Iter Per Astra: Volume 1 - Lost Princess
Astral 8 - Aftermath

Rose’s pain had subsided and was now awake, when she opened her eyes she examined her surroundings, she saw Joseph unconscious beside her. Rose’s hair was all messed up, and was filled with sand, she felt her eyes twitch as there was sand in her eyes, which she just scratched her eyes to remove it.

She looked up to the sky and noticed that the battleship was severely damaged, and was barely hanging on to the sky, its thrusters were not firing at a constant output, and it would fall any minute now.

Seeing a Confederacy battleship this damaged brought joy to her, even though deep down, she knew that this was just a drop in the bucket of the Confederacy’s total might.

She turned towards Joseph, she knew that he was unconscious, and if she were to speak now, he would probably not hear her, but she preferred it this way, it would eliminate any awkwardness about what she was going to do now.

“Thank you...” She whispered. “...for making me... feel welcome here...” She stood up. “Farewell... Joseph...” and walked away from him.

Then, as if she had flipped a switch, she started to scream in anger. “Why?... Why?!... Why did I do that? Me-Melody was right... I might have satisfied my revenge, but I can’t stay here now, they know where I am. I just... I just traded a place I could have called home, for--”

Joseph then groaned as he was disturbed by the sound that Rose was making. But didn’t wake up.

Rose was startled by this. She then stared at the gun that Joseph was carrying.

“No...” She said to herself.

She then took off her cadet badge, set it on the ground beside Joseph, and walked away. “Farewell... Commander...” She then walked away towards a small overgrown area of Nautica harbor further inland.

A short while later.

He slowly opened his eyes and saw the orange-blue sky of Coryzen, he felt a bit of pain across his body because of the explosion a little earlier.

Floating in the sky above was a distinctive ship flying. It was the CRNS Shoukaku, Joseph recognized the ship as it was one of the first ships of the CRN that he boarded, and it had a special place in him.

As it was a starfighter carrier, multiple starfighters surrounded the carrier as they launched barrage after barrage at the Confederacy battleship. Further weakening its failing shields after the big impact that the harbor’s defenses had made.

“How long was I out?” He said with the thought that Rose was beside her, be it awake or still unconscious.

Joseph stood and looked at the remains of the turret, which he had just barely avoided its overload blast; A bright orange-yellow liquid, reminiscent of lava, continued being poured from one of the pipes that was where the turret had just been standing.

“A plasma energy pipe.” He said to himself looking at the distinctive old technology. “It’s been a long time since I’ve seen one of those.”

He turned his gaze back to the Confederacy battleship, just when a giant red laser came from high in the sky, probably from a ship out of the atmosphere of the planet, tearing a clean hole across the ship, top to bottom, causing catastrophic failure to its reactor and engines, following the explosion of the reactor, it free fell into the ocean below.

“That’s the arrow-class corvette doing its thing.” He said.

He then looked beside him and saw that Rose wasn’t there, only her rank badge that had her name.

“No, it can’t be.” He then realized that when the turret exploded, he was the one that received the biggest impact. “She must have gotten up and left, but why?” He continued looking around until he saw Rose beside one of the old overgrown CRN buildings on the harbor, looking at the sky. The explosion of the Confederacy Battleship must have gotten her attention.

“Rose!” He called.

She noticed that Joseph called to her, she gave out a small smile at him, but instead of coming to him, she just walked away.

“Rose? Rose!” Joseph called again standing up to give chase. Grabbing the rank badge in the process.

Nautica harbor had some of the oldest buildings on the entire planet, some of these were made when the planet was just considered conquered around three centuries ago, the nearly closed-off beachside on the eastern part of the continent, separated it from the rest of Coryzen’s expansive ocean. Nautica Harbor back then worked to help people of that time understand how the climate of Coryzen worked, to determine if the planet was habitable after the World Engine had done the initial terraforming, centuries before.

After people from multiple different nationalities came to Coryzen and organized themselves as a stand-alone government, they moved the government buildings further inland, abandoning the old buildings, but leaving and expanding the marketplace, and building a light naval presence in the harbor, until a few decades ago when the Starline family donated a battle-ready space station to protect the entrance to the Coryzen system.

Joseph approached the building that once was the town hall of Coryzen, as Rose walked off behind the building, he called to her, but she never turned around to face him or explain why she left the way she did.

“Go away...” She answered back. “Please...” she said under her breath.

“Rose.” He kept calling. “What is wrong with you?”

“Stop!” Rose shouted as she turned around and pushed Joseph away.

