When I woke up, I had a splitting headache, and I was absolutely starving. A groan had barely left my lips when Moonlight’s voice entered my mind, and I felt a warm hand gripping mine. -How are you feeling, my Maiden? You pushed yourself too far. You are extremely fortunate that Poppy was watching you and managed to catch you before you hit the ground, or you could have been seriously injured,- the Unicorn chastised me. I could tell that she was more relieved that I was safe and awake than truly angry at me, though.

“I’m fine, Moonlight, just tired and very hungry,” I mentally assured her before opening my eyes.

I appeared to be inside one of the medical tents, and I was lying atop a pillow with Poppy kneeling beside me. It was she who was holding my hand, and as I opened my eyes and attempted to move, she was instantly looking down at me with a worried expression on her face as she asked in a tremulous tone, “Are you alright, Love?”

“Yeah, just a bit worn out, and very hungry,” I reiterated for her sake. “Probably could have been worse. Moonlight said that you kept me from hitting the ground, so thanks for that, hot stuff.”

Her first reaction was to plant a very passionate kiss on me. Once she had caught her breath afterward, she explained, “Yeah, I was panicking that you would get hurt when I saw you pass out, you were a good twelve feet from the ground. You weren’t really falling that fast, though, to be honest. We Sprites don’t have a lot of weight to us after all, and your wings were spread and creating some drag too. I was told that, generally speaking, it’s almost impossible for Sprites to generate enough speed, even at terminal velocity, for a fall like that to hurt us, unless we had something much heavier than us weighing us down.”

Aww, she was doing her nervous babbling thing, so it looked like she really was worried. I felt bad for worrying her like that, so I quickly apologized. “Sorry for worrying you, Poppy. Well, all of you, actually. I know that Moonlight was worried, too, and I imagine that my sister and Ainslee were as well.”

“Yeah, Love, though I think Karen was the worst mother hen of the bunch,” Poppy admitted with an attempt at a smile as she shook her head. “She was insistent that we take you to the medical tent and have one of the Fairy medics look you over. She wanted to do it herself, but she was worried that she might miss something with how small we are, and she doesn’t really have much training yet, other than first aid training and that crash course on field medicine.”

That was touching, and even a little surprising, given how prickly Karen could still be at times. It was nice to hear, though, because it meant that Karen was honestly starting to see us as friends, and not just people she was forced to train and work with. I gave my girlfriend a smile of my own as I tried to get up and said, “See, I told all of you that her icy exterior was starting to melt, at least with us.”

My attempt to get up was quickly smothered as my girlfriend shoved me right back down into a resting position. “Nuh-uh, Love, you’re not going anywhere, Captain’s orders. Captain Monroe came by while you were out and left orders that you’re to rest, eat, and get plenty of fluids until you’re needed for extraction. When you do that, you’ll be doing it in smaller groups than that last one, and you’ll have at least half an hour to rest and recharge between groups. No using your teleportation until then, unless it’s an emergency.”

I didn’t like being sidelined while there was still work to do, but I did have to admit that I had done my job already, and far more than anyone had expected from me, even myself. So, I tried to relax as I inquired, “So, where is everyone now? And how long was I out? Did I get everyone through the portal before I passed out?” Those last moments were still a little fuzzy to me.

“Captain Monroe said that everyone is accounted for, so you managed to get everyone here before you fainted. It’s been almost an hour since you passed out, so the Breach is closed and search and rescue teams are now searching through the wreckage, getting headcounts from the local Incursion shelters, and canvassing those who might be turning into Altered from the Wild Magic escaping from the Breach. We should probably be seeing people seriously injured being brought here from the Incursion Zone for treatment soon,” Poppy explained. Then she quickly added, “As for our teammates, Ainslee, Kelly, and Karen were getting antsy sitting around and not doing anything, so they joined up with one of the search and rescue crews. I assume Moonlight stayed here to watch over you, but you’re the only one who can really communicate with her.”

