City Series:Volume6d Chapter3

Chapter 3: The Ruin Runs

7/24/1943 15:42 – 17:18

The past was presented to me

And I was told to obey it

But I…

No

We…

ACBS

An automatic ramming weapon originally designed by the German military. The Germans called it an auto-ramming ship, but the Allies call it an automatic control bombing ship (ACBS).

A few variations based on the MO were produced during World War Two, but there are no records of them ever being used.

The Allies liked how the auto-ramming ship could automatically fly to its destination and eliminate any enemy crafts with its high speed and auto-interception system, but they decided to load wide-range bombs in their ACBS. That way they could efficiently destroy an entire city in a single attack instead of relying on a thousand bombers.

By ’43, the Germans had developed their small V1 auto-ramming ship, but the Allies used the information on the V0 they received through Poland to complete development of their larger ACBS and MO at about the same time.

After the war, ACBS development would shift to development of supersonic weapons such as an intercontinental ballistic variety, which changed how wars were fought.

Part 1

Hamburg Base’s rooftop terrace was already dyed orange by the setting sun.

The 15yd terrace was located 7 floors up.

Other than the central stairway, it only featured railings on the four sides.

Currently, two people stood in the sunlight there: Lowenzahn and Hazel.

Lowenzahn was leaning against the eastern railing. But instead of taking in the breathtaking view outside, she was looking back toward Hazel who stood at the stairway entrance.

The scarlet sunlight shined directly on Lowenzahn as she beckoned Hazel over.

Hazel left the stairway and stepped out onto the terrace.

It bothered her how a light westerly breeze caught the hem of her surgical gown.

Then her slippers caught on a slight dip in the floor.

“?”

Her long blonde hair swished through the orange sunlight as she looked down at her feet. The small dip casting a short shadow there was not a brick or a stone. It was a pattern.

“…?”

Her gaze ran along the rest of the floor.

…A yard-long relief?

She stood on a scene of a woman battling a water dragon in a cave’s underground lake. Her slipper had caught on a dip in the curve of the dragon’s back.

She shifted her gaze to the right.

A one-armed young man, a girl, and several knights walked through a wheat field below the cloudy sky.

She shifted her gaze up.

The Messiah girl, the one-armed young man, and two knights fought a dragon atop an open field just outside of a forest.

“The Unreif Germane.”

“This isn’t easy to maintain. It was originally in the main entrance, but we had it moved here when the place was remodeled.”

“I can imagine,” thought Hazel, approaching Lowenzahn.

She watched her step this time and stopped about two yards from Lowenzahn.

She could see all of Hamburg Base past the railing Lowenzahn leaned against. Around eight white buildings formed two rows. Running between those rows were a row of storehouses and a road large enough for transport vehicles to drive along side by side. She also saw the occasional entrance to an underground space.

The most notable feature was the 20yd-wide waterway flowing through the center of the base.

According to Heiliger, the base was primarily used by the development division and most of the buildings lined up on the east and west were research facilities, so all of the usual military facilities and hangars were located underground.

The main gate and a small runway were located past the waterway. The runway bordered the forest, which was the one side of the base without a wall. The base opened up onto a dark green expanse instead.

She also saw something familiar on the large road in front of the waterway.

The two Grösse Panzers there were colored blue and red. They stood in front of something like a giant green mountain located next to a large storehouse and they each held a weapon. The blue one a rifle and the red one a shield.

…Those are the ones I always see with the Kaiser.

Lowenzahn followed Hazel’s gaze, turning toward them.

The blue and red Grösse Panzers were sinking into the ground. An elevator was carrying them to the underground hangar.

“Skilled Neue Kavaliers from all over Germany are gathering here,” said Lowenzahn without turning back around. “Those impatient knights want an audience with you even before you arrive in Germania a few days from now.”

She finished speaking just as the elevator resurfaced empty.

Then Hazel noticed sudden movement from the mountain-like thing located next to the elevator. The green mountain was nearly as tall as a four-story building, making it taller than the large storeroom next to it.