A barely audible warble-like sound was heard, and small metal bits or metallic rocks lying on the ground flew away from Rose as she shouted. It was like a sudden gust of wind.

Rose looked at her hands scared, they were trembling, Joseph noticed fear in Rose’s eyes, but it was not of him, because she wasn’t looking at him, it was at something else, something that she could do.

She took a deep breath to compose herself and said. “Please... Pleeeease!... stop... following me...” Rose pleaded.

“Why?” He asked.

“Why?” She exhaled. “I... I don’t want you getting hurt... so I am running away.”

“You have done nothing wrong. Why are you doing this?”

“I... I am not going to tell you.” She said as she walked away again.

“If something is bothering you, let me help you.”

“You can’t help me...!” She shouted, turning around, and pointing to Joseph’s chest. “No one can... This society... the entire galaxy... they are not friendly to my kind. The only way that I can end my suffering is to just disappear and die on some forgotten planet.”

“I know why you are leaving,” Joseph called after having thought for a minute.

“I don’t care...” She said with a sad face.

“It’s because you are a Xenohuman, aren’t you?” Joseph stated.

Rose breathed sharply and her eyes blasted wide open.

“You were the one that stopped the missiles, weren’t you.” He continued. “There is no technology on Nautica Harbor that can stop missiles like what I witnessed.

“You saw it?” She said softly as a tear crossed her face; she gritted her teeth. “Why... Why did I have to do that? Why did I have to reveal myself again!!!” She shouted so loudly that nearby birds flew off scared.

“You had to... reveal yourself... again?” Joseph asked. “What do you mean?”

Rose then turned back towards him, she stood there for a few seconds. “I’m sorry.” She said as she extended her hand, and Joseph’s blaster then flew from its holster in his belt towards Rose’s hand where she caught it.

“What are you doing?” He asked, a bit terrified. As he knew that the blaster was loaded as he had just finished reloading it. And even if the safety was on, Rose had the required training to remove it if she was going to do what she thought she was.

Melody had told him about the existence of Xenohumans, he even knew about Melody’s powers. But Melody had warned him that her powers were not harmful on their own, but if he were to meet a Xenohuman who had a stronger power, or a power that could affect the surroundings around him, there was no way of knowing what they might do to him if he said something to them about it. Xenohumans are not very friendly to people who know their abilities as other countries will conscript them or make them vanish.

Coryzen’s good relations with Xenohumans are a secret from the public because the Coryzen government fears that the United Nations will assault them for this. Coryzen is not a strong galactic nation, but its navy is very skilled compared to other nations of their size. However, they have no hope of surviving a direct attack from the United Nations’s largest naval force in the galaxy.

“I don’t want to kill you,” Rose said. “I really don’t want to do this... but I have no choice... I am going to ask you a favor, I know this will sound weird, but I want you to forget about me.” Rose stated. “Forget, everything about me, forget my name, forget how I look, forget my powers, I want you to forget everything, forget, forget, forget!” She screamed at the end as if forcing herself to do so, she was also holding back tears.

“Rose!” He implored. “Please, let me help you! I know people who can help you, my father can help you.”

Rose didn’t answer, tears then started to form in her eyes, “Please...” She said as she lifted the blaster towards Joseph, removing the safety. “Please, just forget about me, this way, it won’t have to end badly for you.”

“You don’t have to do this; I can help you. Coryzen can help Xenohumans like you, they have saved Xenohumans from many places in the past.”

“I’m sorry, but you can’t help me.” She said closing the blaster on him. “And listen closely because I will not say it a second time... do not! — Follow me! — and also—forget about me.”

He nodded. “Fine.”

Rose then let out a heavy sigh, turning her head down and closing her eyes for a second before lifting it again and look at Joseph again.

“You know...I’ve been here for nearly six months, and you are the only person that treated me like a normal person. I really thought that maybe I could finally get a normal life here... I don’t blame you for what happened today, all of it is out of your control, but... you are the only one who managed to see my powers. So, you are the only link here.”

Joseph was about to try to convince her to stop when a group of robotic soldiers along with their human commander arrived behind Joseph.

Rose froze at the thought that they may have heard her conversation, but in doing so she left the gun aimed at Joseph. which gave off a bad image to them.

“Lower your weapon cadet!” Shouted the human commander of the group.

“Commander Iago! Stand down, this isn’t what it looks like.” Joseph lied. “She doesn’t mean me any harm. She just confused me with one of the Confederacy soldiers on the harbor.”

“Oh really? I believe you.” Iago said coldly, followed by a gesture on his hand that made all the robots aim their rifles at Rose.

“W-What the heck are you doing!?” Joseph shouted.

