Heather’s eyes widened as I drew my monstrous blade and held it out one-handed. “H-how…” she quickly pushed aside her surprise and sneered at me again. “My, aren’t you the little savage? Why you were chosen as our team leader I’ll never...”

“Enough!” our trainer’s voice rang out. My grandmother didn’t sound happy at all; she didn’t look it either from the frown she was giving us both as she leaned against a wall not far away. “Perhaps, Heather, she is upset with the way that you have been constantly needling her since you arrived. That is no excuse for losing your temper though, Snow. When someone can’t control their emotions in a fight they take risks they otherwise wouldn’t and often die as a result.”

“But Wingleader, I wasn’t…” Heather tried to complain.

“Heather, you are going to shut your mouth and listen. This attitude of yours regarding Snow ends now. She has been more than patient with you and took care of you without resting while you were still abed. But since you’re both so eager to fight… Trainer override. Set all Storm Wing recruit weapons to training mode and disable mode-shift.”

-= Training mode engaged for C-13 Goliath. Mono-molecular edges dulled to prevent injury. Mode-shift disabled. =-

“Try to control your strength and speed, Snow. Sira believes that your denser muscles and bones won’t just make you more durable than other Angels of your size and body type but faster and over twice as strong as well. You will need to adjust, so try to start off easy and gradually work your way up but watch the strength, you don’t want to kill Heather. And try not to hurt her bad enough that her nanites can’t handle it,” my grandmother told me evenly.

“W-what?” Heather sputtered as I grinned.

“This is what we are here for, Heather,” our trainer told her with a serious expression. “You wanted my personalized training, did you not? This is how Angels learn to fight and use their weapons, through combat. I certainly never had anyone show me what to do. I learned while fighting Demons. So you two can just fight out your aggressions until one of you yields or falls. Let’s go have a seat and watch the show, girls. Once they’re done it will be your turn, Karina and Autumn. Lisbet, you’ll be watching both fights and telling me whenever you see a possible opening where you could assist Heather and Autumn with your grenade launcher and what grenades you would use.”

I launched myself at Heather, swinging my huge sword at her in a wide arc. Shit, my grandmother was right, I really needed to learn to control my strength and speed. I thought that I was holding back but I still closed the distance between us much quicker than I had anticipated and I had to try and slow my swing before it could hit her and probably do some serious damage. I had built up too much momentum in the tip though and it was getting away from me with this one-handed grip.

Heather reacted instinctively, bending backward so that my weapon sailed through the air where her chest had been only a second earlier. She was barely upright and dancing out of my range before I managed to stop my swing and reposition myself. I wasn’t sure which of us was more surprised by her display of flexibility, reflexes, and grace but from the look on her face, I was betting that it was Heather.

She was watching me warily now as we both took turns feinting and lunging, feeling out one another’s capabilities. This also let me get a better feel for both my weapon and my new physical abilities. I could only assume that Heather was doing the same as she switched up her hold on the haft of her glaive. Her footwork had changed too, she was getting better with her balance and seemed to be trying to use the greater length of her weapon to her advantage.

I circled Heather, considering my options as she held her new glaive somewhat awkwardly and tried to keep the point of its blade between us. My weapon was big but she definitely had the edge in reach. And while I could easily swing this thing around one-handed, it probably had a two-handed grip for a reason. It wasn’t a weapon meant for finesse and I would probably get a lot more power out of a two-handed strike. As much as she pissed me off though, I had already proven that I didn’t really know my own strength and speed yet and I didn’t want to risk killing or seriously harming her.

I batted aside a few of her awkward lunges as we both got used to the weight and balance of our weapons. If I was going to do anything against her then I needed to get inside that long reach of hers. Since I had been using a one-handed grip she was concentrating her efforts on my left side where my guard was lowest. As she lunged again, swinging the blade of her weapon to my exposed left side, I found my opening.