“Is that a Grösse Panzer!?”

She realized it was in fact a giant armored warrior carrying two towers.

It stood more than 20 yards tall and Lowenzahn explained what it was.

“That is Army Division Chief Karl Schmitt. He lost his body during the previous world war and chose to permanently join with his Grösse Panzer as part of the Eisen Ritter Project.”

The enormous Grösse Panzer sank belowground just like the previous two had.

Lowenzahn stepped in front of Hazel as if to hide that from view.

“Now, I know this is sudden, but where should I even begin with this?” She crossed her arms and peered at Hazel’s face from below. “Don’t worry. I’m not trying to force the job of Messiah onto you. You no longer have the right to refuse. You don’t have the right to choose whether you will save the world or let it be destroyed. Got that?”

Hazel nearly nodded, but stopped herself.

Something about Lowenzahn’s statement bothered her.

…I don’t have the right?

That meant she didn’t have the ability.

She thought about what ability meant in this case.

…When I said goodbye to the Sylphide, I hoped to decide how I would use this Messiah eye.

“Um, wh-what do you mean?”

Lowenzahn raised both hands and silenced Hazel with an exaggerated gesture.

“I will explain that along with the true purpose of the Panzerpolis Project. You see…” She took a breath. “You lost the ability to save the world last year – on that night at Cologne.”

Part 2

Several large boxy blue shapes floated in the sky as the sun set.

Several similar shapes rested on the field below.

The shapes were all aerial ships measuring more than 100 yards long.

A flagpole bearing the Union Jack was set up alongside the gray runway crossing the center of the field.

The field was surrounded by forest. This was Bassingbourn’s secondary airfield located in southeast UK.

The setting sun shined on the sky, the ships, the field, the runway, the flag, and the forest.

All of the ships were on standby.

The crews remained in their assigned barracks and the maintenance crews surrounded the ships performing inspections.

But one ship in that vast field was very different from the rest.

The small aerial aircraft carrier was located at one corner of the field. It only carried a large two-hull transport ship and six large spare fuel tanks.

Between the tanks and the two-hull transport ship, a few dozen crewmembers sat in deep thought while directing their eyes straight head.

Their eyes were all on a very large person on the west end of the deck.

The gray-haired man with two prosthetic arms was Pale Horse. Corelle sat directly in front of him.

“And?” she asked him. “What’s this about Hazel not having the power of the Messiah?”

Pale nodded. His downturned face was unusually hard-set for him.

He glanced over at the others before answering.

“The Allies didn’t believe it, but it’s a major secret that could influence the survival of the world itself. I won’t say it again.” He took a breath. “To put it simply, a Live explosion at Germania on August 23, 1943 will turn back time by a thousand years.”

No one knew how to respond to that. A few said “huh?” before falling silent.

Pale ignored them all and continued.

“Hazel, Berger, and the Sylphide will be closely involved in that explosion, so they alone will be carried back to that point a millennium ago as the keys to reconstructing the world.”

Corelle held out a hand to stop Pale there.

“W-wait just a second. Then this Lehrer who you went to see last year…?”

“Like I said earlier, Lehrer is Hazel after using Sylphide to wake up in modern times again. She is a Buster and she used that power to save the world, but…”

“Wait another second. What are you talking about? You’re skipping way too much here.”

Pale clicked his tongue.

“This is going to get long,” he prefaced. “You know Geheimnis Agency Commander Lowenzahn Naylor, right? The issue here is the Ober Beweisen for her Neue Erde heart and the same for Hazel’s Messiah.”

Pale saw everyone frowning as he continued.

“You see, Neue Erde’s Ober Beweisen has nothing to do with prophecy.”

“Huh? But she’s a Sofort Leser. How else does she prophesy?”

“I can’t tell you that. I’m sure the Geheimnis Agency has some other method. Lehrer said as much. So forget that for now.” Pale raised one sharp-nailed finger. “Neue Erde’s Ober Beweisen is a booster for a specific Live reactor. With a side effect, I might add. Connect Neue Erde to that Live reactor and Neue Erde’s owner’s lifeforce is borrowed to boost its output several times over.”

