For the next hour and a half, there was not much for Storm Wing and Phantom Wing to do but help the people delivering the shipment of HESS armor to unload the units from the hover-hauler that they had arrived in and load them in the cargo sections of our MISTS. That took most of that time, and filled our small cargo holds to bursting, and this would only be the first trip. We took turns alternating between loading and securing cargo and caring for the twins.

We were finished securing that first load shortly before lunchtime and then both of our teams secured our MISTs and headed to the Golden Dragon with Aria, the Seraph diplomat. Risha ordered for us, and the food was just as delicious as last time. It was nice being around so many fellow Catkin too, though Risha spent most of the meal trying to get to know Mei Huang and her husband, another Catkin named Billy Gordon, better.

Risha wasn’t exactly holding back with some of her questions, but that was understandable since she was essentially interviewing them to raise her daughter. On the way to the restaurant, I had also agreed to let her test the prospective parents by letting them hold and care for the twins while our team ate. I was a little nervous letting a pair of people that I knew nothing about handle the twins like that, but it was only short term, I could always take them back if they got too fussy, and honestly, it was a good test for them.

The pair passed with flying colors with the way that they doted on Kassie and Kallie, especially Mei. You could see in her eyes and her every action that she wanted to be a mother more than anything. Even changing a particularly smelly and messy diaper didn’t put a damper on her enthusiasm or the wonder in her eyes. I was half-worried that I would never get the twins back from the pair of them when we had to leave.

Overall, they seemed like good and caring people who would raise Chii well, had a lot of love to give, and wanted a child of their own desperately. When Risha had explained the particulars, that this child would be an AI and needed to know that from the start, Mei and Billy didn’t even bat an eye. It didn’t matter to them that Chii wouldn’t be an organic child, or that they wouldn’t be able to raise her from birth, they would raise her as their own with as much love as they could.

At one point Risha asked them about the possibility of Chii interfacing with the AI core and running the city’s systems. The Chinese Catkin frowned thoughtfully as she gently burped Kassie. “If she wants to do that when she’s old enough, then we will be proud that she has chosen to help her community, but it must be her choice. Nobody is going to force our girl to do anything that she isn’t comfortable with; anyone who tries will regret it.”

There was no hesitation or even deep thought about it, just a natural reaction. And from the determination in her eyes and voice, I knew that Risha would be leaving Chii in good hands. Risha seemed to have the same feeling as she smiled and replied, “Good. I’m sure the two of you will keep her happy and safe. I will probably check in when I come to Ashburn every month or so though, to check on her development and see if you need anything.”

Mei furrowed her brow at the blonde AI before stating adamantly. “You will not just check in, Risha. When you come, you will visit, and spend time with Chii and us. As I understand it, this is your child that we will be raising, and she will know and love the woman who created her, even if you’re just her Aunt Risha.” The seriousness was somewhat diminished though as Kassie let out a large belch under the Catkin’s efforts.

Still, the iron in her tone left no room for argument and Risha seemed a bit taken aback by the statement. Her shocked expression turned to a smile after a moment, and she nodded before dapping carefully at her eyes with a napkin. “Thank you, Mei, I would like that,” she said awkwardly.

After that, Risha started to discuss with the pair the logistics of raising an AI child, and what they could expect in terms of Chii’s Avatar and abilities. Love was good, but they would likely have to be firm with her at times, so she wouldn’t misuse those abilities while growing up, especially in a city like Ashburn. She was in the middle of that conversation with them, and the rest of us were discussing the possibility of a world without Demon Seeds when a horrid blaring sound made my ears ring and got the twins screaming.

“What in the Darkness is that horrible sound?!” Lisbet practically wailed as she winced and attempted to shield her large ears against the sound.

“That’s the Demon alarm!” Aria informed us with a grimace, having to raise her voice to be heard over it.

My NCI’s voice chose that moment to speak up in my mind. -= Incoming communication request from Archangel Abbadine Bengal. Do you accept? =-

“Yes, Connie,” I quickly replied.

-= Connecting call. =-

My grandmother wasted no time as she asked, -=Snow, have Storm Wing and Phantom Wing left Ashburn yet? =-

“No, Wingleader. We just finished lunch and we were about to leave the restaurant, and Aria just told us that this horrid noise is their Demon alarm,” I reported.

-= Good, =- she immediately replied. -= There is a massive swarm of Reaper Ants approaching from the south. Ashburn’s suppression teams and gunners are moving into position to hit them before they can get to the walls, but this swarm is huge so I want your teams to assist and show the people of Ashburn just what the Angel Corps is capable of since they will be short one suppression team. Team Theta’s armor was in the process of being repaired and now they’re trying to fit them with the new power cores, weapons, and more durable Razorwing metal for the armor. =-

“What do you need us to do?” I asked.

