- he's aware it's dangerous, Maitimo assures Vanyel after some practice. He's just - not inclined to make himself enjoy it less on that account.

That is a very mysterious way to feel but he'll take it.

Vanyel reads the notes some more. He remembers which room the weapon was in; he can Gate directly there, grab it, Gate directly out, it shouldn't take more than thirty seconds. Bringing a live world-destroying weapon through a Gate is not the smartest idea he's ever had but there's no indication Urtho thought this one was unstable, it shouldn't work at all without something to put in to replace the missing core.

At some point it's time to admit that there isn't any more useful preparation he can do on this end. Where's Fëanáro at on shielding? 

He has a very sketchy prototype that might help, but I don't really care to bet anyone's life on it. Three more months and I'll have something I'm happy with.

...Three months is a pretty long time. 

Gating to Velgarth is almost certainly going to get Melkor's attention. Increase the probability that he escalates and they have to set the plan off ahead of schedule. But Melkor might do that anyway and - if he does it'll be better if they've chosen the timing themselves, and already have the weapon. Getting it might take under a minute, but Melkor was able to pin down and trap Leareth in the mountain in seconds. 

(And three months out here might be three years in Angband, but the fact that Vanyel can barely think about subjecting Leareth to that, is not by itself a strategic consideration to move before they're ready.) 

Vanyel asks Maitimo what he thinks. 

If the shielding doesn't work, and Olórin can't make it stop, then you Gate it out. And maybe that gets him too, but he wouldn't be dead, just - hard for us to retrieve with our current resources. And if the shielding fails., and Olórin can't make it stop, and somehow you can't Gate it either - maybe if it fails much faster than expected, such that it gets your magic too? - then we have a couple of nonmages here and if the Valar can't fix it or are themselves dead there's no way to reach Velgarth. ....maybe leave Velgarth instructions on how to reach us, to mitigate that worst case scenario? But I don't think it's worth three months of waiting.

Vanyel doesn't like it but it makes sense. 

He'll take a couple of days to prepare – talk to Leareth's commander over in Velgarth again, get details on the artifact prototype they have for between-world communication, make his own over here. Since it can be paired with a Quendi-style artifact and thus powered indefinitely, theoretically it should be able to receive messages even if there are no Velgarth mages left alive in Arda. Probably they should leave it with someone Maitimo trusts, in Valinor, with the maximum level of protection between it and where the attack would happen. 

When that's done, and Vanyel has gotten a good solid night's sleep, he's ready. 

He leaves it with his mother. He has not had any spare energy to throw at his parents' relationship, lately, and Fëanáro's been working every waking moment on the use of the Silmarils for the war, but she's started going up to the city, guessing somehow the right moment to slip in and talk him through a problem. it's the first time they've talked in years without yelling at each other. 

Maitimo mostly thinks that wasn't Melkor but he's not going to say so. 

Now?

Now.

Drawing on the Silmarils to fuel it – Vanyel's practiced enough Gates now that he can do it simultaneously and exhaust himself less – Vanyel raises a Gate to Urtho's Tower, to the exact room where the weapon he needs is, and dives through. 

And something - slithers along the Gate, maybe, not destructively, not interacting with it, just there -

Vanyel snatches up the weapon, using a touch of Fetching to help – it doesn't look much like a weapon at all, more like an abstract sculpture of some kind, a pillow of hollow-cast bluish metal cubes stacked in a sort of random arrangement. The metal bears an odd sheen or patina, like rainbows in oil. 

He throws a hasty shield over it, just in case that does any good, and sprints back through the Gate and slams the Gate down. :Maitimo we have a problem: 

What

:Felt something - interfere with my Gate - magic, not Velgarth magic, it didn't damage anything but it was there. Has to have been from this end: He grits his teeth. :Do you think this means we need to kick things off now: 

Yes. - in some fashion that definitely definitely does not explode you because what if something got out -

:Oh NO: and he doesn't even have time to get out a warning back home, or, no, it's less that he lacks time and more that the spell is tiring, even with the headband from Fëanáro that increases his endurance, and he's going to need every scrap of his strength for what's ahead.

But he takes a deep breath, and feels - not calm, but clear, crystalline and transparent and perfectly focused, like a honed glass blade. Vanyel has always been better at pulling himself together when something is trying to kill him. 

:Get Olórin and your father: he snaps out. :I'm Gating to the place we decided: shortly outside Angband, far enough to be sure Melkor won't be able to counteract his magic, hopefully close enough that they won't need to have the weapon active for long. 

:–Oh, gods: he remembers it now, like an idiot, :I do not have time to get us a Mindhealer so that'll need to be after. I can put a lot of compulsions on Leareth in the interim: If they find him alive. :If I'm too tired or unconscious, drug him or hit him on the head or something, he can't do magic if he's not conscious. Reckon the attack itself should buy us time, he's going to have some unbelievable backlash from it: 

Understood. 

Angband is big; they can have an army help them search it but the army's not that close - they can be ordered to get there, right away, as fast as possible - that makes this rather all-or-nothing but there was never any hope of winning this without Vanyel -

Then Vanyel will have whatever time interval elapses until the others are there and ready, and then, Gate goes up. Moment of no return. He hesitates, but only for a fraction of a second, before stepping through. 

Angband is tall and black and imposing and looks like it was designed by an evil god who does not particularly go for creativity or subtlety. 

Fëanáro sets the Silmarils up to shield them.

Vanyel puts the weapon down on the ground. 

:Like this: he sends to Olórin, directly sharing his own mage-sight, gesturing at the motion needed to set it off. :Wait for our word. Then - it's going to basically suck all the magic in there through you and you need to keep it all controlled:

He throws his own shields over the Maia as well, for all the good that's likely to do. 

The ground shakes. A blizzard of black smoke and ash erupts from the nearby mountains; something seeps out of the ground with a hiss.

Vanyel clenches his teeth, waits until absolutely the last second he can justify. :Go: he barks to Olórin. 

SUPERWEAPON!!!

The first thing to happen is that a dozen motes of light dance along the cubes, toward the topmost one – and then spread in a ring, matching the full width of the device's base – and then, in an instant, everything inside the ring vanishes. There's nothing but a darkness deeper than darkness, it absorbs and swallows light. The Void. 

And the magic of Angband is sucked inexorably toward it. 

Their surroundings shrink to nothing but light against the darkness, rainbows swirling into the mouth now open in the fabric of reality itself, everything around them drawn through Olórin himself and then out of the world entirely. 

The fortress starts to crumble, without magic supporting it, crashing down on itself. 

- if that kills him - no, that doesn't matter, not right now. 

The doors of the fortress of Angband swing outwards, and then crumble to dust in the process of swinging outwards. Melkor is there. He's holding an enormous quantity of stone suspended in front of him. His face is unreadable. The ground shakes more violently, more violently - 

- then the ground shaking stops. Melkor is still standing there. To a Quendi eye he looks just the same, perhaps staggered somehow. 

The weapon is still functioning.

The Silmaril-shield snaps.