For the last phase of their journey, their buses joined a convoy of Void Rangers heading for Yomawari Outpost. The T-type mecha escorting them were currently in tank mode, their treads eating up ground as they kept a watch for Void kaiju. While the adult, sensible part of Reiko fervently hoped they didn't encounter any… a childish part of her kinda wanted to see what would happen to one if it was shot by the hybrid cannon's plasma.

  That would be immature, of course. And very silly.

  Mitsuki practically had her faced press to the window the whole way as she drank in the details of the escort mecha keeping pace with them, muttering about Master Models and D-16s and wanting a hybrid canon. That last set off Chloe and Sapphire, and both tried to convince her how honest ballistics cartridges or a proper electromagnetic launcher (respectively) were much better than some wishy-washy 'do everything' weapons system. Tomoko just commented how her guns had no bullet drop, and left it at that as Chloe and Sapphire decried it 'didn't count'.

  Reiko shook her head at their silliness. Gunslingers.

  It was a shorter trip to Yomawari Outpost, down a paved road wide enough for three of the tank mechs driving side by side, which led straight into the darkness. In addition to the tank mechas, the convoy they had joined included dump truck mechas with long beds for materials, transport trucks that were probably full of supplies, and buses with big sisters—more Void Rangers—who were on their way back to the outpost. The fog-like shroud continued to grow thicker as they approached their destination, the darkness seeming to draw closer and closer to the bus. By the time they reach Yomawari Outpost's gates, Reiko couldn't see the tanks escorting them at all save for the glow coming from their rear lights.

  "Thank you for driving us, big sis," Reiko said politely as she passed big sis Daisy at the driver's seat.

  Daisy gave her a tired smile as she leaned back and pulled out a small pillow and a blindfold. "You're welcome, little sister," she said as she visibly got ready to take a nap.

  Reiko stepped down from the bust, and behind her she heard other crèche-sisters thank big sis Daisy as they also passed by. She stepped out into a small parking lot—not a proper motor, just a reception area for buses and other vehicles—to find her crèche-sisters gathering in front of a big sister with black Ranger markings, and quickly joined them, standing attentively as she adjusted the satchel over her shoulder and the pair of heavy knives at her waist. Soon the buses had emptied and everyone had formed up. In front, Rain nodded and turned towards the Void Ranger. "Everyone present and accounted for, big sister," she said cheerfully as the other big sisters made their own formation a little way off and were met by a more senior enlisted Ranger. "We're ready for the safety briefing."

  The big sister nodded as Rain went to her place in the formation, then turned her gaze towards everyone. "Welcome to Yomawari Outpost. I'm Ranger Ericka of Delver-7, and my squad has been asked to accompany you to the drop-off point. While we shouldn't run into anything on our way, if any Void life or mutations are encountered, your orders are to deploy barriers and retreat back to this location while we lay down suppressing fire. Once you arrive, form up and await further orders. Is that clear?"

  "Yes, big sister!" Reiko chorused with everyone.

  Ericka nodded. "Very well. Ready to go?"

  Reiko looked behind her even as she checked her own satchel and pockets, finding that she had everything. From the back, each sister confirmed her readiness to the one in front of her, and when it was her turn, Reiko did the same until every column had confirmed they were ready.

  "Everyone's ready, big sis!" Rain announced as all the affirmatives came up.

  "Very well. Follow me, everyone. Oh, and Happy Decanting Day."

  """"Thank you!""""

  The crèche-sisters stepped out of the heavy blast doors closest to the Void breach with hands on weapons, walking in little squads of at least three people, all intensely aware that they were at one of the most dangerous places on the planet that didn't involve active volcanic activity, poisonous fumes, or extreme weather. While Reiko knew that most animals around long-established settlements had learned to avoided the Kaedekin, 'most' was not 'all', and none of them wanted to have to deal with a hungry jhorobus, or even just an adolescent myrmeer with a big set of metallic antlers and hormones telling it to use them violently. While she didn't exactly feel unsafe—she was a magical girl after all, with a buddy full of spells, a pair of very good butterfly batons, and a hundred eleven crèche-sisters with her to back her up—Reiko was still glad for the escort of Void Ranger big sisters accompanying them. The Rangers were alert but relaxed, which helped put the girls at their ease, even if some like Chloe seemed to be daring the fog-like shroud to spit out something she could shoot.

