

A place to set up his tent is easy enough to find.

Now he has a tent.

He wishes he'd brought more artifacts. If he had something for healing... but he doesn't. Well, in a few weeks he'll get to go home and quest for an athra.

A group of very slightly drunk soldiers approaches him after about ten minutes. Would he like to play cards? This guy over here will buy him in, apparently for the bragging rights of having brought an interesting person to the table, though he doesn't actually say as much.

"Sure, why not. You'll have to teach me the game, though."

It'll be fun, they promise. The first two hands of poker are a warmup, nothing actually wagered, to be fair to the new guy.

It does indeed seem to be fun! He picks up on the basics pretty quickly.

And then actual wagers.

People bet things as varied as a compass, 'L' tickets, a knife, biscuits, and actual cash, with vigorous debate on the relative worth of each thing.

These are tough customers, and they know this game.

Tiro has pretty much no resources of his own to bet. He plays fairly conservatively, not wanting to end up in debt.

No, he won't end up in debt- Corporal Hasel gave him a pack of cigarettes to bet with. If he runs out, he's out and that's that. No debt here.

As soon as that part is solidly clarified, he starts taking more risks.

Well, whether he'll come out ahead or behind depends largely on how good he is at reading other people.

Extremely.

And his luck runs about even, too, so by the time the soldiers break up for the night he has turned his pack of cigarettes into four 'L' tickets, two shillings four pence, and a quarter of a bar of chocolate.

Although this was not strictly part of the arrangement, he offers to pay Corporal Hasel back for the pack of cigarettes that got him started.

Corporal Hasel will accept the chocolate as repayment. Can't get that with tickets.

This seems reasonable to Tiro. All right.

It's late. He finds his tent and sleeps. In the morning he seeks out breakfast at the mess hall and does not spend any of his luxury tickets.

Is it the same mess hall as he went to yesterday?

Yes? Should it not be?

Then the staff will recognize him and not question his authorization to be there and receive food. Would he like dry pancakes (syrup is an L), mashed potatoes, Mystery Stew (hearty, if unidentifiable), or oatmeal?

He is feeling adventurous and will try the Mystery Stew.

The Mystery Stew tastes like it probably contains meat of some kind. And beans. It could really use some seasoning, though.

Meh, could be worse. Time for a productive day of learning any language spoken in his presence!

...a productive half-morning of learning any language spoken in his presence, then he gets bored and goes looking for Gren to see if she has suggestions about how to use his time more productively than that!

If he looks in the hanger he can find the redheaded one working on her flying machine with some of the maintenance crew.

She sprints up to him. "Hi again I never introduced myself properly I'm called Knight! I really like working on the Steelwings and talking about them and I almost never get to explain things to anyone new and you're new so do you want to learn about them?"

"Yes, that sounds perfect. I'm Tiro, I forget if I told you that already."

"I knew that Gren told us. So the thing about Steelwings is they turn Witches' mana into physical force. We don't know why it does this, how it works, but we know how it looks, and how to change how it looks, and that means experiments are the entire basis of Steelwing technological advancement! For fighter-style 'wings like these the most important thing is..."

She's very energetic, isn't she?

She is. And it's very energizing. Tiro is energized. He's going to learn so much about Steelwings.

Yup! Apparently they come in a bunch of different varieties. Fighter designs are a constant tradeoff between maneuverability, speed, reliability, and armament. The dive-bomber model behaves a lot like the fighter model and is just a bit bulkier and better at, well, diving. There are 'courier' models that are capable of immense speed in straight lines, almost sound-breaking. Heavy models that can allow a Witch to efficiently lift huge loads without exhausting themselves as quickly as other 'wings would. Every aspect of them is steadily improving, though of course producing and repairing and maintaining them on a large scale is a gigantic task. But since airpower is the centerpoint of the Neuroi War, they've gotten very, very good at it.

The reason she knows so much about Steelwings is because she's kind of obsessed with pushing hers to ever-better limits. She trades her 'L' tickets for requisitions of special new parts, and similar tradeoffs. She doesn't want to talk about anything but flying.

This is a pretty respectable interest to have. Tiro is also interested in flying. He borrowed this artifact from his family's collection to go flying with!

It's really neat.

She doesn't ask whether she can borrow it, though it looks like she wants to.