-= With a swarm this large, a queen must have spawned during that last big seed-storm. I want Storm Wing and Phantom Wing to support the suppression teams and cover their flanks to the east and west. Don’t let those things get to the walls, find that queen, and take her down, =- my grandmother quickly explained.

“We’re on our way, Wingleader,” I promised. Then I had Connie disconnect the call before calling out to my fellow Wing Commander. “Maryn! New Orders! The ground outside is crawling with Reaper Ants, and we’ll be supporting the suppression teams! Ashburn’s forces will focus on the center of the swarm, Phantom Wing will whittle down the west flank, and Storm Wing will take the east flank!”

“You got it, Snow! C’mon, Phantom Wing, let’s reap some Reapers!” she called back before she and her team dashed out of the restaurant and off toward their MIST to mobilize.

Meanwhile, the Huangs were hurriedly securing the steel shutters to secure the restaurant against any Demons that might get into the city, except for Mei, who now had both Kassie and Kallie in her arms, ready to turn them over to me. At least that damn alarm turned off now that the initial warning was given, and the city was being locked down. “Mei, we’re going out there to support the suppression teams, and Marti needs to pilot our ship and get ready for possible wounded. Do you think that you could watch the twins for me for a little while?”

She looked uncertain for a moment, but then smiled down at my girls and nodded. “I will protect them with my life, Snow. Thank you for entrusting them to me.”

“They seem to like your scent and I’ve seen enough to know that you’ll take good care of my babies while I’m gone,” I told her candidly before leaning down to kiss Kassie and Kallie on their foreheads. “I’ll be back soon, girls. Momma has to go kick some ass.”

Autumn, Risha, and even Heather repeated my actions, giving the twins a quick goodbye before we left the restaurant and hurried toward our MIST. The steel shutters covering the door of the restaurant clanged into place behind us, so I was at least assured that the twins would be secure while we were gone. Moments later, we were in our MIST with Marti at the pilot controls.

As soon as we were in the air, I moved those of us who weren’t piloting the craft to the passenger section to buckle in, though I didn’t do so myself. Instead, I activated comms, turned on the holographic command console, and called up the file on Reaper Ants. They were large insectoid Demons that vaguely resembled ants, but were bigger than grizzly bears, were heavily armored with thick chitin plates, and their six legs ended in scythe-like blades.

“We need to be careful out there, these things swarm worse than Spidren, those blades on their legs are razor sharp, and if they bite you, there will be poison. Their poison is particularly nasty and deadly. It won’t be enough to kill us, but you’ll be in a lot of pain while your nanites flush it out and heal the wound, so try not to get bitten,” I told them all. “With all that thick armor on their bodies, their weakest points in close quarters combat are likely their thin legs and their less armored heads.”

“Would you like to know, more?” Risha asked, slightly stressing the last word.

“Is there something you can tell us that’s not in the files, I’d be happy to hear it,” I replied, turning my attention to the Avatar.

“No, never mind. I think the file contains everything pertinent, so let’s get this bug hunt underway,” she said with a sigh before muttering, “Clover would have gotten it.”

I shrugged it off and started to issue individual orders. “Marti, find a good spot to drop us off to face the east flank of that approaching swarm, then hover above us in case you need to drop down and extract one of us for medical attention. Don’t cloak the MIST, we shouldn’t have to deal with any fliers, and I don’t want to risk those gunners on the wall accidentally hitting you.”

-= I’m on it, Snow, you can count on me! =- the medical AI replied eagerly over comms.

Then I turned my attention to our team’s other AI. “Risha, the swarm has already probably smelled all of the fresh meat in this city, so the queen will probably be somewhere away from the thick of the battle, starting to set up a new nest. The moment we land, I want you to send out your micro-drones to find her and then get into range to take her out with your Minimax. If we let her establish a nest, she’ll have hundreds of eggs hatching and looking for food within days. Once she’s dead, the rest of the swarm won’t be getting orders from her anymore and should fall into confusion, making our job a lot easier. Other than that, you’re free to use your full strength and your particle beam weapons to help thin the swarm, as long as you avoid friendly fire.”

“I’ll launch the drones and fan them out as soon as we’re on the ground,” Risha assured me.

“Heather, you know the drill by now,” I told the former princess with a smile. “Find a perch to start sniping and calling out targets. If you see something that I might miss in the thick of battle, let us know.”

“So, the usual, huh?” Heather replied with a grim nod. “Don’t worry, Snow, I’ll be your eyes and have your backs.”

