> Time until next Challenge: 11 days, 15 hours, 23 minutes
Blessedly, the onslaught lessened almost immediately after we turned north. Hamlet still hit us as hard as he could, but there were wider gaps between attacks.
We kept seeing new varieties of Titans.
“What the hell, Ariel? Didn’t you say that only five varieties had been approved for the initial group of Earth Titans? I know this is a different set, but how are we seeing…” I consulted my Eidetic Memory. “Eighteen different kinds and counting?”
“Ah. I should have guessed. So… you have a lot of possible Titans in your databanks that you’re not supposed to spawn?”
“Nearly 20,000?!”
Pointy straightened in Cassie’s arms. “So many? But… wait. Ariel, do you think Hamlet can actually spawn all of those?”
“Okay, so how many options do you think he has?”
“So… probably thirty-some, but we can’t be sure they haven’t added any. Give me a quick rundown on those to pass to the Arsenal for them to disseminate.”
“They probably haven’t added many, if any,” Pointy said. “Judging by the radio traffic, there’s only a skeleton crew still in the system, and I imagine Titan design is an involved process. They might have gotten a few previously, but I doubt it if they haven’t thrown them at us yet.”
I repeated Ariel’s words, grateful that the oversized monsters took time to form. It only gave us a few seconds warning, but at least they never caught us completely off-guard.
Vince didn’t even respond verbally, just stood up and dove out a window, hitting the road in a roll that would have made an action star proud.
He was really, really fast - optimized for speed - and would be able to stay ahead of a speedy Titan if anyone could. Catching up with us later wouldn’t be an issue for him. The issue was the “if anyone could” bit. These were new opponents, which were always a risk, and the number of people available to support him were few.
We’d been on the road for… not long. A bit over an hour. During that time, our fleet had thinned. We still had about half the cars we’d started with, but the rest had been left behind, damaged into undrivability. Even the cars still with us looked rough: two had crumpled front ends and all bore pits, burns, and scars.
Most of my strongest defenders were still with us, but they were tired, and had split into two groups to face both new Titans. It was obvious which was which. One was a smooth-skinned sinuous thing, four-legged with barb on the end of its long, whiplike tail. The other was a massive mound of black fur and teeth, built like a predatory garbage truck.
I turned on Analyze as I watched Vince run, and relaxed a tiny bit as I realized he was using his “Enhance” specialty for an extra boost of speed and power. Then I blanched as the yellow Titan dove toward him faster than I expected. Vince spun to the side, narrowly dodging.
Belatedly, I activated Paralyze, targeting only part of the monster’s anatomy to make it last longer. It was lucky that I’d gotten such a good look as it was forming, as the Titan was now moving too fast to see clearly. I chose a joint in its front foreleg. On its next step, the leg wasn’t there to support the monster as expected, which sent it crashing to the ground.
Vince capitalized on the misstep, sinking his spear into the monster’s back and drawing first blood. His prodigious boosted strength let him cut deeply and slow the Titan as it tried to rise. A crowd rushed in behind him, following up on his attack… and giving Vince nowhere to dodge when the Titan whipped its tail around.
My husband still managed to turn, taking the spikes on his shoulder instead of on his torso, but the force of the hit easily tore through his gear and sent him smashing into the men and women around him.
The tail went limp right afterward as a soldier drove a sword into the wound opened by my husband, cutting deeper and severing the spine. Andy grabbed Vince and ran toward us, my husband’s body limp as a ragdoll. Behind them, everyone backed away from the Titan, now dragging itself toward us with its forelegs. It wasn’t completely immobile, but it was slow enough that we’d outdistance it quickly.
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They were at the car in seconds, Gavin’s tail whipping out the window to pull Vince inside.
“I can heal him, but he’s got poison in! He- Oh. Thanks.”
My middle son’s panic abruptly receded as another of my guardians put a hand on Vince’s exposed forehead. None of my family had Cure Poison, but the Arsenal had sent along not just one but three defenders with the ability.
Vince looked shaken. “Well, that wasn’t fun. Oxygen Reservoir, Regeneration, and Healing Touch would have kept me going for a while, but that shit was serious. Didn’t just paralyze my arm and leg muscles; it got my lungs and my heart too.”
I pulled him close, hugging him. “Don’t you dare go back out until your Specialty’s up again.”
“I’m not going to promise that, Meghan. You really think I’d be safer in the car than out there, where I can at least dodge? Not to mention… I crossed the damn country to get back here to protect you guys. I’m here. I’m going to do that.”