He doesn't make the offer; he doesn't know her that well yet. But he's happy to talk about Steelwings some more. Steelwings: pretty great.

She's awkwardly avoiding looking at him now, and stammering. (She really really wants to try it, but you can't ask to borrow important things it's rude she knows that much and probably against regulations not that she knows them all-)

Information about Steelwings is still being conveyed, though.

"...Are you okay?"

"I'm... Bad at... Talking to people. Can I borrow it there I said it I was rude you can say no and we can go back to talking about Steelwings."

"No, you can't borrow it. Tell me more about Steelwings!"

Steelwings are pretty great and Knight knows a lot about them! She offhandedly mentions her two patents. 

"I'm getting older though. Twenty seven. In a few more years I won't have enough mana for combat left. Guess I'll go racing, research and development maybe..."

"What happens to your mana when you get older...?"

"Disappears. We just get less and less. Goes down by half by thirty. Injuries do it too sometimes, or malnutrition, but mostly age.

"Huh. I wonder why."

"If you wanna meet a doctor, I think we can do that. They're gonna be busy after a battle though you know. Obvious reason."

"Yeah. I can skip it. They have better things to do."

Back to talking about steelwings. She's heavily into theory now, it's a surprising amount of math.

Tiro can keep up with surprising amounts of math! It's kind of fun, even!

Yeah, she'll keep happily yammering away about Steelwings and only glancing at the cool artifact every once in a while all day if he lets her.

He does have to go get lunch at some point. But then he can come back!

Does he want to try helping Knight install this new part? It's made of an alloy of a fancy new metal called aluminum, they've started to refine usable amounts of it in only the last two years.

Sure! That sounds like fun!

She barks out commands and names of tools or steelwing-parts, explaining the process very fast.

It's absolutely delightful to not have to slow down her explanations for someone.

They have to open it up, move this assemblage out of the way, unscrew a bunch of things, lift the new part in and fit a bunch of tubes up to it, screw things back in, move that assemblage back, then double-check it all.

And they do, and it works, and Tiro is delighted to help!

Tiro's going to be Knight's new best friend at this rate.

At one point Gren comes in to question Knight about the rest of the squad's 'wings. Knight reports that they're in acceptable shape, to which Gren wryly comments, "Which means 'excellent condition' to anyone else. Hi Tiro."

"Hi Gren! Knight's teaching me everything she knows about Steelwings, it's pretty great. But if you have a suggestion for something more useful I could be doing with my time, I'm all ears."

"Funny you should mention. You might not be pleased by this, but the Unusual Resources Division is very excited about the glass you make when injured. They're probably going to ask for more sooner or later."

"You're right, I'm not pleased," he says. "Making that stuff hurts."

"Yeah... Depending on how much they like it, they might offer to pay you, or other favors, but nobody's going to sneak up to you with a hammer if I have anything to do with it."

"Thanks, I appreciate that."

"We're not so desperate in this war to lose a bit of humanity for some extra-shiny lanterns and mirrors."

He smiles.

"They also want to know what other artifacts you or your family have, with an eye toward buying or leasing them."

"I don't have any with me... we have a few area-effect healing artifacts, you could see about leasing those... a cup that's always full of water, a hunting bow with perfect accuracy except that it refuses to hit humans..."

"...Would it refuse to hit Neuroi, is the question. There's an ace called Thunderbolt, and the name doesn't come from a lightning ability but how she can fire super-powered arrows."

"Well, I'm sure my family will let you test that if you pay them a reasonable amount."

"There'll be problems figuring out a currency exchange, and the Unusual Resources Division's budget is not infinite, but yeah."

"It's in a good cause; they won't try to drain your budget."

"They'll want the healing artifacts too of course. And when I tell them this I imagine they'll want to put you in front of their lie-detector then requisition a teleporter to try and establish contact."

"While you're trading for artifacts you can try the royal collection too, it's got more and better things, but I don't know it as well."

"They definitely will. What kinds of stuff do we have that you don't? To get an idea what to show off."

"We don't have a lot of your recent technology. Radios, telephones, all that. And no Witches."

"The tech is all really new and mostly expensive, and we're using most of it for the war effort. Depending on if we can get through at all, and how hard it is, I bet some of it is definitely on the menu. In less peaceful news, the general staff is planning a counterattack in two days. A huge flight of Witches and thirty thousand ground troops pushing east. So if they can't get you home by then I'll be gone from here. Unless they make me stay, I tend to be point-of-contact for new things. Not sure yet."