“Lisbet, do you have any grenades that you think can hurt them?” I said as I turned to the team’s Harekin Tinker.

Lisbet looked thoughtful as she mumbled, “Regular and shrapnel grenades might have trouble with that thick armor, but their legs could be damaged by them, and maybe their heads if they’re facing the blast. Plasma grenades would probably cook them alive and then burn the corpses, but you wouldn’t be able to fight that way until the fires burned out and things cool down. That might be a while since there’s enough fuel in my plasma grenades to keep them burning for a good ten to fifteen minutes.”

“Awesome.” I grinned as an idea came to me and I pulled up a blank image on the holographic display before drawing a rough estimate of the projected swarm and pointing to the locations that I was referring to. “This is us here, and to our right, that will be Ashburn’s suppression teams. Way over on the right is Phantom Wing. Lisbet, since Marti will be hovering above anyway, I want you to stay here in the MIST, use the anchor lines to secure yourself, and fire out the rear hatch to attack from above. I want you to create enough plasma grenades to fire a full volley here and here, far enough behind the first wave to keep us safe from the heat. You should be able to take out a good number of hostiles and bottleneck the rest to slow down those behind them. If they try to go through the fires, they’ll be cooked before they can reach the other side. Once you’ve set the trap, use your pulse cannon to try and thin the numbers coming through the bottleneck to make it more manageable for the rest of us.”

Lisbet nodded and unbuckled to go to the food dispenser to make her grenades. Karina on the other hand gave me a wild grin. “I love this plan. So, I’m guessing that you, me, and Autumn get the fun part?”

“Yup, let’s show these suppression teams how Angels get the job done,” I replied with a similar grin.

A few minutes later, we touched down ready for combat. The leading edge of the swarm was approaching fast, already halfway across the barren kill zone between the forest and the city, where many Demons had met their demise from the gunner-manned Gauss-Gatling placements on the city walls. Those gunners were already working on decimating the leading edge, but there were still hundreds of Reaper Ants, and they would need to reload soon, which would take time. By the time they could reload, the frontline of the Demons would likely be in their blind spot, or they would risk hitting us and the suppression teams. It was giving us time to get our forces in place though, and for us to enact my plan.

I had barely given the order when Marti took the MIST to the air again, as Lisbet loaded her grenade launcher for the first salvo of plasma grenades and Risha sent out her micro-drones. “I’ll be back to join the fun as soon as I get our lovely sniper in position,” Autumn reported before playfully waggling her eyebrows at Heather and hoisting the other Fay in a princess carry. Then she was off and changing her gravity to carry Heather up the city’s defensive wall to give her a good view to do her job.

The gunners on those walls stopped firing as the pair reached the top alongside them, so I imagined that they needed to reload, and now the frenzied swarm of Demons was closing in. Lisbet launched her first salvo, wiping out a large segment of Reaper Ants behind the leading edge, and between our position and the Suppression forces from Ashburn. She had quickly reloaded because another swath of near-violet-hued flames consumed part of the left edge of the swarm and a good distance beyond, cooking more of our enemies and ensuring that they would have to go around to get at us.

-= I’m in place and have eyes on the battlefield, =- Heather reported. A second later, a Reaper Ant at the leading edge fell and was trampled by those behind it as its head exploded to one of her bullets. -= Aaaand our crazy future mate just jumped off the wall. =-

I turned to see Autumn plummeting to the ground, but just before hitting the ground she altered her gravity to land like a feather. “Let’s get the job done, Storm Wing! Connie, Gatling mode!” I exclaimed.

-= Affirmative. Pulse Gatling mode engaged. =-

A whir of clicking, hissing, and transformation later, I tore through the first wave of Reaper Ants with a barrage of violet-colored energy bursts that decimated them. I had used up probably a quarter of my gift energy in doing so, but now we would only have to worry about those coming through the bottleneck or around the plasma fires to approach our flanks. I trusted Heather to warn us if she saw the latter happening from her perch on the wall.

The bottleneck between plasma fires would only allow for a column roughly five or six Reaper Ants wide to get through now, so we could approach this battle more directly now. I switched my weapon back to Claymore mode and charged forward with Karina laughing gleefully as she ran alongside to my left. One of her scythes, lashed out, bisecting one of the leading Demon’s heads, and then the other whipped out to sever the legs of another’s right side. She teleported above it to slam one of the scythe blades into its head and kill it.

