*

Kalach is well on its way to destruction. The Traveller has been almost fatally injured and its only hope, and the hope of its denizens, is the Acolyte, Rocan, escorted by the Elves Daric and Virmira. Only one machine on planet Earth can offer any salvation. They are heading for the Amplifier, residing on top of the Spiretower in the English city of Hundra. Their plan is to use the massively powerful device to magnify Rocan's power enough to save Kalach.

But the odds are not in their favour, and with millions of lives depending on them, Daric knows that time is running out.
                                                                                          *



"I'd have loved to live in Kalach." Virmira breathed, her face to the glass. Her black eyes were wistful as she unconsciously touched the Elven spiral tattoo on her cheek.
"Wouldn't it have conflicted a bit with your environmentalist ideals?" I frowned at her. "The metal and the markets and the metropolis?"
The Dark Elf looked at me. "I'd be carried across the skies on the back of a giant, mysterious sky-creature. I'd say that was living with nature. Hell, living with something like the Traveller might even be better than Birchoke."
I sighed. "Too late now."
My eyes flicked briefly to Birchoke; the rolling great forest stretched out for miles below. I thought of the Elves living in it - my species. Leading their simple, normal lives, unaware that far away, the Traveller slowly plunged from the sky, a screaming white dot on the red horizon. It was barely upright; buildings slipped from its sides, their tiny splintered forms falling miles before crashing onto the sea below. We could hear nothing but the silence of the building surrounding us, and the bustle of Hundra's cars below, but watching it, I could imagine the panic on Kalach. There was nowhere to go; the citizens were as doomed as the Traveller itself. The sky surrounded them, trapped them. It had given them so much freedom, and now it enveloped them, preventing their escape. Their Magician was dead, and there was nothing else to save them.
The Traveller once had been found in a coma in the depths under the Eastern Alps, and now it was dying in the clouds over England. It couldn't end like this.
"Come on." I scowled to Rocan. "We've not got much time before the military get here."
The Acolyte looked at me, fear in his eyes. "I don't know whether I can do it, Daric. I'm nowhere near as powerful as a true Magician."
Virmira tore her eyes away from the window and hauled him up the stairs, her long black cloak sweeping after her. "We don't have the time."
I kept pace easily - the Elven armour barely rustled on my chest, the light network of spirals concealed beneath my casual clothing. As I ran, I wondered whether this machine really would work. If Fenrus was as clever as he claimed, we didn't need an actual Magician. The Amplifier could make Rocan powerful enough to pluck Kalach from the sky.
A bang echoed up the staircase, followed by shouting. More bangs. Then an explosion.
It had begun.
The military were taking the building, but Fenrus's men were putting up a fight. We had a head-start. We sprinted up the staircase. Virmira drew her weapon, and I furiously tapped a number into my mobile.
"Hraat."
"Mr Hraat, I'm honestly surprised you answered."
"Wouldn't have done for anyone but you, Daric." replied the Orc.
"Would you mind telling me," I panted, as we leapt up the stairs three at a time. "Why your men are blazing into the building like fireworks up an exhaust pipe?"
"The Amplifier is government property." Hraat retorted. "My interest is the safety of this city down here, not the one up there. According to our projections, the Traveller will land miles away - it's no concern of ours."
"It could save Kalach."
"It's not finished. It's untested. It's dangerous."
"It's also our only hope of saving thousands of people." I snapped.
"Give yourselves up, and forget about Kalach." he said. "They're dead men walking. Or, more accurately, falling."
There was a click, and I swore.
"Hraat's taking the building."
Virmira and Rocan didn't bother wasting words, simply renewing their efforts. Though not a fat man, I couldn't help but wonder whether Rocan was struggling a bit with the stairs, compared to the pace of two slim Elves.
As we passed the fifteenth floor, I glanced out of the window, over the treetops of Birchoke, and out to the sea beyond. Kalach was becoming larger, but not much lower. Now, I was no mathematician. Nor an aviator. But just from looking at it - if the city came down, I wasn't sure it would hit the sea.



We hit our first snag less than a minute later. The snag in question was wearing Kevlar body armour, rushing out onto the main staircase, and had an impressively elaborate weapon in his holster.
He didn't have time to touch it before Virmira shot him in the head.
Rocan and I dodged his body as it bounced limply past us, trailing a red streak down the steps. Virmira swore, launching herself up the next few steps and slamming her hand against the bannister. She hated killing without good cause. The man was doing his job. He was probably private security. He didn't know what Fenrus was really doing, nor what the machine upstairs really did. He was just protecting the people he worked with.
But the building was on alert, and we were armed strangers. If we'd been too slow to react, he would have killed all of us, and neither Kalach nor the Traveller could afford for that to happen. He had to die to save them. I knew Virmira was telling herself that, but from the way she still threw herself up those stairs, I knew it wasn't making her feel any better.
I wondered what would happen if Hraat's men reached the machine before us. Would we have to kill them too?
I decided it was better not to think about it. I knew the answer already.
Eventually, we reached the top floor. Glancing at the door, Virmira and I grimaced at each other. On the other side was a long, thin corridor, lined with doors. The room we wanted was the fourth on the left, but getting there was a tactical nightmare.
In the end, we ran. It was stupid, and we could have been killed. But every minute we wasted, Kalach fell another half mile or so.
The room was mercifully empty when we burst in. Hraat's men hadn't reached it yet, and it looked like the scientists had cleared out, leaving the machine behind them.
The Amplifier.
The three of us stared at it, dumbstruck. Three thin claws curled from the ground, electricity crackling up and down their metal casings, their bodies alternating between a blazing white