When the bulwark finally falls I breathe. I stop all the tanks moving around me, I stop the bots, I land the aircraft. I reach for the silence. The Veltari branchling from House Fubai hails me. I turn off communications.

I climb out of the cockpit and lower down until my feet feel the soil. Surrounded by the statues of the army, I hear only the silence, and it fills me. I remove my helmet to listen better. Nothing. Pure emptiness. I feel my Horizon pull forward in my mind and let myself be drawn toward it. Towards the silence, towards completion.

Then I hear it. Wind under the wings of a bird overhead, breaking the perfection of the moment. My Horizon pushes away, fading into the distance, as this damn creature turns overhead.  

It doesn’t survive the first shot. I fire five more until it’s nothing but ash carried away by the wind. I holster the laser pistol and reach back out for the silence.

It's gone.

Back to war, I suppose.

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