“An’ you’ll say lots of naughty words!” Cassie chirped.
“That I fuckin’ will,” Vince muttered.
“You fuckin’ will!” Cassie repeated gleefully.
“Cassie…” I started, but let it go. It wasn’t important. What was important was making it through the next hour, the next day, and the next week. “Never mind. Marie, any word on new guards to join us? Most of our group have used their Specialties, and Hamlet still has surprises left.”
“There should be three SUVs ready to join with fresh fighters when we reach Meridianville. Another two, at least, in Hazel Green. Plus, the Arsenal sent flyer teams out to make sure the road ahead is clear of cars and debris. We’ll still have to go offroad if Titans or Threats tear it up, but we won’t have to worry about car crashes blocking the way.”
“That’s good. It hasn’t been taking that long to clear, not with how strong we all are, but I’ve been worried we’d get delayed at the wrong moment.”
I looked out the back window, to where part of our group was still fighting the black pile of fur, keeping it from chasing after us. They’d break off and join us as soon as they could, but this one was clearly one of the faster Titans. Unless crippled or killed, it would catch up. Our fleet wasn’t moving that quickly.
At least I had a little breather. Judging by the trampled cotton fields surrounding us, there weren’t many people in the area. Hamlet shouldn’t be able to send anything after us for another few minutes.
Ariel, I thought. Give me a rundown on the other Titans we expect. I want to warn people in advance and maybe name them all, so I can communicate more quickly. Let’s give them numbers, too, to speed up my warnings.
I repeated what she told me aloud mechanically, giving the action only the smallest part of my attention. The rest of my mind was churning.
Everything had been going so well for the past few weeks.
Even today’s Challenge had gone well. There’d been some surprises, but nothing we couldn’t handle.
Since we’d come back, everything had gone to hell.
A Threat that was borderline unkillable, followed by a succession of lethal, high-powered Titans. We’d been sent scrambling in a panic, all our careful plans thrown out the window along with the “rules” of the Maffiyir.
I thought we understood what was happening! I didn’t expect them to cheat! I thought we were winning. Not just winning this contest, but setting the Maffiyir company up to suffer for years to come.
I grimaced. I guess they thought so too?
We had done a lot.
Over 30,000 people across the world had taken one of the ability set-ups the Voices for Non-Citizens had suggested would prepare them to be space lawyers, and most of those people had a background in law.
We’d worked out a system where Ariel gave me data about any part of the contest that was skirting the law, written in Commonwealth Standard and compressed into an image. Then, I used my Eidetic Memory and Basic Holograms to display those images on the walls of the Quarry whenever I had downtime. Since I was being watched by God-knows-how-many aliens at all times, this was a ridiculously efficient way to pass proprietary Maffiyir data to the company’s opponents. While the Voices for Non-Citizens were careful to maintain the fiction that their communications weren’t directed at us, they often started discussions on the topic of data I’d recently sent, slipping in idle hopes for what data I’d send next and exclaiming about their “luck” when I sent it along. Pointy frequently repeated their broadcasts for my whole family, and the dramatic overacting of the space lawyers frequently elicited giggles from my kids.
That didn’t even cover our efforts to deny the seas to our oppressors. We’d claimed over a third of the planet’s water, yes, but very little of that was empty seafloor in the middle of the Pacific. If you looked at the more “interesting” areas, like the Great Barrier Reef, the Panama Strait, or the Mediterranean Sea, the percentage approached 75%. Even the ocean’s currents - our shipping lanes - were more than half human-owned.
On top of that, we’d been building a communication network that spanned the globe. It didn’t quite reach every corner, but we were getting close. We’d been able to give people advice on ability synergies and pitfalls, and any time anyone found a monster’s weakness, that information spread everywhere in hours.
Finally, Ariel and I had made direct efforts to skew the contest in our favor. Finding and sharing information was a given, but only the start. We’d tweaked Specialties to ensure humanity would be able to make baby humans in the future. I’d implemented additional rules to steer Ariel toward giving kids defensive Specialties and adults toward the high-power offensive Specialties that were needed to take down Titans and Threats.
When I considered it all, maybe it wasn’t so surprising that the alien in charge of our downfall had given up on fighting fair.
Still, we couldn’t just keep reacting. That wouldn’t get us through the next several days, and there had to be more we could do. Today had been horrifying, but really, wasn’t it just proof that we’d been successful? If the contest was ending soon, we needed to eke out every last advantage we could. Maybe-
Maybe I’d have to think more about this later.