"I bet you could make a deal with the king of Haela where you bring some people over to learn how to make all your technology and he lets you walk off with some artifacts. And - good to know about the counterattack."

"Engineers are available. We have a shortage of them compared to what we want ourselves, though, people who are good at it are only so common."

"You can work it out with Talovir."

"Yeah. I'd tried to copy that artifact, but it's got an immense amount of power behind it, I can't match that. It's more efficient to use other magic. Say, I never finished teaching you to read."

"I would love to continue learning to read!"

Knight practically trips over herself to offer a Steelwing maintenance manual as practice material.

Gren has an old adventure novel, a couple of maps, and various bits of paperwork on offer.

Tiro is interested in Steelwing maintenance manuals and old adventure novels. He isn't quite up to having both things read to him at once, but he can switch back and forth.

Actually, better not to irritate Knight. Gren will leave them to it at least until they run out of manual.

Sure. Knowledge! Yay!

Meanwhile:

Very close to the place where Tiro originally arrived in this world, someone else shows up.

He is more or less human in appearance, with several... quirks. For one thing, he's eight feet tall, with exaggeratedly broad shoulders and slim hips, and a shining waterfall of ankle-length silver hair flowing down over his black velvet cape. His face and body are flawlessly symmetrical, his skin bloodlessly white, his eyes solid black from lid to lid. He looks around slowly, his motionless face fixed in a mild puzzled frown. Under the cape, he is wearing what looks like plate armour made of gleaming white porcelain.

This place continues to be an empty village in a deserted wasteland, with the addition of a lot more rubble and a few craters.

Twenty people in tan uniforms are painstakingly picking up tiny pieces of Tiro, overseen by one person with a slightly more decorated uniform.

There are human figures flying in the sky, a few of these notice him, and shortly after a great many people know that he's there. Two hundred or thereabouts.

He orients himself toward the nearest human and says something crisply enunciated and incomprehensible in an exquisitely beautiful, very carrying voice.

That would be one of the guys picking up pieces of Tiro. He jumps in alarm, then stares.

The boss-human shouts at them for a moment and the squad is shaken from their little reverie. They set down their buckets of glass and start to run in the opposite direction. Not in a flat sprint, but at least a healthy jog. Most of them steal looks back at the athra.

More and more people continue to know what's happening here.

The athra rises into the air to watch the fleeing humans, but doesn't pursue them, just floats there. His ridiculous hair flutters in a nonexistent breeze.

The humans are significantly more alarmed, now that it's shown he can fly. Flocks of the flying ones circle at a distance, high up. Some of them carry recognizable weapons, like swords and bows. The rest of the stuff and the sticks the ground-humans hold are probably also weapons from context.

He calls out to the flying ones, repeating his earlier question.

No, they don't understand him. They shout back in their own language. It sounds stern.

Gren dashes back into the hangar, looking for Tiro.

He looks up from the manual, mildly alarmed. "What?"

"I think an athra showed up. Tall, strange proportions, black eyes, big hair, near where you appeared."

"...I should go talk to it, nobody else is going to know how," he says.

"Yep, language problem. They're going to haul in a linguist to get lessons from you now I bet. The standing order is to keep our distance, and attack if he does anything hostile or approaches the fortifications. Because not everyone's gotten the memo that athrai even exist yet. URD was explaining them when I left, let's go." She hops on her Steelwing. "Knight, good job it's already ready, get everyone else on flight standby, would you?"

"Sure thing boss."

Tiro hovers. "Lead the way."

She does.

To a room full of very important-looking people who aren't quite shouting in their argument over how to treat this athra.

"...I should really go talk to it," says Tiro.

Great. Here's a radio (big, heavy thing) please don't make any promises on our behalf or tell them about the fortifications. How much backup does he want, two flights, three?

"I don't honestly want any backup at all. Whatever answer gets me out there fastest."

They at least want a radioman to follow him and make reports, and he'll need backup.

That is quickly arranged.

Out to meet the athra goes Tiro. It's still floating in midair, occasionally asking any humans in earshot a question in Haelahar.

He flies close enough that he won't have to yell. The athra looks at him, still wearing the exact same puzzled frown.