“Which Live reactor are we talking about here?”

“You’ve seen the aerial photos of that big-ass cross in Germania, haven’t you?”

No one nodded, but no one shook their heads either.

More tension filled their faces and they maintained their silence.

Pale raised a second finger as if to take advantage of that silence.

“Next. On August 23, 1943, the Allies will bomb Germania, but Germania is protected by the barrier created by Tristan. The Vaterlands around the world are a problem too, so the Allies have an idea.”

Corelle continued for him.

“Gather up all of the anxiety Lives in the world, send them back into Tristan, and have it destroy itself.”

“Exactly, Corelle. Do that and Germany as well as most of the nearby Eastern Europe countries will be so ruled by anxiety they can never again recover.”

“So Neue Erde’s owner will use its Ober Beweisen to fight back? To try and stop the world’s anxiety the Allies are forcing onto them?”

Pale kept his right hand’s two fingers raised and scratched his head with his left hand.

“Correct,” he said quietly. “The Geheimnis Agency Commander feels the need to sacrifice herself to the machine in order to save Germany from the anxiety.”

“Continue.”

“Sure,” said Pale. “But that heroic Ober Beweisen has a side effect.”

He raised a third finger.

“Neue Erde wasn’t actually made just to boost the reactor like that. That boosted power is in fact only the means necessary to extract certain Lives from the ley lines.”

“What Lives are those?”

“This world’s Spacetime Lives.”

It took everyone a few seconds to grasp what he had said.

He sighed after seeing them all nod.

“I’m sure you’ve all heard of it as an Ober Geheimnis. The basic timeline of the world exists as Lives, forming one of the basic pillars supporting the entire world. It has only been contacted a few times before. We aren’t talking about anything as insignificant as the Lives behind a land, a country, or the planet. Everything in the world is carried by the Spacetime Lives and they can be extracted through the ley lines, since those are the greatest form of Lives we can control.”

His shoulders drooped, but then he looked up to view them all and raised a fourth finger.

“But the anxiety will be even more powerful. According to Lehrer, it happens late at night on August 23, 1943, in the middle of the bombing of Germania.”

He took a breath.

“Neue Erde attempts to fight back by extracting the Spacetime Lives with its Ober Beweisen, but it loses control and the Lives pressurized within Tristan grow too powerful and they explode. Both the anxiety Lives and the Spacetime Lives do.”

“Wait.” Corelle held out a hand to stop Pale. “That makes no sense. If the Spacetime Lives explode too…”

“Yes, the world’s timeline would be destroyed. The past and the future would both explode and disappear together. That would mean ruin. The world would be destroyed.”

“But…but we’re still here. So the timeline couldn’t have been destroyed.”

Pale raised a fifth finger in front of Corelle’s eyes with a hint of a smile on his lips.

“That’s where the Messiah comes in. I said Lehrer ended up a thousand years in the past, didn’t I? That’s because she saved the world from ruin.”

He looked up into the sky. Everyone else followed suit. The setting sun shined on a new giant aerial warship slowly traveling east. It produced a deep roar as it pushed the wind out of the way.

Someone muttered “that’s the flagship” while viewing that 300yd ship.

After waiting for the flagship to pass, they lowered their gazes. There was no longer any skepticism in their eyes.

Pale had lowered his gaze along with theirs.

He had also lowered his right hand with the five raised fingers.

“Now, then,” he said. “I’ll tell you how Lehrer saved the world. And why Hazel can’t do the same.” He pointed at his right eye with his metal finger. “The Messiah eye’s Ober Beweisen grant’s its owner the ability to fully perceive Lives of even the highest level. That includes the anxiety Lives and the Spacetime Lives.”

And…

“A Buster has the power to destroy Lives. Lehrer used her Ober Beweisen to perceive the anxiety and explosion Lives and destroyed them just before Tristan detonated, but she couldn’t do it quite so cleanly.”

“So she was forced to destroy 1000 years’ worth of Spacetime Lives too?”

