Linda was looking around like a kid in an unsupervised candy store. The Wardens, who had dragged them here from the inn to Syfis, had returned to pick them up from the armory with their weird flying machine. The Ruling, Wotar, she corrected herself mentally, had called them 5th Northeast daily patrol.

After her initial culture shock since waking up in the cave had worn off, right now everything seemed exciting and intriguing to her. Thanks to this new and improved attitude, Linda managed to see quite a bit of the vehicle’s construction this time around. It kind of looked like a flying tank. Although the whole front of it seemed to be made of glass, Wint explained to her that it was so heavily armoured that there were some metals on Alaiah who were less durable. It was painted black and its shape was sort of like a huge bat, because its back was slightly elevated and its propellers were under the long wings which spread out from its huge metal carapace in the shape of a V. In contrast to the planes she was used to seeing however, these wings were wider at the front than the back, just like the tiny flying mammals at home, while in flight.

This time they weren’t shoved unceremoniously into the prison ward, instead they were allowed to sit on very comfortable leather chairs, close to the side windows, which stretched all the way to the pilot’s cabin. Linda glued her face to them like a five year old on its first flight and this was exactly what she felt like when the large machine roared, animated by the starting of her powerful engine and mere moments later they were hundreds of meters off the ground.

Paradoxically, the higher they got, the more details she could see - the houses, which were growing further and further apart, as they were moving away from the city and then the meadows - so beautiful and green, almost as if they were not real, but a painting, a work of art. For a moment she wondered if she truly was on another planet - what she was seeing right now looked an awful lot like England. If squinted her eyes just right, she could imagine flying over Birmingham during the summer. And who knew, maybe in the end she could manage to get used to calling Alaiah her home now?

Unfortunately, this flight was over a lot sooner than the first one. It almost seemed to her that the huge flying tank had just leaped and now she was seeing the ground come closer and closer again. Her inner child’s tantrum was cut short however with the appearance of new and more fascinating toys.

Their landing spot was part of an impressive complex of landing fields and runways, covered in smooth asphalt. Well, at least Linda called it asphalt. Here, as she had come to find out, they were bound to have some twisted, made up name for the material. Most likely even the airport wasn’t called an airport, but that wasn’t all that important. What caught her attention the most were the machines in front of them, which made the vehicle they had come in with look like a child’s remote controlled helicopter. Their huge metal bodies were gleaming with the last rays of the setting sun. They reminded her a bit of zeppelins, although their backs looked more like space rockets.

Next to one of these flying monsters, she saw a mobile staircase attached and sighed in relief. Despite the impressive size of these machines, they were, after all, not super weapons. Apparently the awe had reached her face quite visibly, because Wint poked her ribs as they were getting off the flying patrol vehicle.

“Easy there, little one, that’s a glider, it ain’t gonna eat ya. Well, depends on how ye choose to look at it, I guess.”

“A glider?”, Linda echoed, her eyes wandering over the smiling face of the wind storm and toward the metal body of the one with the stairs attached.

“Yes, glider”, Wotar added. She had just sent the Wardens away and now only the three of them were left on the landing pad. “The fastest and statistically safest way to travel on Alaiah.”

“They are quite fast, aye”, Wint nodded. “Ye grab one of these and in about twenty hours ye be in Magmalia.”

“Unfortunately, we won’t be able to put the full potential of this one to use however”, Wotar shook her head. “It is simply too easy to track a glider flight.”

Which in translation meant that they would have to rush to make up for the time lost while not taking advantage of the high speed flying machine. Linda was trying not to break into a sprint as she was trying to keep up with the other two women’s fast pace.

They had explained to her in painstaking detail what the objective of the current mission was, so at least now her brain didn’t feel like walking upward on a downward escalator. Apparently, the prince of the other major country - Magnolia or some such, had flown the imperial coop for some reason. And this was very bad for the good women of AWA, because if the not-so-good women of the Earth nation were to find out that the promised boyfriend of their princess would not be available to grace her hand, there could be a rather ugly conflict, which could very well escalate to an all out war. At this point in the briefing Wint was politely asked to leave the room, because she apparently couldn’t refrain from commenting on the “tricks” of politicians who couldn’t contain their estrogen long enough to avoid military action. It was apparent even to an alien line Linda that the wind storm had nothing but ill-concealed contempt for the ruling class in particular and authority in general.

Although she noted with some surprise that in this at least Wint and her were on the same page. After all, could there be a more ridiculous reason for starting a war than the fact that your little princess won’t be able to take advantage of the male parts of the Imperial son? Clearly, the Earth nation wouldn’t see things this way.

At the moment however, the thing which bothered Linda the most was what exactly was expected of her here. The Ruling over sea had insisted she tag along, despite Wint’s protest and Linda’s confusion. She was no warrior, nor was she any diplomat or political expert. Back home on Earth she couldn’t be forced to vote if her life depended on it. Secretive political machinations filled her with violent rage. And then here she was now, a participant in one such operation and a part of her which to her surprise was gradually growing stronger, was actually thrilled by this development.

Wotar just cut them off, saying that whatever preparations needed to be arranged, would be planned and executed on the way, for they were pressed for time. By preparations, surely they meant extensive training for Linda, because without it, she would surely be little more than a piece of luggage.

They told her also that the glider they were now boarding was going to drop them off at one of the closest islands where there was some top-secret military base. From there they would take a sea ship which would, slowly, but surely get them to the very fringes of AWA territory. She could only hope that they would have enough time to at least teach her how to use the weapons she had taken. Because she was damned certain she had no Gift, as they called the ability to control one of the four elements around here. Perhaps the body she was inhabiting was suffering from this genetic plague which had AWA women so scared?

The glider’s passenger cabin was definitely larger and much better furnished than earth airplanes. Although, of course, this could just be because she was aboard one of the personal gliders of the Alliance’s political elite. They told her that this particular machine wasn’t marked as a diplomatic transport, but this trick wouldn’t work for long because even unmarked gliders could be easily tracked via satellite or by military bases on the ground. If they even grazed the airspace over the fire-earth empire, border patrol would blow them to smithereens before they had a chance to enjoy the scenery.

Linda laid back on one of the comfortable leather seats and let her head fall to the window. All of a sudden she felt extremely tired and she suddenly realised that, since waking up in the cave, she hadn’t slept for more than one or two hours at the Warden barracks. The muted humming of the glider engine lulled her and within minutes she was deep in dreamless slumber...