"Stranger!" he says. "I am Tiro of the line of Fara Bright-Handed, and honoured to meet you. What brings you here?"

"I wanted to know what had become of my heirloom," it says. Its frown changes smoothly to a smile. "And now I know part of the story. Tell me, how came you here? How, wearing the net of my hair, did you come to be in this place? I want to know. You must tell me."

"I do not know what brought me here, as I was sleeping at the time," Tiro admits.

"Oh! I have come a long way to hear very little," says the athra. It goes back to frowning, a slightly different frown this time, less puzzled and more annoyed.

Everyone in the sky gets slightly more tense. Radio guy shouts to please not annoy it.

Tiro ignores them all.

"I have more to tell than that," he says.

The athra tilts its head at him, and after a moment remembers to change its facial expression to a politely inquiring one. The expressions themselves are individually unremarkable, but they're disturbingly static; it changes between them like someone swapping out the sign hanging in front of their window. "Go on. I am interested in your news."

"The people of this world are in great danger," Tiro explains. "You see around you the aftermath of a battle with the menace called the Neuroi. They are strange and powerful, and they have killed an enormous number of humans."

"This is alarming news indeed!" says the athra, sounding appropriately alarmed, although it's still wearing its 'polite inquiry' face. "It would be good and noble to save these humans' lives!"

"I very much agree that it would," says Tiro.

"You must help me."

"I'd like that," he says. "A moment, please; I need to translate our conversation for the locals."

"Yes, please do," says the athra.

Tiro turns back toward radio guy and says, "I told the athra about Neuroi and it wants to help!"

Well, he did recognize the word 'Neuroi'. He broadcasts this information to a bunch of eager listeners. "Good news. Return chatter is skeptical about what 'help' looks like - resources, fighting them directly - and isn't happy with the prospect of negotiating with an athra, but we'll take anything we can get."

Gren approaches as close as radio-guy, then leaves again. With a bit of a headache. What the hell even is that. It doesn't make sense.

"They are pleased by your offer of help, and they want to know what form your aid might take," says Tiro.

The athra changes shape from a tall broad-shouldered man to a tall broad-shouldered woman; most of the difference is in the hips, which get wider, and the feet, which get smaller. "I want the humans here to live well and thrive!" it says.

"A noble aim. May I make some suggestions for how to bring that about?"

"Yes, please do."

"You could grant eternal youth to the women with magic," suggests Tiro. "You could craft a powerful artifact of healing. You could find the Neuroi and destroy them or make them harmless."

"Do you like my heirloom? Is it beautiful and useful?"

"Yes, it is both those things, and I am proud to wear it," says Tiro. "To really help these people, though, you're going to need a wider scope."

"I see, I understand," says the athra, nodding. It makes a gesture, a graceful wave of its hand.

Every Witch within about five miles is now biologically twenty years old and in the peak of health.

Gren flinches, hard. And flies further away. What the hell. Her copysense is now much sharper, she hadn't realized how much it had declined-

At least the magic that's now on her without her putting it there is less overwhelming than the incomprehensible wall of noise that is the athra.

Most of the rest of the Witches out flying take this development with disbelief, then joy. Some of them shout out thanks, for old scars disappeared. The rest of the army is cheering as well, when people start to realize what's happened.

They want to know if he can do it for more Witches, and if he can do it enough, regular humans.

Some of them are a lot more worried, though. If it can do that with a wave of its hand... Athrai don't kill, Tiro says. But it's still worrying.

"...I'm sure that will be a great help," says Tiro.

The athra changes its expression to a pleased, hopeful one.

"Can you create something like a fountain of youth, that does that for anyone who touches it or drinks its water?"

"Yes!" says the athra. "That is certainly within my power, and I am happy to help these poor people."

It puts on a look of concentration and holds out its hands. A beautiful fountain rises from the ground, huge and complex, sheets of water cascading from tier to tier and then sweeping back up in high arcing jets at no discernible provocation.

"Now you have a fountain of youth," Tiro explains to the escort. "Anywhere in particular you want another one? This athra is really eager to help you."

...They're already planning to move the fortifications forward twenty miles, and build a city around it. Literally. They called the Chiefs of Engineering just now and said they needed to build a new port and airport and railways, closer to this thing to get as many hundreds of thousands of people to visit it as possible. This place is going to be a global treasure. It'll probably be renamed.

