2412, Diori 07, Daleth

Being back at Depandes was a slap to Cyrdel's face after all the effort it took to get him out. This time, though, the emptiness sat on his gut like it had been there for a long, long time. He caught himself on multiple occasions glancing to his right expecting Ravalee to be there. Every time, all he found was thin air. He might have made it out of Alkara with company but he made it back alone.

Well, technically, not alone since he had the ingenious human as company.

Cyrdel dug a lump of metal from his belt. It's the last one in his arsenal. His teeth ground against each other as he fed it into a machine which cuts metal into thin, ductile wires. He would later twist the wires around a terznite ore which would allow him to store spells inside it. The wires helped in providing a fuse so Cyrdel could activate the gadget with better accuracy.

He glanced at his companion and noted the human was lost in thought with eyes cast to the ground. If Cyrdel could peer into minds like Ravalee, perhaps he would know Nyxis seemed to find the Rabante earth distasteful.

To Cyrdel, it's nothing but upturned earth reminding him too much of what happened on Penleth. It might mean differently for Nyxis, though. The human barely frowned and always had a witty retort to anything ever said but now, it didn't seem to be the case.

"I thought frowning makes you look older?" Cyrdel perked up, slotting the metal into his wire-producing gadget before turning the wooden crank. He heard the metal crunch against the gadget's sharp, grinding teeth.

Nyxis blinked a few times before his gaze settled on Cyrdel. The human didn't look any better than any of them had the past week. Cyrdel, himself, felt his limbs become heavier. It's also harder to get up every time he wakes up from a weary sleep. Of course, Cyrdel knew why. They were all told about it and there's no way they could deny it when the proof's all around them.

Nyxis smiled but it didn't quite reach his eyes. "Nothing," he said after a minute of silence and a shrug. "I was just...thinking."

Cyrdel nodded and pursed his lips. He wasn't making it any easier for the both of them. "Do you want to stop? It is becoming dark," he mentally kicked himself for being bad at conversations.

Usually, he could tolerate a full day without talking but that's only because there's no war bearing down upon their shoulders. There's no mission of utmost importance entrusted to him back then, either. If his wishes would be heard, he wouldn't like to spend his probable last days spiraling down into his thoughts.

Nyxis jerked his chin towards the clearing crawling to their view in the horizon. "We are almost to the border," he pointed north. "After that, we are inside Depandes. We cannot waste any more time."

Cyrdel clicked his tongue as he extracted the freshly-grated wires bunched at the plate at the base of his gadget. He hasn't even given it a name yet. How pathetic. "True," he said. "We could always wait until morning. That way, we can slip past the border unnoticed."

"Then if we fail, there will be witnesses," Nyxis drew his foot back to kick a dislodged, dark pebble. Instead of skipping away, it crumbled into a pile of soil as the magic holding it together unraveled. That seemed to bring another cloud passing through the human's face. "We cannot risk any of our activity to reach our enemies' ears. It is better to do this at night."

The human inclined his head and Cyrdel found himself doing the same. The sky started to be tinged pink. It looked like Crozal was the moon greeting them tonight. Cyrdel wasn't sure if that's a good thing or not considering the myths surrounding the Crimson Mother.

Cyrdel had to agree with Nyxis, though. After all, it wouldn't take much in him to admit he didn't know what he was doing in this mission. He was never a grounded person—always scattered and wild—and Ravalee was the only one who kept him on his toes with her calm personality and her ability to force him to slow down. Now that she's gone...he was just drifting around wherever circumstances drag him.

Nyxis cleared his throat. Cyrdel looked up to regard his companion. The human had his eyebrows raised, apparently waiting for an answer to a question Cyrdel hadn't registered.

"Did you say something?" Cyrdel coughed into his fist and winced when his chest hurt as he took a deep breath.

Nyxis sighed, the fourth time he did since they emerged from the tunnels. "I was asking what your plan is when we get to the border."