I dashed forward, past the blade of her glaive, and blocked the swinging haft with my own weapon as I switched to a two-handed grip and planted the tip of my sword’s blade into the ground to intercept the blow. Blade and pole connected with a loud *tang* followed by a scraping sound as I raised my blade again and moved forward inside her guard using my strength to keep her weapon at bay. Her long reach was now a disadvantage as I moved in closer, she would have to either gain some distance again or swing her weapon over me and try to hit my other side with the haft.

Heather chose both in a way, she danced backward trying to get some distance between us again as her glaive pulled away from my blocking blade and swung over to try and get to my exposed right side. I was faster. I shifted my claymore to my right, blocking again as I got within range to deliver a kick to her chest. I might be stuck using my massive sword but it wasn’t my only means of attack.

The blow knocked the wind out of her and it felt like I might have cracked a couple of her ribs as she backed off, wheezing and trying to put some distance between us. As bad as I felt about potentially injuring her she was still standing, not to mention glaring at me. The nanites would fix the damage. She had neither fallen nor surrendered, so that meant that this wasn’t over yet and I was going to keep pressing my advantage.

I didn’t give her time to catch her breath. Instead, I sent an overhand swing at her and thankfully she managed to step adroitly aside. I was trying to hold back on my physical abilities enough to at least give her a chance to counter but the blow still left a large gouge that was bigger than my sword in the floor of the training room and sent shards of stone flying, some of them peppering my opponent. “Shit, if I had connected with that…”

Heather had clearly been thinking the same thing as she looked at me wide-eyed and tried to get more distance. Her eyes widened further at the speed at which I recovered from the swing and was back in her face again. She did manage to shift the haft of her glaive in front of her to intercept my next, more subdued, overhand blow as a staff-fighter would though. For an instant, she looked smug before I grinned and kicked her in the stomach, this time holding back a little more strength so I wouldn’t seriously hurt her.

She sounded like a popped bladder as the air rushed out of her lungs and she winced from the blow. “No… fair. We’re supposed to be using our… weapons.”

“And here I thought that we’re supposed to be fighting like we would if we were up against Demons. The Angel Elixir wasn’t just given to us so we could wield these things but to give us the physical abilities to fight Demons on an even footing. I’m not going to rely solely on this weapon for that. Our weapons are just tools and we might not always have them at hand. They could be knocked out of our reach… like this.” I tossed my claymore out of reach behind her.

“Are you… crazy? You just threw away your weapon!” Heather snapped, putting some distance between us and thrusting with her glaive.

“No,” I said as I used my feline agility to avoid her thrust and jump over the follow-up swing that followed. “I may not have my claymore, or even be able to use my Seed-borne gift at the moment with no moisture here, but I will never be without a weapon. Weapons can be whatever is at hand.” I slashed at her with my claws as I got inside her guard and, while she managed to pull away, it left four shallow gashes in her forearm. I had been hoping she would have completely avoided it but it made my point.

She hissed in pain from the scratches but it seemed that she was catching on. I was too close inside her guard so she went for my head with her conveniently placed elbow. She even managed to graze me before I rolled underneath to end up behind her. When I got back to my feet I once again had my sword in my hands. Good timing too, since I had to use the flat of the blade to block the tip of her weapon. The thrust probably wouldn’t have skewered me with the blade dulled but it would have hurt.

Several more thrusts came my way and I continued to block them with the flat of my blade… until I didn’t. I switched to a one-handed grip and dodged Heather’s next thrust, grabbing hold of the haft of her glaive just behind the blade with my free hand and then I pulled. She was halfway into range for me to attack when she surprised me by letting go of her weapon and using her forward momentum to tackle me, sending both of our weapons skittering away as she landed atop me.

She got in a good punch to my right eye but I got my feet underneath her and pushed off, sending her flying. Quickly, I rolled to my feet and pounced on her, using my superior strength to hold her down. Now all that she had to do was surrender. The only question was, how I was going to get the stubborn little bitch to say it. I just kept holding her down by the shoulders, my tail swishing slowly from side to side. After all, I was willing to wait as long as she was. Then the bitch went and grabbed my tail and yanked.

