A familiar dream, a banquet, dancing, polite conversation, simpler times before all this happened, the face of her mother, peaceful times and even her father’s smile.

She wakes up as Anastasia starts the landing sequence, Valeria also stirring, she takes her helmet and puts back on, double checks her rifle is loaded and stows it readies her sword and shield instead, Valeria now completely awake winces as she moves Amber saying to her softly “Easy there, no sudden movements until your completely awake.”

Anastasia enters the crew area after she set the ship down.

Valeria asks “Where are we and who are you?”

Amber then replies “We are nearly at the rest of my team, this is my partner on missions, Anastasia Zaitsev, she is from Volga.”

Anastasia then says “My pleasure to make your acquaintance Valeria. You may call me Anya.”

Valeria responds “Pleased to meet you Anya.”

Amber then says “We are nearly there, 9 kilometers to cover on foot, once we are there you can sleep all you want.”

Anya then asks “Ready?”

Amber replies “Yes” as Valeria just nods.

She opens the landing ramp, Vostroya rifle already shouldered, scanning for movement, seeing none she motions them forward, for the next couple of hours they move slowly, staying hidden and not moving too much too avoid drawing attention to themselves, as they close in on the landing zone, they see the massive fight going on, regular explosions of ice and blue flames interspersed with the tell-tale report of Gunner firing his assault cannon.

They continue moving, as they close to within 1 kilometer the Rhine forces deploy artillery and begin shelling the area, the barrage is intense but the shields erected by the Dragoon engineers hold, along with point defences that destroy a fair amount of rounds.

Gunner stops firing warnings flashing on his hud, the cooling system is close to overloading, he disengages the Retribution and switches to his Stryker shotgun instead, loads a magazine and pulls the charging handle. As the Rhine troopers get close he starts firing, the massive 6 gauge rounds ripping into the shields and armor. He disengages the entrenching system, so he can move freely.

Just as he moves to a closer vantage his previous position is hit by an enemy mortar, the shields having failed.

Gunner calls into the comm “INCOMING!” as rounds start pounding the defences to rubble.

He keeps firing and reloading as fast as he can go. His comm alerts him to an incoming message “Alpha 1, this is War God actual, Liberty and Blood River fleets inbound as are we, Rhine third fleet in retreat.”

Gunner says “War God actual, this is Alpha 1, requesting air support on enemy artillery transmitting coordinates now”

Captain Reyes replies “Coordinates received commander, Spectre gunships and Reaper assault fighters inbound, keep your heads down. Eta 5 Minutes”

Gunner then calls on the comm “Alpha team this is Alpha 1, request status”

Lucia replies “Alpha 2, a-ok”

Amber repiles “Alpha 3 inbound on your location, heavy 1 civillian”

Anastasia replies “Alpha 4 responding, combat effective, with Alpha 3.

Angel replies “Alpha 5 reporting”

Evelyn says “Alpha 6, still kicking”

Gunner then says “Setting up nav point, meet up after incoming air support clears the way”

He gets 5 green lights on his hud. Nodding satisfied he continues firing at the now finally slowing enemy forces.

The next 5 minutes felt like an eternity as the artillery keeps hitting their positions, the next few moments were tense as the sonic booms of the re-entry of the air support thunders in the skies, the Avenger cannon arrays on the Reaper assault fighters tearing into the enemy vehicles and the Spectre gunships suppress and destroy enemy infantry and vehicles alike.

The fight is finished in a matter of minutes later. They mop up the stragglers.

Gunner stands up and surveys the scene and thinks to himself “I wonder if they attacked anywhere else, probably has to do with whatever we found on New Dawn”

He then keys the comm “Alpha 3 you still there?”

Amber responds “Inbound now, medics on standby please”

Gunner responds “Roger that, Echo 521 is inbound, you hurt?”

Amber replies “Negative sir, my sister is, I’ll explain once we are onboard the Hannibal.”

Gunner just replies deadpan “Looking forward to that explanation.”

He then calls Onyria on the Hannibal “Onyria, situation in orbit?”

Onyria responds “Commander, heavy damage to orbital defence infrastructure, 52% of the Bretonian defence fleet has been destroyed or heavily damaged. Loss tally will take days collate”

Captain Reyes then responds “One thing is certain Commander, Rhine just declared war on everyone, Amaterasu, Liberty and Blood River also had incursions but to a much smaller degree, they never even made it planet side, the systems were scanned, nothing is left of Rhine there. Volga is the only unknown, but then again Grigory Reznov has never been an easy man to read. Full debrief when you arrive.”