Cyrdel averted his eyes and worked on finishing his contraption. Out of all the people in the fortress in Penleth, Cyrdel was probably the only one to have successfully snuck past the strict border system without being caught. He was probably the only one who could analyze the mechanics in security and take it apart in mere seconds.

Sometimes, Cyrdel hated being the only one who could understand the things he did. Whenever he would attempt to explain, most of his peers would just tell him to hurry along and confirm if something will explode or not. Even the mechanics inside the Palace looked at him like he was crazy whenever he would ask for their opinions regarding his projects.

"It's just that it's impossible," one scholar would say.

"It's never been done before and we don't want that," another would quip.

To Cyrdel, it kind of defeated the point of innovating, and ultimately, it belittled their job. What's the use of having mechanics if they're not going to make fairy lives better? If they're just going to stick into inventions that fairies from hundreds of years ago had made, how would they progress as a society?

The Cyrdel from the Palace had thought these thoughts countless of times, narrating to a certain point of eloquence all his counterarguments to it. If he was asked to speak about it on the annual celebration of the feast of Nira instead of the bland creed he was forced to orate, he would have spent the whole day debunking these claims and instilling a new vision and purpose to every mechanic out there.

The Cyrdel from the Now, however, was glad the brownies degraded in terms of their creativity and ingenuity. When Cyrdel and Nyxis got to the border after a few more hours of walking, Cyrdel could see at least five operational flaws in their policing system.

It's up to him to exploit it.

Cyrdel and Nyxis came up to a mound of soil that would hopefully shield any view of them from the line of brownies patrolling the border. The road sloped down as soil met cobbled ground, chunks of rock and what looked suspiciously like glass shards spilling into the manicured road.

Cyrdel passed a terznite ore to Nyxis after checking if the wires were wound tightly. It was a rush job and he didn't want a mishap in the middle of the action. The human raised an eyebrow at the gadget. "What is this supposed to be?" Nyxis turned the ore here and there.

"I have not thought of a name for it yet," Cyrdel reached over and turned the ore over until it caught a little bit of the moonslight. "But here is how you use it."

With nimble fingers that memorized the mechanics, Cyrdel explained in great detail how to release the magic trapped inside the rock. After a few minutes, Nyxis's eyes glazed over and he asked, "So will it explode?"

Inwardly, Cyrdel groaned. Then, he schooled his face and his tone into a patient facade. "Yes, in theory and as you have seen in the tunnels, it will," he said. "You just have to do this and then that so that the magic coiled around the pulsing core would then travel through the pathways—"

"Got it," Nyxis palmed the gadget and shoved it to the pocket of his trousers. Cyrdel resisted the urge to wince. "Got any more for me? That security is tight."

Cyrdel cast a brief glance at the wall made from mepwing spittle mixed with sruhane clay. That should be easy to burn down with the right ingredients. The border itself was unremarkable, just a wall standing at three times the height of an average fairy. It boasted a walkway at the top, with molded crenelations against the painted parapet. Brownies dressed in an odious uniform no doubt issued by the Sovereign patrolled the walkway, carrying what appears to be one of his rejected proposals for city police weaponry.

His blood churned in his neck. First they invaded his city and now they're stealing his plans? He should have burned his workshop before escaping. Let him hope the Sovereign didn't find...that. If she did, then life as they know it would be over.

Not that it wasn't already ending. Still, Cyrdel would prefer to not be included in their enemies' schemes. He would never live the guilt down if he had contributed to the destruction of the island in some way. He gritted his teeth and dug around in his tool belt. A maximizer joined the terznite ore in Nyxis's possession. "Take care of that," Cyrdel warned as Nyxis turned the gadget in his fingers. "That can only strengthen a maximum number of three shots."

Nyxis bobbed his head. If anything, the human seemed to considered this as an adventure and not an endeavor they have to do. Cyrdel could see the thirst for action glinting in his companion's green eyes.