By the spirits, did that fucking hurt. I let out a yowl of pain as the pink-haired Fay pulled and then I was hissing at her angrily, my ears laid back flat and my captured tail bristling as tears rolled down my cheeks from the agony. I braced against the pain and lifted a hand close enough to Heather’s face so that she could clearly see my claws and then I growled, “Let. Go. Of. The. Tail. Now.”

“Are you kidding? I just found your weakness,” she taunted.

“No. You just found a new and dangerous way to piss me off. Never pull a Catkin’s tail, you have no idea how much that fucking hurts. You will let go and surrender or my claws won’t just graze this time. I feel pain, and you feel pain, do you get that?” I hissed.

It would seem that she got it. “I… surrender,” she conceded with a sigh. Her eyes were wide and I could smell the fear on her as she spoke those words, slowly nodded, and let her hand release its grip.

I hissed at her one last time and then released her as I got to my feet and went to retrieve my weapon. Once it was back in place, secured by the magnetic plate on the back of my harness I walked to where the others were sitting on a bench watching, the lingering pain in my tail still enough to cause tears to flow. I silently leaned against the wall with my arms crossed since I likely wasn’t going to feel like sitting for a while.

“Are you okay, Snowy?” Autumn asked in concern as she stood up, hugged me, and wiped the tears off my cheeks. “It looked like you were in a lot of pain.”

“I’ll be fine, she pulled my tail. It really hurts but it’s not that serious,” I told her enjoying the distraction that the Fay’s attention provided.

Karina and my grandmother both winced in sympathy and the Devilkin joined in the hug. “I had that happen once, it hurt like hell.”

“Luckily mine’s short enough not to make a tempting target,” Lisbet said, though she too had a sympathetic look on her face.

That was when Heather caught up with me and sat down on the bench clutching her glaive with white-knuckled hands. Our trainer stood up, the expression on her face unreadable as she looked over me and Heather. “Snow won that round. Would anyone care to tell me why?”

Because she’s freakishly strong and she cheated?” Heather grumbled.

That actually got a laugh out of my grandmother. “Cheated?! There is no such thing as a fair fight, especially when Demons are involved. They’re going to do things that you won’t expect or be properly prepared for, so you’d best get used to that idea right now. Had Snow chosen to use more strength and speed she would have won a lot sooner but she was trying to keep things ‘fair’ and not seriously injure you, Heather. Even though she was holding back she still won though. But why?”

“Was it because she was being unpredictable?” Karina guessed.

“That is part of it,” our trainer admitted. “Snow won because she realized something that it takes months for some recruits to figure out. Some never do, and those ones usually don’t last long. When they receive their weapons and start training to use them they rely on mode-shift and get into the habit of thinking that it’s their only weapon. That’s not true. These may be your primary weapons but they will never be the only tool that you will have available in a fight. As Snow demonstrated you might lose it in a fight and have to fight in some other way until you can reclaim it. She managed to get Heather to think that way as well. You have your Seed-borne gifts and your physical abilities and as long as you’re aware of your environment, you can always improvise. Don’t get hung up on the weapons that you’ve been issued. Yes, you will be training hard to master them, but be ready to use everything at your disposal.”

“But Sira…” Lisbet was about to argue.

Her protest was cut off as my grandmother said, “Sira is seldom wrong about how well a weapon that she has chosen for an Angel will suit their combat style but even she would tell you that she doesn’t expect you to rely solely on it. Did she tell you, girls, how she chooses those weapons?”

“Well, she made us take that personality test,” Autumn offered. “She said something about deciding it based on our personalities, physical abilities, and something that she called extra-planar energy potential.”

Grandma Abby nodded. “Yes, and each of those is very important though sometimes your Seed-borne gift may be a part of it as well. Your personality determines how you might react in a fight, your tactics, and whether you’re more likely to just go in swinging or wait and watch for opportunities from a distance. As for physical abilities, that’s pretty obvious; strength, speed, stamina, balance, and agility all determine how well you might be able to use certain weapon types. Do any of you think that you could swing Snow’s weapon around like she does?”