-You can tell her that I am indeed here to watch over you,- Moonlight interjected. -It was for the best that I stayed here anyway. My healing magic may be needed for those in serious condition. There are a couple of other Healers here for the more seriously injured, but even with three of us, I fear that we will all need to use our power only in the most life-threatening cases or risk being overwhelmed.-

I quickly confirmed for my girlfriend, “Moonlight is here, and it makes sense since she was worried about me, and there might be people brought here soon who will need her healing power. I’m glad the others are out there helping; we should be, too.”

The others would be useful out there, and not just because of Karen’s training in first aid and basic field medicine. Both Karen and Ainslee had special abilities that would allow them to get through rubble relatively quickly, while Kelly could go into potentially hazardous areas to extract people without being hurt. Honestly, both Poppy and I would have been useful out there as well, since we were both small enough to get into tight places, and I could use my teleportation to extract any trapped people while Poppy’s fire could provide light in those same tight and dark spaces.

Just thinking about that made me feel guilty for just lying here while other people were making themselves useful in the search and rescue efforts. Still, I was under orders… at least until I could get those orders changed. I guess some of my disappointment showed on my face, though, and it seemed that I couldn’t fool my girlfriend.

Poppy took one look at me and frowned. “I know that you want to be out there helping people, Love. I do, too. You’ve already done plenty, though. It’s because of you that we were able to get our first response and main forces here before the end of the Incursion, and Captain Monroe said that that limited both casualties and captures during this Incursion. Because of you, we were able to position a few key teams between the fleeing Titans and the Breach and attack them from behind as well. Usually, we wouldn’t be able to get such a sizable force here so quickly, and that’s due to your efforts.”

“She’s right,” a familiar voice agreed, and I turned my head to see Captain Monroe approaching. I attempted once again to sit up and give her a quick salute, but Poppy pushed me back down, and the Captain herself said, “At ease, you’ve done enough already. Your efforts allowed us to hit the Titans harder and faster than we ever have before, even with the hiccup that you encountered when you first arrived. Vanguard casualties have been light, and we estimate that less than a dozen people were captured and taken through the Breach, and most of those were before you even arrived, people who had the misfortune to be close to the Breach when it opened. You did well, Lily.”

“I did?” It felt good to hear that I might have made a difference, and my heart warmed at her words.

“Yes, you did very well under the circumstances,” she insisted with a smile and a nod. “Your teammates seem to be doing well with the search and rescue efforts as well. In fact, I’ll be petitioning Commander-General Kline to have your team officially join the first response and rescue teams once you’ve all finished your studies, and maybe even continue to shadow us on other Incursions like this one until then, where you might be needed to get us on site quickly. You’ll be more useful to us than to the main combat forces.”

Captain Monroe wasn’t just there to give me a pep talk. She had initially intended to check on whether I was awake yet, and since I was, she took me and Poppy to the command tent, where there was a meal of sorts waiting for me. I could have stayed in the medical tent, of course, but the bed and pillow I had been lying on would probably be needed soon, since the first of the injured who needed more than just first aid were being brought in.

While Captain Monroe and Poppy kept me company, I drank a cup of nectar and ate what was essentially an MRE meant for fairy-type Altered, consisting of some dried meat, a couple of blueberries that were as big as coconuts from my perspective, and some toasted grains. The meal was meant to be high in both natural sugars and protein to give both an immediate and long-lasting energy boost. Thankfully, it took care of the hunger that was gnawing at my belly and the lightheadedness from pushing myself too far and going sugar low.

Again, Captain Monroe wasn’t just there to watch me eat or anything like that. As I was eating, she had me, and by extension, Poppy and Moonlight, observing things in the command center and learning how things worked for the search and rescue teams during an Incursion. She apparently wanted to make sure that I was resting until I was needed again, but that didn’t mean that I couldn’t learn while doing that.

For Captain Monroe, that mostly meant coordinating the various Fairies working search and rescue, who were mostly doing aerial searches, getting into tight places, searching for survivors in the rubble of buildings, and using their abilities to help get them free when applicable. Search and rescue was an all-hands-on-deck affair, which was why both the first responders and our main combat forces were all involved. The first response teams were in charge of coordinating everything, though, since search and rescue was a big part of their training.