“I think so, yes. She and the other people at the center of the spacetime explosion were sent to the past. The Panzerpolis Project isn’t actually meant to defend Berlin. It’s a project using the Geheimnis Agency Commander and the Messiah to protect history and the world by making sure that same loop plays out every single time.” Pale nodded, straightened his back, and put on a more carefree expression. “But unlike Lehrer, our Hazel is a Tuner. That means she can’t destroy the anxiety Lives. She can’t save the world by destroying it. That was decided that night back in Cologne.”

He smiled bitterly and chuckled.

“The Geheimnis Agency Commander intends to complete the loop and avoid ruin so the world can try again. M. Schrier and I intend to save the world without relying on the loop. There must be some way of doing it.”

He looked to the others and said one last thing.

“So what will the rest of you do?”

Part 3

“And so you have strayed from the scenario that has been repeated time and again to preserve the world. You have left the looping scenario set up by the Panzerpolis Project.”

Lowenzahn stepped away from the terrace railing and walked past Hazel to the west.

Hazel was too preoccupied trying to make sense of what she had just been told.

Her Ober Beweisen was not enough to save the world. She needed the power of a Buster as well.

…So I chose the wrong kind of power?

She had made that decision during the battle at Cologne.

She had seen a school and decided she wanted to be a teacher after the war.

But…

“Unfortunately, you won’t have a chance to see the end of this war. In fact, the world itself won’t. Because…”

“The millennium’s worth of damage to the Spacetime Tons sends the world back 1000 years from August 23, 1943 to begin another loop?”

“Yes. If you do not wind up in the past, the last 1000 years of Germany’s history will be altered. The Messiah will not appear in the past. Do you get it now? You must return to the past to preserve the world. You cannot escape the Nibelung.”

The word Nibelung reminded her of the card in her coat’s breast pocket and she heard a bitter laugh from behind her.

“But maybe that’s for the best. If this war continues, Germany will lose. And the anxiety will cover the world. Doesn’t repeating the fun part time and again sound better than seeing the boring ending?”

“But…”

“There is no other way. My mother explained it all to me when I was little. Including what I must do! She told me I can preserve the world by becoming a part of an Eingeweide concept weapon! So…”

Hazel looked back, but Lowenzahn’s face was obscured by the setting sun shining in from behind her.

“So I will keep the wheel turning. For my own sake.”

Her Lives were the orange of joy.

“Messiah, let me help you with your dreams.”

“Eh?” Hazel tilted her head. “My dreams?”

“I mean this.” Lowenzahn kicked at the relief on the floor. “You have dreams about an ancient army on the move while you wander through a dark forest with him, don’t you? Maybe you think of them as nightmares, but you have dreams that feel like your own memories once you grow accustomed to them, don’t you?”

“…!? How do you know about that?”

“Those dreams really are your memories. In August of 1943, you destroy Tristan at Germania, making you, the one-armed young man, and Sylphide the keys to reconstructing the world.” Lowenzahn kicked at the relief again. “So when the world was reconstructed a thousand years ago, it included some Tons from you, him, and Sylphide. That is also why your Tons include some German Ton data even though you are Heidengeists and why your Tons include your own memories from the previous loops. You see those memories as dreams.” She took a breath. “So you have those dreams even though you have already given the wrong answer to be the Messiah.”

“Th-then…!”

“Then what?”

Hazel frowned.

“Why did you capture me!? I’m not a Buster! All the Geheimnis Agency people here think I’m going to save the world. But you just said I can’t do that!”

Lowenzahn relaxed her shoulders and sighed.

“Like I said in the beginning, I know full well that you lack the ability. What I need is your Messiah eye.” She smiled bitterly and shrugged. “Getting it all the pieces to fit wasn’t easy, let me tell you. I had to give the Allies information on our Wort Bombe in exchange for you. I leaked that destructive weapon’s data as a replacement for your Busting power. They intend to load it onto an auto-ramming ship to ensure they destroy Tristan in August.”