“I doubt that anyone but her can swing that monster around easily,” Heather muttered.

“Well, some people could but her strength, and other physical attributes, was one of the reasons that it was chosen for her. As you all just saw, she is also very adaptable and can think on her feet. She could have likely used any weapon, but Sira chose this one because of Snow’s higher potential for using extra-planar energy,” our trainer lectured. “Also, while she might be reluctant to take on the role, Snow has many great leadership qualities. You all have roles, and just like your weapons they were chosen to suit your physical abilities and personalities.”

“What does being a leader have to do with swinging that huge thing around,” Heather asked pointedly as she gave me a sidelong look.

“A leader needs to be directly involved in the ebb and flow of combat so that they can assess the enemies, change tactics if needed, and decide how their team assets can be used in any given battle. That weapon was meant for a front-line fighter and team leader. Leaders don’t just order their teammates around, they inspire them through their actions by being directly involved in a battle and holding the line when necessary,” our trainer explained.

We all took a moment to process that, especially me, until Lisbet asked, “What are our roles then?”

“You, Lisbet, are in a support role,” my grandmother answered the Harekin. “Both of your weapon modes are long-range because you aren’t meant to get into the thick of the fighting but provide support from a distance. You are also meant to provide technical support by repairing or creating required equipment while in the field.”

The Archangel then turned her gaze on Heather. “You are meant for a similar role, Heather. You would rather keep your enemies at a distance, even when using a close combat weapon and it shows in the way that you tried to fight Snow at first. The G-2 Shadowstrike has the longest range of any weapon we currently use in both its close-quarters and long-range modes. You will be using your Alchemy to assist Lisbet with her role while not in combat.”

Heather didn’t look very happy with that, but she kept listening as our trainer continued speaking. “In combat you will usually take the sniper role, finding an out-of-the-way perch to support your team from a distance by taking out targets of opportunity and watching for dangers that your teammates can’t see while in the thick of battle, then taking them down or letting your teammates know about them. This makes you the team’s secondary leader as well. You and Snow will need to learn to work together and communicate effectively in combat.”

“What about me?” Karina asked thoughtfully.

“You and Autumn both hold a similar role. Like Snow, you’ll be front-line combatants but you both have Seed-borne gifts that allow you high mobility so you’ll be moving around a battlefield a lot, hitting the Demons from different angles and not providing stationary targets for them. You will also act as scouts when needed,” the first Angel replied before clapping her hands together and grinning. “Speaking of you and Autumn, it’s your turn to show us what you’ve got.”

Unlike my fight with Heather, Autumn and Karina’s battle ranged all over the training room. The Fay ran up walls and along the ceiling, forcing the Devilkin to keep teleporting and using her wings to hover to be in range to use her punch daggers effectively. Whenever Karina managed to get in close enough to strike though, that slender sword of Autumn’s was there to poke and prod her opponent as she gracefully danced out of the way.

Autumn was so nice, friendly, and sweet so it was a bit strange to see her in a fight. Where Karina took the offensive and tried to overwhelm her opponent with a flurry of attacks, Autumn just stayed calm and gracefully avoided attacks, waiting patiently for opportunities to land strikes of her own. I began to think that Autumn was going to win just by tiring Karina out.

She did win, but not in the way that I expected. She had just moved back out of the Devikin’s range and she must have seen some sort of pattern to Karina’s teleporting because at the moment that she reappeared Autumn never let her get an attack in. She launched herself off the high ceiling of the room to tackle her opponent and then they both crashed to the floor with the Fay using the Devilkin to cushion the impact.

“Ow… okay, I’m done. I surrender,” Karina said with a groan. “Sneaky Fay, I thought that you were going to just keep avoiding me, and then you did that.”

Autumn just smiled at her as she helped our friend to her feet. “Just be grateful that I only switched my personal gravity back to normal. I could have increased it too.”