Plenty of places could also use one, depending on how long the athra will tolerate spending traveling to them.

Tiro asks. The athra smiles glowingly. "I will go wherever I am needed!"

"Tell us where to go and we'll make more fountains," says Tiro. "It doesn't seem to care about travel times." He explains to the athra that it should bring him with it as a translator, and it agrees.

First go to Benghazi. Due west about a hundred fifty miles. After that, well, they're having someone write up a travel path for more cities as we speak and will probably know by then.

They'd appreciate it if they brought a flight of Witches on courier-wings following. It will stop the locals from being suspicious, and those machines have radios built in so the local commanders can be contacted if something comes up. Gren begs off, saying the Athra overwhelms her copysense. They have her stick around and confirm that the fountain works as described instead.

Tiro and the athra agree to this plan. Off they go.

The fountain works pretty much exactly as described. It dispenses the same magic that the athra spontaneously gave to all those Witches - eternal youth and health, with the 'health' part imposed vigorously enough to get you pretty close to true immortality. Not all the way, but pretty close. It also has an infinite supply of water; if you drain some water out of it, it will refill itself very promptly, and drinking any of the water or touching the structure of the fountain confers the benefit.

Some of the UDF High Command want to wait, keep operating as normal, do their due diligence of paranoia at anything new. They're shouted down because are you mad every minute we keep this from people is a crime against humanity.

By the time they get to Benhgazi, scratch courier-flight, here's a bunch of different teleporters hopefully one of them can move the Athra.

The second fountain is just as elaborate as the first, in approximately the same style but with a different exact design. It's beautiful.

Tiro explains teleporters to the athra. The athra says that teleporters should be able to teleport it. It's unclear whether this is a prediction or a statement of intent, but the first teleporter they try succeeds at moving the athra. Tiro comes along.

London, Moscow, Mumbai, Jakarta, Seoul, Los Angeles, Rio de Janeiro.......

After a few hours the entire world is talking about the strange visitor distributing fountains of youth.

Each city gets a fountain, every one with a unique appearance but the exact same magical effect. Tiro is delighted. The athra also seems to be delighted, as far as it's possible to tell.

Once they arrange for every city of any significant size to have a fountain (which does take a while), the offensive part of the war is going to be on hold for a while while everyone celebrates.

The Neuroi always take a month or two to adapt to anything new after all.

Gren finds Tiro sometime in the aftermath and barely doesn't straight-up hug him. Her mom, the last family she has left...

"The last day has been more good news than we've had in twenty years. Is it wrong to thank whatever brought you here?"

"No, I don't think it's wrong at all. I'm glad I could help," he says.

...You know what, screw it. Hug. Gentle, nonbreaking hug.

"The fountains saved my mom. Last family I have left. She was... Sick. And there are millions of the same story. I'm thanking the athra too of course."

Hug!

"Athrai aren't usually this helpful. Either we got an especially nice one, or it was really scared about the Neuroi trying to kill everyone. Or I'm unusually good at convincing athrai to do things, I guess."

"The second thing seems likely, if they're that big on not killing. I don't really care why to be honest." Endhug. "It's not like this is the end of all our troubles. We have precogs, they say the Neuroi aren't outmatched yet. But there's parties in the streets, every street, you know how long it's been since I saw people this happy?"

"A long time, I bet," says Tiro. "Making people happy is my favourite thing."

"If you still want to go home, I bet the teleporters will have recovered from that spree in a day or two."

"I'll go where I'm needed. Which is probably here for at least a little while longer, while we figure out more uses for a panicked athra."

"Oh, they haven't had someone stick to you furiously learning your language yet? I thought they would've."

"The language honestly isn't going to help that much."

"Background knowledge is important, gotcha. I can't get within a hundred fifty feet of an athra. They hurt my copysense, like a wall of noise. Or a canvas somebody throw every color of paint at and set on fire."

"Ouch. The stuff they do and make isn't as bad, I hope?"

"No, not nearly as bad. Same, flavor? Still confusing, it works on a different level. But so much less intense. A dim mess is much better than an overly shiny one, and it can even start to look pretty if you see the patterns, to stretch the metaphor."

"Well, that's good."

"...I think a lot of people are worried about what it might do if it gets bored. The fountains are shooing that fear some but we've never interacted with athrai before. Makes you nervous."