I quickly ducked a scythe-like foreleg that attempted to cut me in half and with a powerful swing of my massive sword; I cut off four of the creature’s other legs, sending it crashing to the ground. I stomped on its head to finish it off, sending goo squirting everywhere, as Risha fired twin particle beams from her hands, vaporizing a pair of the Demons’ heads, and then punching right through their bodies in a bright flash of annihilation that took out even more targets behind them. Damn, those weapons were scary.

Autumn flew past me to my right, her feet slamming into and crushing one of the creatures’ heads in a gravity-assisted kick before nimbly avoiding the attack of another and impaling its head with her rapier. -= There are half a dozen coming around the fire to your left, =- Heather’s voice warned as a bullet exploded the head of a Demon that had jumped over the one that I was currently decapitating in an attempt to get at me. -= Lisbet, do you have an angle on them? =-

-= I’ve got them covered! =- the Harekin replied as pulse cannon fire hammered the ground and anything on it from the direction Heather had indicated.

After over ten minutes of intense combat, Risha was in the middle of eviscerating another Reaper Ant with one of her particle beam weapons when she backed off to draw her Minimax. “I’ve found the queen, Snow! She’s out of my weapon’s three-mile range, about six miles south-southwest. You were right; she’s building a new nest with about two dozen other Reapers.”

“Marti, I need a pickup for Risha. Get her close to that location so she can take out the queen and any other Demons with her. Lisbet, you’ll stick with them and help finish off her helpers. Burn the nest and the corpses, just to be sure.” I ordered as I used my gift to encase the legs of five approaching hostiles in ice, pinning them to the ground. “The numbers are thinning, so we can handle things here.”

-= We’ll be right down, Snow, =- Marti promptly replied.

I decapitated the closest of those that I had frozen in place and formed an ice spike to finish the second while Karina’s scythes finished another two. The other was finished by Autumn, who had switched her Light Foil to laser pistol mode and fired a beam point blank into its eye while it attempted to snap at her with its mandibles. She had to use her off-hand for the moment since she had taken a shallow wound to her right arm when a Reaper Ant managed to penetrate her HESS armor with a vicious slash. Fortunately, the wound wasn’t deep or very serious, and both Autumn and her armor were being quickly repaired by their respective nanites.

A shot from Heather ended another Demon that was closing in as the MIST touched down and Risha quickly got aboard. As soon as she was with Lisbet in the rear hatch she called out, “I’m good to go, Marti. Be back soon, girls, be careful while I’m gone.” Practically the instant the words left her mouth, Marti took off again and followed Risha’s directions toward their target.

I looked around for another enemy to attack but there was nothing nearby. I hummed in concern and asked, -= Heather what are you seeing from up there? =-

-= We’re almost clear, Snow, =- Heather’s voice said over the comms. -= Maybe a dozen more on our side, those plasma fires and your first attack really tipped things in our favor. Maryn’s team appears to be doing okay too, but it looks like the Reaper Ants are regrouping and consolidating their forces. If they make a solid push for the center, we may be in trouble. It looks like the suppression teams are trying to conserve their ammunition, so they could be running low. =-

-= That power armor of theirs can take a hit, especially the larger models, so the Reapers can’t do much damage to them. The trade-off is that they aren’t very agile, have no energy weapons, use a lot of power just running, and their ammunition and jury-rigged power supplies are finite. If we had time to upgrade them before this attack, it would be a very different story, but as it is now, they’re the weak link. =- Risha muttered.

“From what I heard from Desra, they’re also used to single or small groups of major Demons attacking at a time after running out of other Demons and other food to keep them fed wherever they come from. On that small amount of targets, they can concentrate fire between the suppression teams and the gunners on the walls to finish things quickly. They aren’t used to long, pitched battles or fighting swarms like this,” I explained with a sigh as I tried to get a better look at the battlefield. “They’ve had a few, but usually in those cases the city gets breached, and the suppression teams have to take the time to reload their weapons, replace their power supplies, and make any quick and essential repairs that they can before they can finish any that got inside the walls.”

Damn, it looked like Heather was right. The stragglers on our side were moving to join the larger group that the suppression teams were engaging. “How soon will you be within range of your target, Risha? I would really like it if we could take the queen and her commands out of the equation.”

-= ETA forty-eight seconds before I’m in range to use the Minimax, =- she replied. -= It’ll be around another minute after that before I can take the target down. =-

“Hit her as soon as you’re in range,” I instructed. “Connie, please send Maryn a request to add Phantom Wing to our comms channel.” I had a wonderful idea since my gift energy still seemed to be around half full, and I would need one of her team members for it.

-= Sending request… Request accepted. =-

-= What’s up, Snow? Are the bugs retreating on your side too? =- the Wing Commander of our sister team asked.