Lowenzahn pointed toward the black cross visible in the eastern sky.

“I will borrow your Messiah eye’s power then. Our Beweisens are the same, so I can forcibly activate your Ober Beweisen. Then I use your eye to view the Spacetime Lives and make sure they remain as undamaged as possible while letting the Wort Bombe go boom and trigger Ton collapse.” Lowenzahn stared straight into Hazel’s Messiah eye. “You don’t need to do a thing. I only need to borrow your eye for a bit.”

Part 4

The sky was colored the purple of late evening.

A small field in the mountains sat below the sky as night fell.

A pile of wood sat on the field and a motorcycle with a sidecar was parked next to it.

A young man in black stood on the pile, removing the wood and tossing it away.

A woman in purple sat next to the sidecar.

She had built a stove from the discarded wood and a fire was burning inside it.

A pot of soup was simmering atop the stove.

The fire crackled inside the stove, briefly illuminating their dark surroundings.

She spoke quietly while viewing the light through her tinted glasses.

“No one knows anymore how it got started. The Panzerpolis Project wouldn’t have existed originally. But as the loops continued, it was eventually created to keep the wheel turning.”

“And your memories appear to you as dreams?”

“Yes, but the memories from my thousands of past iterations only tell me how desperate they all were. The dreams are a result of their anxious desire to not fail, to not run away, to not be hurt.” She took a breath. “I intend to create something new. I won’t give up just because I created another loop. None of my past selves could do anything about it, but destiny can be changed.”

“So unlike your past selves, you chose to sleep for a thousand years inside the Sylphide?”

“Yes.” She pulled a card from her pocket – the Hermit. “Back in my world, this was the Wheel of Destiny.”

She heard his bitter laugh from atop the pile of wood.

“Sounds like you’ve changed destiny after all,” he said. “If you failed to fix destiny in your time, what can you teach Hazel now that she’s a Tuner?”

“There is one way to do this and I have already informed M. Schrier via letter. You must stop Tristan before the bombing of Berlin. Not destroy it – stop it.”

“That’s a lot easier said than done.”

“It is what it is. And Hazel’s Beweisen can stop Neue Erde.”

“So you want her to stop the Geheimnis Agency Commander’s heart, killing her? And if the anxiety Lives are building up inside Tristan like you claim, then Germany will end up with some bad Live pollution.”

“But it’s better than another loop.”

He threw down another piece of wood. He threw down a disgusted comment along with it.

“Which is why you slept your way to the modern age, huh? You really want to get history moving again, don’t you? But you know what happens if we don’t start another loop and you get what you want, don’t you?”

“If the loops stop and Hazel does not end up in the past, the last millennium of Germany’s history will collapse from the very foundation. Because it will create a history where the Messiah does not save Germany a thousand years ago.”

“And the world will correct itself to match. Most likely, we’ll all disappear and become someone else. That’s another kind of ruin for the people in the world now.”

He threw another piece of wood.

“Are you okay with that?”

“That is how the world is meant to be.” Lehrer held her knees. “The chaos in Germany a thousand years ago was due to the anxiety that we failed to fully destroy back in ’43. I hated how everyone thanked me for eliminating that chaos a thousand years ago. Because I was only hunting down the trouble we had sown through time.” Lehrer squeezed her arms tight around her knees. “And you know what? I am destined to disappear no matter what happens.”

“…?”

“Without another loop, I will disappear along with this world. And if there is another loop…well, there is only one timeline. If everything is redone, I will be overwritten.”

“You mean Hazel will erase you by following in your footsteps?”

“Yes. In this world’s Lives, the old me will be rewritten with the new me. If Hazel creates another loop, she will overwrite and erase me. So…”

So…

“I can only exist this one time. As irresponsible as that might be.”

She lowered her head and stirred the soup with the large spoon leaning against the edge of the pot. The somewhat brown potato soup swirled inside the pot.

“What was I like last time? Let me guess: I was the second most wonderful guy in the world.”

“Why would I tell you that?” She gave a snort of laughter. “Telling you wouldn’t accomplish anything.”