The faster we found people injured and buried in wreckage and extracted them, the more likely it was that we could keep them alive. There was more than just search and rescue operations going on, though. In addition to that, any intact Titans who hadn’t returned through the Breach needed to be tagged so they could be taken care of once the rescue efforts were complete.

Captain Monroe explained that the Titans had no pilots, something that I had already heard before, and that when the Breach closes, any that are left behind go inert when whatever signal is controlling them is lost. That meant that their magitech weapons and shields no longer worked, but there was a risk of them becoming active again during the next Incursion if they weren’t properly dealt with. That involved destroying what Captain Monroe called the main control relay system in the chest.

Only when that was destroyed could we be sure those Titans wouldn’t rise again in the next Incursion. Those inactive Titans would then be dismantled and collected by the Vanguard’s magitech R&D division for resources and to study their various systems. Most of what we had learned about magitech so far had come from dismantling and studying damaged or deactivated Titans left behind when Breaches closed.

I asked why they hadn’t come up with a way to disrupt the signals controlling the Titans, but apparently, they weren’t all controlled by one signal with the same frequency. Each Titan seemed to be receiving a unique signal, meaning that they were probably being remotely controlled by individuals, which made sense to some degree, according to Captain Monroe. The Titans didn’t seem to be following any one set of orders or even work well together in some cases.

Rarely, more than one would go after the same potential captive, and even more rarely, one would kill someone that another had spared. This hinted at possible division in their ranks, or that maybe they weren’t as unified as the public at large believed. That could provide openings for us when the time came to take the fight to them, but it also made what little we thought we knew about our attackers as a species unreliable.

Even with the various abilities of the members of the Vanguard and the sheer number of people dedicated to the task, it wasn’t until midnight local time that the entire Incursion Zone was thoroughly searched, and our operations in Rio came to an official close. Reconstruction and other aftereffects of this event would be up to the city itself to take care of. By then, our forces were thoroughly exhausted, especially those of us who had first arrived eighteen hours ago.

Poppy had gone to help with the search effort once she was sure that I was okay and that Captain Monroe wouldn’t allow me to push myself too hard, joining the rest of our team while Moonlight used her healing power to stabilize the worst off of the injured so they could be sent to either one of the local hospitals or the one in Amethyst Harbour. I wasn’t just watching and learning with Captain Monroe during that time either. Once she was certain that I had gotten a few hours of rest, Captain Monroe had me start transporting those who were bound for Amethyst Harbour straight to the hospital.

There were over three dozen people who were becoming Altered, some of them seriously injured during building collapses, and some had injured family members who either wanted to go with them or needed better medical care than we could give them in a tent. Fortunately, I took them over several trips over the course of the afternoon and evening and was able to do so by teleporting them rather than by opening another portal. Captain Monoe also ensured that I had enough rest between those trips, as well as some nectar and a meal when needed. I even got to nap for a few hours between two trips to transport groups of people that included some who needed immediate emergency care.

Now that our operations were complete, though, I had to take all our gathered forces back to Vanguard Tower. Everyone was exhausted, and I probably would have been as well if I hadn’t been ordered to rest and refuel between trips. Still, Captain Monroe had me spread that out into five trips, each of which would have close to the same number of people as that first portal I had opened, and I would be taking a half hour to rest and drink some nectar between each trip.

On the fifth trip, I cast my final portal to ferry over the last of our personnel, those who had been disabling any abandoned Titans and packing up all the tents and other equipment that they had kept on site. The Titans would be retrieved by transports once they were functional and secure again, since there was no way I was going to be able to bring those with me, even if I was familiar with their destination. By this point, I was too damn tired anyway, even with the nap I had managed to have earlier.

My team waited until that last trip as well, since I was also our ride home, and it wasn’t until after three in the morning that we arrived back at the tower. By then, we were all thoroughly exhausted from the last twenty-two or so hours, and as soon as I teleported us to our dorm room, we all climbed gratefully into our respective beds (or stall in Moonlight’s case). There was a lot to talk about, but we were all too damn tired and that could wait until morning… or maybe afternoon, after we all had a good, long rest.