Really, Habberport couldn't have been worse positioned to respond to the surprise attack from the Midnighters. Almost all of their newly-mustered ground forces were on the jungle-side of the city, not the waterfront. Our presence outside the gate had caused a further redistribution of the city's defenders and static defenses disproportionately toward the outer wall. The docks and narrow beaches were undermanned, and it would take time for the humans to re-deploy their soldiers. Meanwhile, the Midnighter landing craft were being propelled by some sort of giant aquatic bug, pushing the barges from behind with such force that they rode up on white crests.

Even if the humans couldn't redeploy to protect their vulnerable backsides, helicopters excelled at it.

"Choppers, get to the beaches. I want troops deployed. Scrappers and igni to the docks. Block the jetties so the Midnighters can't offload into the city. Air support, take out those bugs on the backs of the barges before they can make landfall. Eileen, are you up on the net?"

"In the C2 jet, boss! We're holding at 7,000 chooms."

"Good, I want that refit railgun charging and I want you calling movements."

"APOLLO!"

I recognized Dame Redfang's voice outside the airship and saw the dragon knight dodging between crossbow bolts and lesser spells, angling for the open lower deck of Gemini-II. I scrambled down from the control station. The CG of the airship shifted as the heavy dragon landed, causing more than a few goblins to stumble and at least one to roll right out the front of the airship. The dragon knight deftly snatched the squawking blue creature out of the air, catching its leather shirt between her teeth and flinging the lucky goblin back into the ship.

The armored mage on her back had his plate scorched in a few places, and the dragon herself was missing patches of scales. Over the waterfront, other members of her order were attempting to harry the landing craft with lances of white fire and dazzling spells—but the elite air cavalry of the Midnighters outnumbered them badly. She had seen what I'd seen.

"The landing craft," she gasped. Combat flying on her injured wing must have been a special kind of excruciating. "We can't keep them off the beaches!"

"Way ahead of you, sister," I said.

Below, goblins were spilling out of the helicopters and onto the sands by the hundreds. Dozens of personal gliders circled, owners looking for favorable ground for their rifles and mortars. Others dropped poppers or firebombs on the wooden ships. Troops dispersed, the choppers began to rake the decks with turbid flamers and self-cycling guns, or angle recoilless rifles at the tractor bugs. Several of the landing craft wallowed, robbed of their living propulsion. But for each one stopped, four more kept on. The Midnighters weren't currently firing on goblins. Perhaps they were caught completely off-guard, thinking us aligned to their genocidal goals.

"Dame, I need the humans to know not to attack my goblins on the beaches. I can buy Habberport time to muster, but a fight on two fronts only aids the landing fleet."

Below us, a formation of heavy hobgoblin fighters swooped low, firing their complements of rockets. Several explosions rocked the middle of the Midnighter fleet. Fully a third of the flying cavalry turned to pursue the jets, and the assault magic finally began to target the airborne goblins, taking some of the heat off the dragon knights.

Dame Redfang laughed. "Even the humans are not too daft to see which direction your spears are pointed, King Apollo." She hesistated. "But… why do you do this? Is the Midnight Queen not your ally?"

"Anyone who endorses the wholesale murder of an entire city is no ally of mine," I growled. Especially when done in a misguided effort to protect me in the first place. "We don't need to kill the Midnighters, just turn them back. We have got to get this mess sorted!"

The airship rocked as a Midnighter artillery spell created a black displacement nearby. But the magic fizzled, and I thanked my lucky stars that we'd added magic-resistant null-devil hide to some of the armor panels. Redfang's battle mage strode to the opening in the deck and spun his glaive in a circular pattern. A blue shell of energy materialized in front of Gemini-II, intercepting several smaller spells aimed at our dreadnaught.

Our goblin gunners returned fire, sending recoilless rifle shells and rockets back down at the ships below us. One of the capital ships angled our direction, and the palanquin at the prow began to shift and warp with the makings of a Midnighter battle spell.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

"Boss, boss!" shouted a goblin running up to me with a portable handset radio. "Canaveral on the line!"

I took the handset. "This is Apollo. John, you there?"

"Aye boss. Midnighters are all in a huff here, but they ain't tried nuffin' yet. We got lads comin' in from the badlands and the other bluffs. The bugs know they're squashed."

"They won't do anything to risk the rockets or the space program," I said. Hell, that was the whole point of their stupid surprise attack that had derailed my negotiations. For a race of people who purported to see the future, they sure could be short-sighted.