“Fair enough. Oh, I finally found the secondary cockpit. Don’t move from there while I stand Schwarz Löwe up. How about you prepare your weapon and summon Sylphide? You can control that thing, right?”

“I acquired a weapon earlier and Sylphide is already flying overhead. I have it soaring autonomously outside of detection range while its self-repair function heals a thousand years’ worth of decay. But more importantly…”

Lehrer stood up.

She looked up to see Berger atop the 3yd pile of wood.

She looked between him and the pot at her feet.

“You can make it quick, but you should really eat something.”

“I’m too busy. I’m putting together a connector staff so Schwarz Löwe can wield Gelegenheit, so you just eat your portion.”

“Oh? But the old you always loved my cooking.”

“H-hold on there.” He hopped down, landed, and brushed off his black coat. “You just said you wouldn’t tell me about him, so how is this fair?”

“Women can be selfish when it suits us,” she said bluntly. “But if you insist, I can tell you more. For example, whenever the old you would kiss me, you would reach your arms around to my butt and-”

“Okay, okay! I’ll eat it! I’ll eat, so that’s enough!” He looked upset, clicked his tongue as he approached the fire, and lowered his voice to a whisper. “Hazel’s a little more modest and has a bigger chest.”

“Then you had better take better care of her than me.”

Berger silently sat down and Lehrer sat to his left and looked to the fire.

“I am Lehrer, but she can stay Hazel Mirildorf.”

She picked up the plate sitting next to the stove and reached for the spoon in the pot.

“You don’t like carrots, right?”

She spooned some soup onto the plate and passed it to Berger. She expressionlessly accepted the steaming plate, checked his pocket watch with his other hand, and started eating. He ate quickly.

“Hey, Lehrer,” he said. “Is there no way to keep you from disappearing?”

“Feeling sorry for me? I appreciate it, Berger. There is one way, but it is something I couldn’t bring myself to do. Besides…”

“Besides what?”

“You have no intention of telling Hazel about this. This is something she needs to realize on her own. If she reaches that realization, I am sure she will save me and all the previous versions of me too. After all, all of the previous ones were overwritten by the next one…which is why they can only appear in our dreams.”

“C’mon, you can tell me. If only you were still Hazel. Then I could just bully it out of you.”

“I have questions of my own. Like how you realized who I really am.”

“That was easy. I’d been curious about it since last year. After all, your kiss felt and smelled just like hers. You drink milk with every meal, don’t you?”

Lehrer’s face grew a red different from the tint of the firelight.

“Berger?” She spooned soup onto her own plate with a displeased look on her face. “I have another question too.”

“Yeah?”

“Now, I’ve heard some rumors going around the AIF saying you forced yourself on that girl when she was only 15. Is that true? …What is that disgusted look supposed to mean?

“Don’t ask. That rumor has done some severe damage to my reputation.”

“I see.” Lehrer nodded and blew on her soup before taking a bite.

She sighed, satisfied with the flavor.

“Can I ask one more thing, Berger?”

“?”

“It doesn’t happen to me much anymore now that I’m in my mid-20s, but she’s still young.”

“What doesn’t happen?”

“When Werecat girls are teenagers, they have a mating season from spring to summer.”

“They…what?”

“But girls have their pride, you see. We’re not animals, so we would only let it show in front of someone we have feelings for. And when we do…well, we’re cats, so we only try to tempt them. Do you get what I mean?”

Berger ate his soup without answering.

“If that girl hasn’t done anything, it’s because she’s been working very hard to resist the urge. She has no idea what she should do and doesn’t have anyone she can confide in. Do you get it now? So…”

She took a breath.

“So if something like that does happen, try to be gentle with her.”

Berger set his plate down, paused for a few seconds, and then collapsed backwards like his strings had been cut. He twisted onto his side, turning his back to Lehrer, and flopped a few times on the summer grass.

“Maybe I shouldn’t go rescue that idiot after all,” he groaned lethargically.

Lehrer poured the rest of her soup into his ear.

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