Wild Wastes 6 -ch 17- (Patreon)

“— what about this clause in regards to tariffs?” asked Harvey. The man was standing next to the Dragon and reading over the packet across their shoulder. “Tariffs pertaining to, or relating to, the growing, creating, or maintenance of wheat, straw, and flour.”

“There’s an extensive area of arable land in the middle of Yosemite,” Aliza stated in a clear voice. “The goal is to make sure that industry remains valid and able to operate freely.

“Please note that there is no export tariffs on those products for the same reason. To encourage those products to be sold abroad.

“Admittedly you could very well have similar concerns so I would expect you to enact your own tariffs.”

“Yes, that makes more sense,” Harvey muttered and nodded his head. “That’s all listed in the rights respected sections for kingdoms.

“Though, it doesn’t say how many kingdoms there are?”

“Technically there would be three if you include the original kingdom of Legion, that became an empire. Two, without including them,” Vince answered. “Yosemite and Spain. Though we have eyes toward France and Prussia at the moment.”

“And Africa,” Aliza added. “Though to be fair, most of Africa was exterminated of life. Now it’s mostly elemental life-forms that don’t have normal needs or requirements.”

“Exterminated?” asked the Lizard, looking up a stack of papers they’d been going through.

“A deity of chaos went through,” Aliza answered. “Ah… since we’re changing topics to a degree, there is a clause at the very back of the packet that I’d like to bring up while you’re still going through it.”

Only ten or so minutes had passed since they’d started to read through it but they hadn’t gotten very far.

Vince couldn’t blame them.

He’d read over some of these things and they felt like a different language. Written in a way that only someone proficient with law would be able to decipher well.

“Yes?” asked Crad, the Dragon. He took hold of the papers the packet he was reading with Carlos, the Human councilor, and began flipping to the back.

Vince had scooped out their names from their heads while they were reading and their defenses had fallen.

“We want the Emperor of the West,” Aliza declared. Her words were said with a great deal of steel in them. There was no budging on this one. “He’s operating a government in exile here in the Tri-Lliance.

“All the Dragons and soldiers you sent up to support him were wiped out. Killed or imprisoned. We’re willing to discuss an exchange for the prisoners but we’re not willing to budge on the Emperor.”

“Emperor?” Carlos asked, sounding confused. “We don’t have the Emperor. We have no love for the man nor would we want to entreat with him.”

Next to him Crad was nodding his head.

Vince frowned at the words.

He’d been paying attention to the man’s emotions and his mind as he spoke.

The words were the absolute truth.

A flicker of emotion came from Crad that matched the Human’s words as well. There was no love lost for the Emperor and if anything, they resented the man.

“He refused to take prisoners and killed all of our soldiers out of hand,” growled Crad after a slight pause. “There are many crimes the man has committed that we would be loathe to consider him as anything other than an enemy.

“Though, that brings up a question. You’ve attacked him? We had soldiers there? Were they prisoners that he took and forced into subservience?”

I don’t even… that… what?

“No. Not prisoners,” Vince clarified with a shake of his head. He’d spoken to the prisoners himself. “They were sent by the Tri-Lliance to assist the Emperor directly.

“All to resist Yosemite. They made regular contact with your patrol boats coming up the west coast.”

The Human and Dragon both lifted their heads at that. Looking at Vince.

Then they both turned and ~ to Tash, the Lizard council leader.

Sitting there without moving, the Lizard was staring back at Vince.

Tranquil and unassuming surface thoughts continued to swirl and flicker across the man’s mind. What would be for lunch, Vince’s visit, going home to see his wife in the evening.

Not a single thought was actually about the current conversation in regards to the Emperor. Nor the boats.

Or the fact that it seemed that the other two councilors were now looking at him.

It didn’t match at all.

These weren’t his thoughts.

There was no way they could be. They didn’t match the situation or what was going on at all.

Safina? Renata?

Something going on out there? Anything strange from the guards?

“Tash? You’re handling the navy. Do we have boats operating in the pacific?” asked Crad at the same time Vince threw out the mental request to his escort.