Gunner frowns and replies “Roger that Captain.”

As he keeps thinking the Raider dropship piloted by Warrant Officer Pulaski arrives and lands, the dragoons and lancers escorting the Empress aboard, then standing guard while they wait for Alpha team to embark, Angel and Evelyn are onboard already, assisting in covering the Empress.

Lucia joins Gunner as they watch Amber, Anastasia and the unknown girl approach. Lucia remarks “Looks like Amber, wonder who it is”

Gunner responds “According to Amber, her sister”

Lucia laughs as she replies in surprise “Think she hit her head?”

Gunner just says “She’s convinced”

Lucia then says “Well debriefing is going to be interesting.”

Satisfied they are within the defensive perimeter they move toward the drop ship.

Anastasia enters first. Amber holding back to check something, she saw something move in the corner of her vision. Next moment all she can hear is a blood curdling scream of agony, looking over she goes white as she sees Valeria laying on the ground clutching a wound in her side. Just as she is about to rush over she hears a voice behind her and grief turns to pure rage.

Walking out from behind a piece of rubble Arsenia Astralis points her power rapier Moon Fang at Amber and taunts her while still aiming her Draco combat revolver at Valeria preparing to fire again “My, my, you Blackburn whelps sure do bleed a pretty shade of red and here I thought your blood would be blue.”

Amber then responds the unable to hide the rage in her voice “You worthless mongrel, you die today, not even the maggots will feast on your rotten hide. Do you hear me? YOU DIE TODAY FILTH!”

Arsenia responds "Flattery will get you everywhere!"

She grips Thunder Child tightly and raises Deliverance, overcharging both and charges Arsenia.

Arsenia dodges the first blow but not expect the shield which knocks her firearm from her hand, the energy from the overcharged shield melting the weapons barrel and rendering it useless.

Amber now completely lost in the fight engages her jump jets flinging her right back at Arsenia who responds in kind by doing the same, both using their aether abilities along with their weapons, lightning and stone clashing as the ground shudders, Arsenia striking Amber and damaging her helmet and a blow from Thunder Child doing the same to Arsenia, both of them taking for their damaged helmets, Amber looks at her foe, black sclera and bright brown irises, long lilac coloured hair, a striking beauty for such a lowly criminal she may have once been a decent human being, banishing these thoughts from her mind, she charges again, using her shield to guard her now vulnerable head, steel flashing and sparks flying as the Thunder Child and Moon Fang clash, Arsenia parrying all but the most savage blows, cracks appearing in her armor.

Arsenia taunting Amber “You know, I truly wish I could rather have stuck her with my blade instead, fillet her alive, with you watching, slowly carving her apart while she is still breathing”

Amber screams at her “Shut up bitch! You do not speak about her!”

Arsenia scoffs and remarks “My oh my, such language, and here I thought you were a woman of culture, yet nothing more than a thug yourself. And seems I have struck a nerve, time to squeeze!”

Amber then screams at the top of her lungs “DIE!”

The fighting intensifies, carrying on for over 30 minutes now as Arsenia starts causing tremors to try and stop Amber but gets too focused on doing this as Ambers savage assault does not relent, the next moment she parries another blow from Amber when a blow from her shield impacts her hand wielding Moon Fang, knocking it out of her hand and breaking her arm. Collapsing from the pain she screams in agony, Amber closing in, preparing to strike the final blow she disengages and says “You are done today, leave with your life while you still can” and leaves her going to Valeria instead, kneeling down and checking her pulse, she’s still alive, albeit barely, lifts her head and steadies it on her leg, Valeria says weakly while crying “Sis? Help me, I don’t want to die.”

Amber responds softly fighting back her own tears “Easy there, try not to talk, I’m here.”

Valeria now nearly unable to speak utters “behind”

Arsenia closing in tries to attack her again using her powers but instead is unable to use them as Gunner blocks them using his abilities as a breaker charging closer with Storm Breaker in his hands, Arsenia closes her eyes and says “No matter now, you are all finished”, just as he swings what should have been the final blow Amber yells at him “STOP!”

Gunner looks at her in surprise and she says “She’s beaten and her ego wounded, this day is done”

Anastasia also having moved closer kneels and comforts Amber now crying believing Valeria has died. What happens next is something that none of have witnessed before but have experienced themselves.

Valeria opens her eyes crying out in agony as the concentration of aether in the area having reached saturation point due to the heavy fighting that occurred here causing her rebirth as an aether, the air smelling like ozone, signifying that she will be reborn as a conduit.

After she stops thrashing about and calms down she passes out, they rush to the drop ship and it takes off.