Rose’s breath shook as she took a few steps back and lowered the gun. She was borderline about to panic, as this reminded her of another painful memory.

Joseph quickly stood between them and tried to get the soldiers to lower their weapons, but as they were robots they only reacted to Iago’s orders.

Rose was confused about who to aim at as Joseph knew her secret, but the others were actively aiming at her, with an intent to kill her. She had recognized Joseph as a good man since she met him earlier that day, but she wasn’t sure if he would go on with her promise of forgetting her.

So, even though she was outnumbered. She decided to aim at Iago.

“You were a hard one to replace...” Iago said leaving a big silence in between the next word and spelling it slowly. “Rosalina.”

Just hearing that name hit her like a bullet, her eyes blasted wide open; it caused her heart rate to increase, followed by losing focus and losing the grip on the blaster which fell to the ground. “Shu... Shut up...” She said softly, placing both hands on her head. “Shut up... please...”

Joseph was worried by the way she reacted; it was as if she was fighting back to keep herself on both feet.

“It’s a pleasure to finally meet you in person...” Iago continued. “Princess Rosalina Nova--”

“Shut up!” She suddenly regained her composure; stood up straight and gave a death glare at Iago. “Shut!! uuuuuuuppppp!!” As Rose shouted, all the blasters from the robot’s hands flew away from their hands and floated around Rose.

It was as if a tornado had pulled all the blasters from the robot’s hands and made them float around Rose at a terrifying speed which at the same time shielded her.

Joseph at that moment realized what she was capable of, the terrifying control she had over her power. The way she moved the rifles across the air was in an incredibly controlled manner. If she decided to launch those rifles at Iago, she would most certainly kill him. He knew that if she did that, she really would have done something bad, but given the current situation, he decided to remain still just in case Rose decided to aim at him as well.

Suddenly all the blasters stopped and aimed their barrels at Iago. He on the other hand didn’t seem worried about the fact that a dozen rifles with enough strength to penetrate any handheld shield, or if not melt or at least bend it, were aimed directly at him, especially when he was not wearing armor of any kind.

The kind of rifles that Rose was controlling were the kind that could destroy tanks, which were forbidden to be used against people by a galactic treaty. This made Joseph question the authenticity of Iago’s position in the CRN, as this was emphasized at every stage of training.

Putting the robot soldiers in between him was a waste of time as the metal that the robots used would melt like butter with a hot knife against these weapons.

“Who are you!?” She shouted. “How do you know that name!? You better tell me if you don’t want me to ki-kill you.”

She then sent one of the rifles flying into a tree beside Iago at an incredible speed, the rifle flew right through the tree, tearing a hole straight to the other side, and it was a pretty thick tree as well.

“You’re even more impressive than what I was told you could do,” Iago said, giving a light applause. “Being able to control so many objects so easily, even missiles that were actively aimed at you. You really are impressive.” He chuckled.

“You saw that?” Rose said.

“But... I’m better.” Iago then pressed a button on his watch and a high-pitched sound was emitted from all the blasters.

Joseph thought that the sound would hurt his ears, but he didn’t feel any pain at all, it was like a normal tone. But it was a completely different story for her, as Rose fell to the ground with her hands covering her ears.

“Aaaahhh!!” Rose screamed. “Make... it... Stop...!”

“All those years they had you and your pals captured, and you thought they wouldn’t have developed a way to disable you,” Iago said as if he was looking for praise as if he was the one that had created the most impressive technology after the creation of the hyperspeed generator. “It was kind of them to give me one of their prototypes to stop you at least.

Joseph realized that Rose had just pulled all the blasters from the robot’s hands, and they would not react if the controller of the robots was disabled, which in this case is Iago. He approached him and punched him in the face and then turned off the frequency emitter.

“What the heck are you doing Iago!” Joseph demanded as he snapped the frequency controller in half, threw it on the ground, and then stepped on it. Which made it go away, but Rose continued to lay on the ground, probably recovering herself from it.

“She is a wanted prisoner of the CRN,” Iago said as he stood up. “And I will bring her in, even if I have to kill you.”

“You’re lying, Director Terix told me to bring her to him.”

“I guess I’ll just have to stop you then.”

“Don’t hold your breath,” Joseph answered as he prepared for a fistfight. “She was given to me as my cadet by the Director himself. If she was a wanted prisoner many people could have taken her in.”

“Probably because she is a prisoner of the Navy, not the Security Bureau which you are on.”

Iago looked at the ground at his blaster that was launched from its holster when Joseph punched him earlier.

“Don’t,” Joseph warned.