“Haaa,” sighed the Lizard expansively.

He sprang out of his seat in the next moment, snatched up a decorative piece on the desk, and rammed it into Carlos’ eye.

The man shrieked and spun away, taking the object with him as he went. Colliding into Crad the man fell away behind the table.

“Guards!” shouted Crad who then held up both hands in front of himself. “Arrest Tash!”

Surprised, stunned even, Vince just stood there.

Watching.

Tash had pivoted, ripped a sword out of a guard’s belt, then beheaded that guard. Brandishing the weapon, the Lizard killed another guard.

Guards were quickly moving away from their posts on the wall toward Tash and formed into a group.

At the same time, another group of guards were all racing toward Tash from the other side of the room.

Then they went past him and began attacking the other guards.

What the fuck?!

Every guard avoided Vince and Aliza and focussed entirely on each other, and the councilors. The group that started attacking the other guards were doing it in a way that spoke to training and awareness of one another.

The group defending the councilors were looking at each other warily and seemed absolutely shocked at what was happening. To the point that one of them lashed out at another for getting close to them.

Tash had fled from the group and was now moving away and out of a side door. One that Vince hadn’t even realized was a door until this moment.

“Vince?” asked Aliza, clearly looking for orders.

Not that he could blame her. The situation right now had quite literally deteriorated to a point of being only recognizable as chaos.

Crad was fending off attackers with his Draconic abilities and magic, even as more began pouring in from the sides. Except that it wasn’t easy to determine which side was fighting for whom.

Only those that were attacking their comrades, the traitors themselves that was, truly knew who was fighting for Tash.

“Protect Crad and Carlos,” Vince decided in that instant.

He’d explain his reasoning later.

Turning he looked to the door.

“Ynes! I need you here now!” he boomed out at the top of his volume.

Even as he called out the door was smashed inward.

A massive Orange claw encircled with magical energies blasting through the point where the two doors met together. Knocking them inward and off their hinges.

Safina came in right after that in her Human form.

Through the doorway Vince could see that Renata had shifted into her Dragon form and most certainly didn’t fit. She’d ended up facing away and kicking the door open with a rear leg.

Her head was twisted in nearly the wrong direction just to squeeze it into the hall so she could knock the door open.

Canae, Dalia, Zathira, Johanna, and Claudia all came in right behind the blue Dragon. The group forming a magical wedge between themselves with Zathira surprisingly at the lead.

They were all in their Legion armor and helmets, though Zathira was without.

Ynes was in the center of the group and was looking around in every direction, her maces held in each hand in a loose grip.

Aliza had already made it to the Dragon councilor and was looking down. Likely at Crad who was on the ground.

The Elf turned, made a hand chopping motion, and the table that they’d been siting at was split in half. It was right in front of Aliza and gave Vince a view of her feet and Carlos on the ground.

The man was writhing around with his hands on his face. Harvey was right above the man with one hand on his shoulder and looked confused and scared.

“Ynes, gather up Crad and Carlos,” Vince ordered and went to move into their wedge as they reached him. The magic that surrounded them parted around him as he entered.

Passing between two Elves he moved in to stand next to the Dryad since that’s where he probably should be.

A magical shield snapped into place around the whole of the group the moment he did.

“Safina, Johanna, councilors,” ordered Ynes, putting a hand on Vince’s back. Her mace dangled from her wrist from the loop around it’s bottom. “Claudia, how’s that exit looking?”

“No response so far. There’s something seriously wrong with… everything,” reported the Elf. “Something is really screwing with our stuff. Short-range is fine but long range is fucked.”

Vince hadn’t heard the Elf curse before but he found himself smirking. He couldn’t deny there was something fun about pretty women spouting terrible things.

Safina and Johanna bolted ahead, rushing off to Aliza, who was getting Carlos to their feet. The Royal Elf had gotten them into a hunched standing position.

Safina reached out and grabbed Crad by the collar and began dragging them back toward Vince.

At the same time, Johanna threw up a dual layered shield around. The outer layer was a nullification barrier and the interior was a magical physical shield.

“Down!” screamed Canae as a group of soldiers rushed in from the side door that Tash had exited from.