"I mean, it might do unpleasant things. That's a risk with athrai. But it won't kill people. And I think for as long as it's still panicked about the Neuroi it'll keep being helpful as best it knows how."

"What are some examples of unpleasant things? The UDF might or might not 'forgive' a couple reasonable things given all the help it's given us already..."

"Making someone disappear and then reappear fifty or a hundred years later in the same place they left... turning someone into a talking animal... all really small-scale individual stuff, they don't do bad things to large groups of people, at least not near Haela."

"We have cursebreakers. I'd give them even odds against athrai magic, even, I can do lots of things but none of them as well, so. Yeah, the fountains outweigh that by so much it's not even funny."

"Yeah."

"...Did you learn to read in just English? I know Suomic and Ostkav, they're different."

"Yeah, I haven't had time to achieve literacy in the rest of them. Teach me!"

So she does.

Literacy! Yay!

Presumably he was already literate in his other language.

Which Gren would be interested in learning the bare basics of, at least.

Sure, he can do that. It's called Haelahar. Here's the alphabet. Here's a few basic words and sentences. Here's a nice poem he remembers about his family's mountains.

Memorization is a skill she has honed reasonably well. And she knows several languages already - makes it easier to pick up a new one.

She's no prodigy at it, though.

Tiro still has fun teaching her. And he's pretty good at it.

Sooner or later her free time is up. "See you some other time."

Meanwhile, the UDF would really like to know how is is best to talk to an athra, and learn his language. Gren will be writing up the basics for them, already.

Tiro is happy to teach Haelahar to anyone who wants to learn Haelahar. He can also probably convince the athra to give itself the same language-comprehension magic he has, although convincing athrai to do things is kind of hit-and-miss even when they're really helpful.

"The problem is that athrai don't think the same way people do and I really don't expect good results from trying to teach someone how to talk to them. I'll do my best, but my big advantage here is the fact that I grew up knowing about them and hearing stories about them and I can usually make good guesses about what they're up to."

Yes, they've noticed that it doesn't seem to quite get humans. Things like facial expressions.

Would he like the chance to ask one of the more powerful precognitives in the world how the athra will react? She's rather vague, but they've already determined she can see its actions from some experiments earlier.

That sounds really useful but he's not sure what to ask. What do they want him to try to get out of the athra next? He could inquire after plausible strategies and see what the precog thinks.

They've been organizing their requests not by how useful something would be, but by how terrible it would be if it somehow went horribly wrong.

They know that the athra seems to like beautiful things so that is another criterion they've been organizing by.

A forge that helps its user create whatever they like, couched as being for the best craftsmen in the world. An artifact that can let people see other kinds of light than the ones humans usually can. Weapons to fight the Neuroi with or direct intervention against them. Buildings of various sorts in various places. An artifact that can grant people refuge and safety. Large quantities of raw materials would be nice but they don't expect that to go over well given what they know about it.

Empowering people as witches and a tame Neuroi to study would be very nice but these are rated high on the 'potential doom' scale.

Tiro predicts that the forge will go over well, the light artifact might or might not work but won't be a disaster, he has no idea if he can get it to cough up weapons and isn't sure what will happen if he tries, buildings seem worth trying and hard to have go too terribly wrong, refuge and safety definitely sounds worthwhile... he agrees that large quantities of raw materials sounds hard but if they're interested he could see if he can get it to raise a mountain full of nice ores or something. He has never heard of an athra raising a mountain but it probably won't be dangerous to ask for one.

What does the precog think?

The precog thinks... That the athra will do one thing and then go away? Maybe? She is confused.

She gets an emotional reaction to the results of a course of action so complex situations like this are iffy. 

The forge and refuge seem most likely. They would much rather have the forge but want to toss around plans and see if they can get a plan that doesn't make the athra go away.

Okay... what if Tiro tries his hardest to get the athra to explain itself, can they get a more useful emotional reading under those conditions...?

The precog's mild drug habit is helpful. They can have her decide to have some only if the answer to a particular question is 'yes' and get clear readings that way.

It seems that it will decide to spend a long time away crafting one of the two things. But it will be much more impressive and useful.

...The forge is a long term concern, going to be used for prototyping and development and art. The item for refuge is needed now. And the precog is now exhausted for the day so let's go with that.