My grandmother was laughing her ass off. “I have never seen a sparring match quite like that one. You both made excellent use of your Seed-borne gifts. Sira was right, the five of you will make a unique team even without the number difference. All of you, go get a shower in while you still can. Then pack your things and meet me in Sira’s lab.”

“Pack our things?” Lisbet asked uncertainly, her nose twitching nervously. “But we’re not supposed to be heading to the academy until next week when all of the other recruits are finished changing and recovering.”

Our trainer was still trying to stop laughing as she nodded. “Right, but since I doubt that you all want to sit here doing nothing for a week, we’ll be going out and doing some field training before taking you to the academy with the others. Lisbet and Heather, come with me, Heather will need to requisition some ammunition and we’ll need grenades for you Lisbet.”

I glanced at my grandmother suspiciously and inquired, “What kind of field training?” She looked like the time that she first taught me how to swim. She was just casually talking to me about how nice a day it was and with no warning at all, she just picked me up and threw me in the water.

“Don’t look at me like that, Snow,” she said putting on a fake stern look that couldn’t mask her grin. “This is going to be fun and you’ll all get to learn to use your weapons properly and work together as a team. If you really must know though, Sira has a mission request for Storm Wing. She said that it could wait a few years until you were fully trained but I just decided to approve it. I think that you should be able to handle it and it will be good training.”

Just over an hour later we were showered, changed, packed, and gathered in Sira’s lab. Some of the other girls had been a bit jealous that we were going out for real-world training but they were also hoping to see us at the academy soon so that the boys didn’t outnumber them so badly. Once we were all gathered with my grandmother and Sira, the AI’s avatar body gestured for us all to sit around a long table.

“Thank you all for accepting this mission,” the AI said as if my grandmother had given us a choice in the matter. “I have calculated that your combination of Seed-borne gifts and other innate abilities makes Storm Wing able to complete this mission within a ninety-eight point three percent margin of error. I have been waiting for the right team to complete this mission for a long time and was expecting to wait until you completed your training before I could officially make this request.”

“The Angel Academy will teach them skills that will be useful as Angels, but most of them possess some of those skills already, Sira. You know as well as I do that they can only really learn to fight Demons by actually observing and fighting them though. This will be good training and if they really can’t handle it then I’ll be there to watch over them and can use my Gift to extract them under the cover of illusions if need be,” my grandmother said with a shrug.

“Wait, we’re going to be fighting Demons?” Heather sputtered, looking suddenly two shades paler.

“Only if we can’t avoid it,” our trainer confirmed. “This mission is primarily for scouting and possibly retrieval of anything useful.”

“Killing Demons is not the mission but if you do encounter any you may have to fight them. Stealth would be preferable,” Sira stated. “As you may recall, I told you that when the Angel Initiative was deemed a failure, many of the people who worked and lived here in Eden Base were reassigned to other projects and facilities. Dr. Karlson left behind information that indicated where he was going and while my knowledge of old world geography and cities is somewhat limited, GPS coordinates indicate that the facility that he was being transferred to is within the borders of Misota, in the ruins of the old capital.”

I could feel my eyes widening and my jaw dropping. I wasn’t alone either. “You want us to go into the Twincity Ruins?! Everyone in Misota knows to avoid the horrors of the old capital, it’s crawling with Demons!” Lisbet hissed in a panicked whisper, almost as if she was afraid to summon those horrors if she spoke too loud.

I knew how she felt but I took a deep breath and tried to remain calm and get some clarification. “So, what? Do you want us to find this facility and see if there is anything useful there? How do you expect us to do that? I’ve heard that those ruins are massive.”

“Yes, this is mostly a scouting mission. You will enter the ruins after dark and find and attempt to enter the complex. While in the ruins and complex you will look for any useful technology, armaments, and spare parts that could be compatible with the technology that we have here at Eden base and anything new that you find that could be useful to the Corps,” the avatar said before turning to our Tinker. “I will upload all pertinent data and schematics to your NCI, Lisbet. I will also upload the coordinates of the complex to each of your NCIs so that you can locate the area to within five hundred feet of the complex.”