Not arguing it, Vince instead dropped down onto his chest in a flash. Hitting the floor at the same time as the rest of his group did.

A whooshing boom left the group as soon as a strange yellow pipe came up and pointed toward Vince and his people. The tube itself was easily as wide in diameter as the thickest part of his thigh.

There was a moment frozen in time as the pipe turned a bright blue color in the split second Vince saw it, before it discharged whatever it held.

Vince didn’t even see what it was, but he felt it pass over his head.

Rushing by him and leaving by a whipping wind that reminded him of standing too close to a car moving past at high speed. It made his hair flutter about.

Then a crash, clatter, and boom, behind him made Vince look backward.

A hole the side of Renata in dragon form had been made in the solid concrete and brick wall. Knocking open a passthrough to the next room.

The wall beyond that also had a hole, though somewhat smaller.

Only to move into the room beyond that, and the next wall.

Unable to see any further than that due to the dust and debris in the air, Vince was suddenly sure of the fact that whatever had been shot had kept going even then.

“Some type of magic shell!” Ynes called. “Don’t let it strike a shield, deflect it! Upward!

“Claudia, Zathira, magical slant! Canae, Dalia, Nullifier, same slant!”

Even as the group got to their feet, Vince saw the magic that Ynes ordered spring to life.

Johanna, Safina, and Aliza were dragging the councilors into Vince’s group.

The guards and soldiers were still locked in a death struggle with one another, but they were all clearly watching the councilor’s leaving. Both sides looked like they wanted to move to engage.

Groaning, Carlos fell to his knees in front of Vince the very second Aliza stopped guiding him along.

Up close, Vince could see that it was a terrifying injury.

The decorative object looked almost like a name placard or some type of paperweight. It wasn’t very sharp and had likely been stabbed in by force alone.

“My eye!” shrieked the man, his eyes partially covering the wound and most of his face. “Ahhhhhhhh!”

Ynes growled, then jerked the man’s hand away from his face.

“Your eye is pulped,” she hissed and then looked away. “We leave it in till we can do something about it if he starts to bleed.”

Crad looked like he wanted to argue about it, but the Dragon was looking at Safina strangely. Then swung his gaze to Vince.

“It’s a coup,” hissed the councilor.

“No shit,” Claudia answered immediately as if she were being addressed.

“Button it,” Ynes ground out then turned to look at the Vince. She needed direction on what to do.

“We’re leaving. They can figure out what they want to do afterward, get me the fuck out of here, Ynes,” Vince said.

“Safina, Renata, make that hole a tunnel,” Ynes ordered and pointed to where the shot had gone through the wall. She grabbed up Carlos and began hauling him onward as she made the order. Harvey followed meekly along and said nothing. “Claudia and Johanna, shields on the rear as we go.

“Rest on sides and forward.”

Everyone began moving with speed. Running toward the hole that’d been made with the two Dragons in the lead.

“Damnit, now I hate being the smaller one,” called Renata, pushing ahead of Safina in a dead sprint.

“Get in there, Rennie!” shouted Safina as the Orange pulled away.

Shifting into her Dragon shape as she met the wall, Renata dove at is. The large hole became large.

Once she’d cleared the wall, Renata halted her shift and went back to her Human shape. She had only partially transformed.

Managing to keep most of her speed, she raced on to the next wall. Dodging around a partially overturned work-desk.

No sooner than she reached the next wall than she did it again.

This time though she went down in a tumble. Her limbs getting tangled in some wooden beams that were in the walls.

“I’ll get the next one,” Safina declared as she shot past the Orange.

Everyone else followed along quickly.

The sounds of fighting were fading behind them, though Vince could also hear it at each door they passed. That just beyond those wooden doors soldiers were fighting one another.

Damn, this whole thing was in the works.

Our arrival made it go off early I’d bet, though it doesn’t seem like “early” wasn’t ready. They moved with purpose.

A strange bolt of magic tore through the wall to their right and angled up into the ceiling. It left behind seared edges and molten stone.

As if it’d cut through everything it touched outright.