All right then. He can go ask for a forge and a refuge and try to get it to do the refuge first and make the forge more impressive.

And right after would he like to try a dozen teleporters to see if one can get him home?

Sure, sounds good. They can try to trade for artifacts if they're still interested in that.

Yes, definitely. For reasonable amounts of return payment of course.

He's sure it'll work out.

So he goes and asks the athra for a refuge and a forge. The athra agrees to this.

The refuge is stunningly extravagant. It takes the athra a week to construct. A hundred lengths of thread-fine silver chain, which, when hung up so that both ends touch the ground, form portals through which only a human can pass, and on the other side, the hundred portals form a wide ring around a beautiful landscape full of rolling hills and green pastures, under a dome of cerulean sky that comes right down to the ground in the gaps between the portals. You can stick your arm into the sky. It feels weird and looks like thick haze and if you try to walk in you find yourself walking back out from the same spot. There is no sun and no day cycle, but sourceless sunlight pours into the dome from all angles.

After he hands off the bundle of chains to Tiro, the athra expresses his intention to "make the forge my second heirloom. It will be treasured, yes?"

"Definitely," says Tiro. "So treasured."

The athra puts on a smile, and then stops making facial expressions and sits down and goes completely still, much like it did when it was spending a week on constructing the refuge. This time, though, its physical form fades from view gradually over the course of several hours.

The immense gratitude he's earned through the refuge and the fountains will surely have people mentioning him enough to sustain him. Not to mention people talking about the socio-economic and religious consequences of eternal youth.

(A surprising-to-some number of people abstain from the fountains, mostly on religious grounds.)

The refuge is strictly used for evacuation and rapid deployment. They're already hatching plans to build an entire miniature railway inside, using what parts can be hefted by the various teleporters, at least those who can target the place.

...None of the teleporters can take Tiro home, apparently, though two of them say they could feel it almost go. Maybe if he describes 'home' to them very thoroughly.

Tiro can describe home all day. He has a good memory and a lot of feelings. He can talk about the Clouded Mountains so vividly you almost imagine you're right there.

They're right there.

Scatter sits down on a rock. "Woo, that's a rush."

Tiro beams.

"You all right?"

"Burns a whole fuck of a lot of mana to teleport between worlds apparently. Give me ten minutes?"

"Sure. I'll go tell my parents where I've been."

"I'll be here."

She stands back up after two minutes and looks around for him. "Keep forgetting I'm not thirty five anymore..."

It's a very pretty mountainside, with grass and trees and flowers and a mostly gentle slope down into a charming little valley. Tiro went valleyward.

And with a little 'fwip' sound she's walking next to him. "Looks peaceful here."

He grins. "I like my mountains."

"They're pretty good mountains. Feel somewhere between Black Forest and Appalachian-y, except neither."

"Remind me where those are? I've seen most of Earth by now but it went by pretty fast."

"Gentle, rolling sorts of mountains. Eastern Liberion - Roanoke was close. Black Forest was a little sharper but their namesake is ash now, you didn't visit the area. Neuroi."

"Neuroi," he sighs. "Well, maybe if I panic enough athrai they'll solve the Neuroi problem for you and then you'll get to keep all your remaining mountains."

"Here's hoping. If there's a big enough uninhabited area here they might colonize and evacuate people. Anyway I should find a place to set up the refuge-chain sooner or later once we're down there, so the actual diplomats can come through without burning through my mana."

"Yeah. I'm sure my family can find somewhere to put it."

She whistles a little tune, looking around at the landscape.

"Kinda want to teleport all over this world. New places are neat.

"That sounds like a lot of fun. Careful, though. We don't know much about the rest of the planet, but I know athrai can be different in different places. Might not be safe to hop around."

"Caution and sense ruining my fun again. Ah well."

He laughs. "I'm sure somebody'll make time to tell you about all the prettiest places in Haela if you want to tour the country."

"That'll be delightful, thanks!"

"No problem!"

That house up ahead seems likely to be Tiro's. They'll be there soon. It's a pretty nice house.

"...You're rich aren't you? Or a noble. Didn't realize 'till now."

"Yeah," he admits. "These're my family's mountains."

"I reiterate: Nice mountains."

"Thanks! I'm very proud of them even though I had nothing to do with making them this pretty!"

Her response is to nod happily and go back to humming some sort of tune apparently.