Cyrdel tucked his cloak tighter around himself. "Do not let any skin be exposed," he said. "That is the only way we can cheat the scanners."

"Scanners?"

"Trail scanners," Cyrdel rolled his eyes as if those words explained plenty enough. The human stared at him blankly. Cyrdel scoffed and pointed towards the border. "You see those baton-like things the patrols are swaying around? That is a trail scanner. They are supposed to emit sensitive beams of concentrated magic that latch onto a person's characteristic trail before taking it apart on a certain intangible level and then, using an elaborate series of matching probability and correlation to existing patterns, it tells you what is the most plausible race of an individual."

"Yes, but will it explode?"

Cyrdel glared at Nyxis.

"I am joking," the human gave a small chuckle and waved his arms in front of him. "But, really, I do not get half of the stuff you said. Why can you not just whisk us away while being invisible?"

Cyrdel winced as if he was slapped. Nyxis had hit a sore spot. "It is uh...a talent I chose not to pursue," he said as vaguely as he could. It's still technically true but he wasn't fooling anyone. Much to Cyrdel's relief, Nyxis didn't push further.

"So no turning invisible and sneaking past the wall," Nyxis's eyes darted here and there, no doubt looking for a way to blow things up from afar.

"That would not work either way," Cyrdel continued after he had considered the invisibility plan. "The trail scanners can detect the slightest hint of a magical disturbance even invisibility cannot mask. Besides, I designed the trail scanner to trace synnavaimis first before going to the more...obscure trail. I also made it to deconstruct any kind of masking a trailcloaker would be expected to do and to penetrate past any reflecting shields."

"So this is entirely your fault," Nyxis said.

"Yes, this is entirely my fault."

There's no use in denying it anyway.

When he first developed a prototype of the scanner, he was quite proud and requested for it to be part of the standard Russet Guard weaponry. He was denied, of course, and he had spent days stewing over that. But now...

Funny how the past bit Cyrdel from behind.

Nyxis's green eyes swept across the plain, noting the line of crossers piling by a gate propped open by at least two brownies. From this distance, Cyrdel wasn't even sure if the guards were still brownies or some Synketrian goons. Then again, considering Alkara was now under the Sovereign's control, it served right to call all of his race Synketrian goons.

"So we fall in line like the rest of them?" Nyxis pocketed the maximizer. "That would take a long time."

Cyrdel shook his head. "Judging from my last experience at borders, the patrols will just ask for your identification after they scan you. We could get past the scanners because of this cloak—"

"Please do not explain how," Nyxis grimaced.

"No worries, I would not," Cyrdel snapped before waving his hand in the air. "But we do not have identification."

Nyxis nodded. It has been an ongoing problem for their side because if they ever attempt to get a shot at registering for an identification, Synketros and Cardovia would be able to track them easily. Cyrdel had seen the traces of spinel, a tracking potion, from the piece of identification papers June had stolen long ago.

The stealing option was out too considering Cyrdel was too honest to ever resort to picking someone's pocket and Nyxis was way too transparent to ever succeed in picking a pocket subtly.

So, no stealing.

"Illusions?" Nyxis cocked his head to one side. He was treating this like it was simply a brainstorming session. "We could use the maximizer for that."

Cyrdel raised an eyebrow. "And make an entire horde hallucinate?" he eyed the flock of birds flying from tree to tree, cawing in weak cries against the thick night air. "Maybe not a good plan if we want to stay discreet."

"Yeah, of course," the human threw his arms up and placed them behind his head. "So what now? Do we just stroll in there and hope they do not ask us for identification?"

Cyrdel wasn't smiling. "No, worse," he palmed another contraption he had been working on since he left Penleth. "We make them forget to ask us for identification."

Nyxis's confused stare was such a novel moment it tempted Cyrdel to have Airene reproduce that memory into a scrying bowl when they got back.

If they get back.