He could clearly see outside through the hole that’d been made.

Then the stump of a Dragon’s neck flopped down over the wall that the attack had come from.

The attack had clearly been aimed at the Dragon’s head and had removed it outright. Either obliterating it or cutting it that cleanly.

Blood pumped out of the neck in fascinating spurts.

Maybe it was more of a timing thing, rather than resources.

Ready to do it and having everything in place, but not the right timing.

Cause this seems terrifyingly ready to take out everything.

Even Dragons.

Safina transformed fully into a Dragon as she blasted through a wall and exited out into what was most certainly the gardens around the government building.

Renata was behind her a second after that and both Dragons were looking around.

“Report,” demanded Ynes. They still had another room and a half to cross before they reached the Dragons.

“We’re not flying out of here,” Safina reported. Vince just barely heard her say it, which meant she was wearing some type of com system that piped the response to Ynes’ helmet. “They’re targeting any Dragon in the air with those… magic… weapons.

“It’s punching right through magical shields as well as the Dragon themselves.”

“Yeah, most of them are trying to land as fast as possible,” Renata added. “Sounds like we need to act the part of a land animal and charge or way out of the capital, or somewhere safe in the capital.

“Given that we’re strangers in a strange land, I really prefer the latter. If we can get out of this perimeter ring we can just fly home. To hell with this.”

Vince couldn’t really argue that point.

They weren’t part of the Tri-Lliance and they had no allegiance to them.

Dying here, in this place, didn’t serve the cause of Yosemite or Legion at all.

“Damn right, out of the capital,” Vince agreed.

“You heard the man, route out. I want Johanna and Claudia in the lead with Renata,” ordered Ynes. “Safina take the rear with Zathira, the rest on the sides, VIPs in the center.

“Zathira, how’s that army looking?”

“Oh not too bad,” remarked the Lamia, her eyes an abyssal black and without whites. Looking further behind them, Vince saw that there was indeed a number of people following along behind them.

He didn’t doubt they were all dead though some didn’t quite look dead.

“Collecting all I can from further afield but they’re also running into fights at the same time. I’m avoiding fights for them just in case they come across innocents,” Zathira continued, then turned her head slightly toward Vince. Her smile blossomed in that moment, then looked away again as Safina joined her at the back.

“This is a coup,” murmured Crad as he kept pace with everyone. “A coup. Tash is actually launching a coup. I never had-I never-there weren’t any signs.”

“His thoughts and emotions didn’t match what he should have been feeling. I get the impression there’s more than meets the eye here,” muttered Vince as they reached Renata who’d shape shifted into her Dragon form now.

She watched them approach, then swung her head around, and began moving at a slow jog away. Everyone made to keep up with her as they began loping along the grounds of the building.

“I can’t leave, I need to stay here and organize a defense,” Crad said in a strangled voice.

“Feel free,” Ynes said and gestured to the city proper past the walls that surrounded the grounds. “Looks like all hell is breaking loose.”

A Dragon that was flying low over the houses was knocked out of the sky by a flash of blue light. One of their fore-legs simply vanished and a hole opened up in their chest.

Guts began to spill out as they fell out of the sky.

Crad said nothing more and they continued moving.

Ahead of them, Renatta plowed through the fields and went through a wall. She avoided the major streets and instead chose a much smaller path that she barely fit into.

It’d make it harder for others to see them though.

In no time at all, they exited that alley and were near a heavy exterior wall.

Or the remains of it.

Renatta had started to quite literally dig through the wall. Her claws acting like giant shovels as she burrowed her way through it.

By the time the rest of the group reached her, there was a hole just large enough for them to squeeze through. Though it was at the top of the wall.

Twenty or so feet off the ground, in fact.

“We can make the jump,” huffed Ynes and began pushing at Renatta’s left leg. “Transform and go through. We’ll have to catch Carlos or cushion him with magic. Everyone else just jump.”

Renatta transformed and everyone else followed along through the crack.

Freedom was just beyond it, though Vince wasn’t quite sure what would come after that. He just knew he didn’t want to be in the city.

With that in mind, they escaped.