“They’re not retreating, they’re regrouping, and I don’t think that our friends from Ashburn are going to have enough ammo to hold them off for long. They might be running low on power too. Risha should be taking out their queen in about a minute or so, but I would rather err on the side of caution with this swarm. Kyra, how many of the plasma rounds do you have for your Scimitar?”

-= I have a full magazine, I used two earlier to give us some breathing room, but I’ve mostly been using my sword mode or armor-piercing Razorwing rounds, =- the Sheepkin replied, sounding a little confused.

“Good, meet me in the middle to join our friends from Ashburn as quickly as you can; we’re going to do a little regrouping of our own since they’re grouping together so nicely for us,” I said with a manic grin.

-= What do you… oh! This should be fun! =- Kyra giggled as I started running full tilt to join the suppression team’s position.

I was halfway across the seventy yards or so between our position and the Ashburnites’ when Risha’s voice said, -= Firing now. =-

Less than a handful of seconds after that I was standing in front of the suppression team that was currently taking point. Damn, I love being an Angel. That was a seventy-yard sprint while dodging corpses, I only counted about five seconds, and I wasn’t even breathing hard. “Hey, guys, how’re you doing over here?” I asked cheekily.

“Uhh… almost out of ammo, and they seem to be regrouping,” one of them said after a brief pause of confused hesitation or maybe shock. By that time, Kyra was standing at my side and grinning as wide as I was.

“Yeah, we noticed that. Since you’re all nearly spent, do you mind if Kyra and I handle this?” I inquired, still bearing a shit-eating grin.

“Umm… how? Big ass swords or not, there are only two of you,” a woman’s voice asked through the tinny and static-clad voice of her power armor.

“Don’t worry, just leave this to us. We Angels do this kind of shit all the time,” I said, waving off her concern. Yeah, I was being cheeky, and maybe exaggerating a bit, but my grandmother did say she wanted us to show them what Angels can do. I looked from the reforming group of what was probably almost a hundred Reaper Ants to the Sheepkin beside me and asked, still cheekily, “Would you like to start us off?”

Bless Kyra’s heart, she grinned right back at me and said, “Oh, no, you first, Snow. I insist.”

“Thank you, you’re too kind, Kyra,” I replied playfully. “Gatling mode please, Connie.”

-= Affirmative. Pulse Gatling mode engaged. =-

As soon as my weapon finished changing modes, I unleashed a torrent of violet-hued energy bolts at the still-regrouping Reaper Ants, tearing into them and the ground beneath them and sending a mix of ice, dirt, and demon blood into the air until my Seed-borne gift energy was almost depleted. As the cloud of displaced dirt and snow cleared, I heard Risha say, -=The queen is down, Lisbet and I are moving in closer to take care of the rest. =-

“Good work, Risha,” I replied quietly before observing the destruction my weapon had caused. I had taken out maybe two-thirds of the group, mostly those who had been at the fore or edges. Those that remained were shambling slightly on their six legs, some bumping into one another in confusion from being cut off from their queen. Quite a few seemed injured by my assault as well.

Kyra had already shifted weapon modes and loaded her clip while I was eviscerating the front line, so she wasted no time finishing the rest of them with her own massive gun. Explosive-headed rounds that were meant to kill Razorwings shredded what was left of the group and consumed them with burning plasma that we could feel the heat from just over fifty feet away. “You missed some, Snow,” the Sheepkin teased.

For a moment, a still silence fell over the group we were standing before, finally broken when someone muttered, “Shit. What the fuck are those weapons, and where can I get one?”

“Sorry, guys, but these only work for Angels,” I said with a grin.

After that, there were only the occasional stragglers to take care of, and that was taken care of fairly quickly. We did help with the cleanup as well though since the Demons needed to be burned and the plasma that Lisbet and Kyra had used with their weapons seemed to do a good job of it. By the time we finished, it was almost dinnertime, but both my grandmother and Sira seemed very pleased with us.

The members of the suppression teams that had seen us at work had been talking while we were cleaning up, and it looked like they were going to be taking the Angels who would be placed or trained in Ashburn very seriously. We even heard a few talking about us at the Golden Dragon when we went to pick up the twins and eat dinner with Mei and Billy. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to stay long enough to do more than eat.

It had been a long day, but it wasn’t over for Storm Wing or Phantom Wing. We still had to get that HESS armor delivered and come back for another load, and we were already way behind schedule. We ended up getting one load each delivered and distributed to those who needed it at the academy. It was late by the time that we were finished, and we would have to pick up the second shipment to deliver to Eden Base for distribution in the morning. Thankfully, there was plenty of room for us to sleep at the academy in the capital so we wouldn’t have to fly home to Woodbury Base.