On the beach, the first few landing craft dropped ramps, and rifle fire rippled up and down the sands, along with the pops of grenades being fired from slingers atop the Ifrit war forms. Several igni had flame spewers and their pressurized jets of kerosene blazed against black Midnighter shield walls. Their rank and file warriors pushed up the beach against a withering fusillade of fire and gunsmoke.

An explosion of black energy erupted against the mage shield protecting the airship, tilting Gemini-II almost 45 degrees. I barely kept my footing as a dozen goblins tumbled across the deck, piling up against the port-side wall. I caught a glimpse out the front of the airship at the three capital ships below us, spear-headed by the royal palanquins.

"Do you see that banner in the center?" asked Redfang. "That is the Queen's standard! She's aboard that ship. But why is she here? We had no quarrel with the Midnight Queen!"

I looked at Redfang. She twisted her neck away.

"Well, no more quarrel than usual."

"It's for me," I said. "The Midnight Queen is desperate for me to reach the surface of Raphina."

"Why?!" asked the dragon knight.

I grit my teeth. "It's a long story. But if there's anyone that can call off this attack, it's her." I looked at the saddle on her back. "Can you get me on that ship?"

"A goblin riding a dragon?!" she sputtered. "We… I… it would be…" She shook her head and I saw the muscles in her neck tense as she blasted a lance of fire out the front of the ship—not at anything, just from exasperation, I think.

"Very well," she said, crouching down. "I'm ready."

"Are you sure?" I asked. "There's a lot of fire in both directions down there."

"I swear upon my honor as a dragon and a knight of the Redfang Hills, you will reach the deck of the queen's ship," she said.

"Good enough for me."

I scrambled up the side of the saddle and onto the crest, with Armstrong and several other secretive service goblins behind us. If Redfang noticed the extra weight, she didn't mention it. Then again, all of us together were probably not much heavier than the single mage in his thick plate armor.

"Uh, boss?" asked Armstrong, "Is this one of those times, you know?"

"Probably," I said, squeezing the saddle's pommel tight as Dame Redfang began to sprint toward the front of the ship. We passed her pocket mage, and it wasn't lost on me that we were leaving both the protection of his barrier spells and the magic-nullifying armor panels of Gemini-II. "But this is something that's gotta be done by me. And I don't see any other wayyyyoooah!"

Redfang launched herself from the front of the airship, wings folded tight against her body. We plummeted down, the dragon maneuvering us with movements of her sinuous neck and tail. Magic explosions detonated in the air in all directions—from Midnighters targeting the dragon knights and my fighters and choppers, and also from the Habberport response from inside the city that accounted for only a fraction of the magical ordnance being flung about. Artillery spells flashed against barriers below or were brought down by intercepting spells. Redfang twisted us to deftly avoid a black bolt and then unfurled her wings and caught the air.

I spotted the black bulk of Gyrfax draw alongside us.

"Dame Redfang!" he called. "Where is your mage?"

"Alas, my company is strange of late. Pray aid me, knight, for we go to kill a queen."

"Negotiate!" I shouted over the cacophony.

"We go to negotiate with a queen."

"Very well. We are with you, and we shall clear the sky!"

Gyrfax let out a deafening roar. I had to clamp my hands over my ears and hold on to Redfang with my feet. The other dragons took notice of the summons and their formation shifted, flanking us and clearing the way with their white fire attacks, even though it cost them ground.

With all the aeronautical grace I'd expect from a dragon, she rode the wind like she'd been born in it, making delicate adjustments to the shape and profile of her wings to hug the wave tops and shoot us between the oncoming ships. The dragons above us drew most of the fire. What few Midnighters angled crossbows down at us from the decks, found Redfang moving far too fast for them to track. The bulk of the Midnight Queen's flagship rose up in front of us. Several figures on the deck were pointing down and starting to bring the ship's fixed ballistae to bear. Redfang flared her wings and brought us above the level of the deck, landing on the prow before leaping down to the flat panels and digging her claws in.

My secretive service spilled off, spreading to form a protective circle around us, while Redfang opened her mouth and hissed a great gout of a smokescreen at the soldiers now pushing back from the front of the ship. Midnighters pushed in from every angle, hesitant when they saw the goblins, and doubly so when they saw my crown and prosthetics.

A big, broad-shouldered elite pushed forward with a spear and shield. He looked a lot like Cla'thn's head guard, though his carapace was faded from dark black to grey and gouged with dozens of old scars. An old soldier, then.

"You… are… goblin king… Apollo?" he clicked, mouth-parts working mysteriously to produce human speech.

"That's right!" I said. "Stop this attack against the humans, immediately! Innocent people are getting hurt on both sides. It ends now."

"We… take king… keep safe. Kill… dragon."

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