My grandmother nodded. “That will also let us know where to meet up if we happen to get separated for some reason.”

“In addition,” Sira added, “there should be an AI like myself managing the complex and they should have similar self-repair systems as Eden Base. I would like you to interact with that AI to gather any useful information that they may have. If they are somehow damaged or destroyed, then Snow will contact me and I will walk her through finding and removing the AI’s secure backup data drives so that you can bring that information back here to me.”

“Wouldn’t our trainer be better for that? I mean, she’s been around this type of technology stuff way longer than any of us,” Karina inquired.

“Yes, but you won’t learn if you don’t try to familiarize yourselves with it,” my grandmother said with a shake of her head. “Besides, this is your mission, girls. I will be there only as an observer; to help familiarize you with your weapons, or in case things get too intense and you need to abort. Snow will be the one leading this mission, I get to just sit back and watch the show.”

I groaned and tried not to look as nervous as I felt. I was hoping that I wouldn’t have to worry about anything like this until after we were finished at the academy but now we were being thrown into the fire. I knew that my grandmother would keep us all safe if it came to that, and it wasn’t like I had never faced a Demon before, but I was worried about screwing up. I needed to ask the right questions so we were going in at least somewhat prepared but Sira didn’t seem to have a lot of detailed information about the place.

“Finally, I asked, “How are we getting there and how do we bring anything of value back?”

“You will be dropped off as close to the coordinates as one of the V.T.O.Ls can safely get you. Once your mission is complete, contact me and I will send one to pick you up and retrieve anything that you find. Working equipment, things like nano-weave factories, and spare parts would be great if they can fit in the storage area of a V.T.O.L, but blueprints and any other data from the AI are the top priority. Should you decide to make an alternative exit strategy please advise me. Good luck, Storm Wing.”

With that, what my grandmother had called the ‘pre-mission briefing’ was over and Sira gave each of our NCIs the information that we would be needing. Then we were taken to the cafeteria for an early dinner before heading down to the hanger and boarding a veetol. The sun was setting as we took off and made our way southeast and toward the Twincity Ruins. We were all nervous and a bit twitchy and our trainer gave us all an encouraging smile. “The first mission is always the worst, girls. Just be glad that you’re getting it out of the way now. I’ll be watching over you the whole time.”

I had somehow fallen asleep and I was rudely jostled awake as the veetol lurched and the pilot’s voice swore in my ears. My grandmother had us set our NCI’s to comms-mode before we took off and the sound of the unfamiliar voice startled me awake. -= Shit! I don’t know what the fuck almost hit us just now, but it looks like this as far as I can take you girls. I can’t risk another close call like that. =-

“Can you land?” my grandmother asked in concern.

-= Not anywhere that you’d want me to, there’s no even ground down there, too much rubble and visibility is too low. No idea what could be hidden under that snow either, and whatever nearly hit us came from ground level. There’s a building that looks intact nearby, I wouldn’t want to risk the weight of the veetol but you could all jump down onto the roof if I can get you close enough, =- the pilot’s voice replied.

My grandmother said nothing she just looked at me expectantly. Right, it was our mission so it was my call. “Do it,” I said. “Everyone grab your stuff and get ready to jump onto the roof.” We all got unstrapped, slung our packs over our shoulders, grabbed our weapons, and made for the door as our trainer threw it open.

The building was tall, far bigger than anything that I could have ever imagined before and just the thought of being that high up made my knees shake a little. I could see the roof of the building getting closer and once we were in range to make the jump I had the others go first. My grandmother went first in case she needed to catch any of us, followed quickly by Lisbet, Karina, and Autumn.

Heather looked scared stiff but she had a determined look on her face. She was just about to jump as a bright blue-white beam of energy lit the night sky and the veetol pilot veered off and narrowly avoided whatever it was that had nearly hit us. The veetol lurched to the side and Heather tried to turn a stumble into a leap for the safety of the rooftop. She missed the rooftop by an arm's length and as she fell I did the only thing that made sense at the time, I dove after her.