  Around them, Yamiryuusei's shroud of dark spirit-stuff was growing very thick, limiting their vision to a range of about five meters. This thick and so close, Reiko expected the shroud to do… something. Muffle sound, reflect it, cause strange echoes, but it just seemed like they were walking through a very dark room or had their eyes closed. She didn't even feel it against her venn…

  There was a trail of bright lights at regular intervals along the path they were walking along, making little islands of illumination against the dark as they headed towards the drop-off point. Everyone had infrared Night Vision spells active to help them see through the shroud—or a visor, in Tomoko's case—as they skirted along the edge of the killing field in front of the outpost entrance, moving uphill in the general direction of the Void breach.

  Reiko thought she could feel the breach clashing against the shroud as the latter acted as a cork to both keep the magic from the void from leaking out while simultaneously keeping magic from this side of the breach from streaming in, her venn seemingly vibrating as the two forces met and agitated the raw magic in the air. Next to her, Tomoko seemed uncomfortable. If she was feeling this too… Reiko put another line in her list of reasons why her crèche-sister definitely had some kind of unknown and unrealized magic. They'd figure it out one of these days… eventually.

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  And there it was.

  The breach was bright in her night vision, illuminated by infrared lights because visible light was unreliable due to the shroud. Ten meters wide at its widest point, the breach itself was inside a wide cleft on the side of Yomawari hill that faced Shizugaoka Fortress. To Reiko's eyes, it seemed like a cave opening that went down into the ground at a steep angle. There were bunkers built into the stone on either side of the opening, and six tank mecha were parked in front of the breach with their cannons pointed straight at it.

  Just short of that was a cleared, level space that the lights they were following led to. Ranger Ericka was already there and waving them towards it.

  "All right," she said, looking apologetic. "I'm afraid this is as close as you're cleared to get to the breach. Please do your preparations here while we get ready to send your bottle down into the Void."

  """"Aw…""""

  Reiko sighed in disappointment along with everyone else. Unfortunately, the breach here in Yomawari wasn't ideally positioned to let them just drop their message bottle into it, so sending it down wasn't as simple as doing a bombing run. A pity. Reiko knew she wasn't the only one who'd been hoping to see their bottle drop into the endless void beneath the universe, but it couldn't be helped.

  Rain visibly straightened from her disappointed slump as Ranger Ericka gave her a sympathetic pat on the shoulder. "Well, looks like this is as far as we're walking. So let's get the bottle ready, everyone! Elizabeth, Leona, the bottle!"

  "It's here!"

  "We got it!"

  Everyone made a path as the two crèche-sisters came forward, carrying the message bottle they'd made back home and had been in charge of carrying here. About the size of tall trash can, it was made of venecite-alloyed steel made from rustwood branches and knugrind scales that they'd all helped gather and smelt, with a cap that screwed on tightly and then locked into place with a rod. From the way the two of them were carrying it, it must be fairly heavy.

  On the outside, engraved in both kanji and Latin letters, was written, "To Stardancer, of the Court of the Falling Sky."

  """"Ooooh…"""" everyone said, and even the big sisters who were staying at the edges of the gathering were nodding in approval.

  The two made a big show of pulling out the rod and unscrewing the lid, revealing the space inside the message bottle.

  "Four inches of vennplate-alloyed steel!" Elizabth announced.

  "A centimeter of vacuum thermal insulation to protect the contents from extreme temperatures!" Leona added.

  "Bands of vennfog-alloy to slow down heat transfer!"

  "Perfect for keeping all the contents temperature stable even in extreme heat!"

  "Especially once we turn the inside of the bottle into a vacuum too!"

  """"Ooooh!""""

  Everyone clapped. That was one well-built bottle!

  Rain clapped her hands together. "All right! Let's fill this thing!"

  Lorelei stepped up next to Rain, holding a cardboard tube. Removing the cap at the end, she pulled out several large, rolled up sheets. A long flat rectangle of yellow vennplate, edges meticulously rounded off, appeared next to the blue-clad sister at a slight angle. She unrolled the sheets, revealing poster-sized versions of the photos they had taken.

  "All right, form a line to sign each poster," Rain said as Lorelei put each poster on the impromptu table, catching them on a little lip to keep them from rolling off. "Once everyone has signed, we'll put them in the bottle, and then everyone can put their letter into the bottle to go with them."

  There was a little scramble as everyone lined up in front of a poster… and then another scramble as everyone checked their pockets for a pen. Fortunately, they found enough to go around, but it was close for a moment, and everyone had to promise Stephanie, Tenshi, Ellen, Muse, Rin, Rinko, Ran, and Ranko they'd help them make more black ink.

  One by one, everyone very carefully signed the posters with their full name and production number, doing their best to make it clear who they were in the picture. It often involved drawing arrows.

  Once someone was done with the posters, they moved on to the bottle. One by one, the crèche-sisters put in the letters they'd written to Kaede. Or rather, to Stardancer. They needed to protect her name, should the bottle fall into the wrong hands. A few added other little tokens as well: garlands of discoblooms, argenties, ant-orchids, bumplums, and croces; little carvings made from alumbark; candies in sealed little bottles, already in a vacuum; some like Chloe put in a bullet each with the powder removed.

  Jane put in… a mirror-like mask.

  Everyone gave her a look.

  She shrugged behind the mask she was currently wearing. "It seemed appropriate," she said.

  Everyone just nodded.

  The last thing to go into the bottle were the pictures of everyone. On the outside of the tube was written, "Thank you for letting us be born."

  That last was a bit of poetic license, but everyone understood that "Thank you for letting us be decanted" probably sounded a bit strange.

  With everything loaded into the bottle, Rain stepped forward and placed her hands on either side of the mouth. Blue vennfog materialized inside, which condensed into vennfluid, and then vennplate, driving out any air there. Elizabeth and Leona moved to place the bottle's lid, applying a thick adhesive to act as both gasket and glue before screwing on the cap and then sliding in the rod to lock it into place. When Rain removed her hands, they heard metal strain slightly as the vennplate inside vanished, leaving only a vacuum.

  With the message bottle secure, Rain and Lorelei handed the bottle to the Void Rangers, who lifted it with care. "We'll drop it in on our next delve," Ranger Ericka promised them. "Sorry we can't let you actually be there when we do it, but it's not really safe to bring you down there."

  "We understand, big sister," Rain said, even if she looked disappointed. "As long as it's sent to Kaede."

  It was just more poetry, of course. It had been hundreds of years, and unless there was some kind of extreme time dilation or she'd attained some form of physical longevity like Mortal or Xynodob, then Kaede would have already been dead for a long, long time. No Kaedekin with thaumaturgy have managed to live past a hundred and twenty years old, although those rare few who'd been decanted with Flame as their magic the way the wizards of old Earth had managed it, and a handful were even still alive.

  And even if she was somehow miraculously still alive, they had no way of knowing if they were launching their bottles in the right direction. Or that they would somehow manage to find their way out of the Void. Or that any would be found at all and not just be lost in interstellar space or fall into the gravity well of a star. It was throwing bottles into the endless ocean and hoping that somehow, someway, the waves, currents and winds would cause it to reach the right island, land on the right shore, and be found by the right little girl.

  Thousands of production batches of Kaedekin had tried anyway. After all, they had to hope. They had to try, to let Kaede know.

  Even if it was only to make themselves feel better, they had to say the words. They needed to try and reach out, even if it was across space and time, and try to ease the pain of a no doubt grieving girl.

  It was what responsible adults did, after all.