Private First Class Tyler Roberts pressed his off-hand against a tree. By putting his palm and four fingers flat against the tree and sticking out his thumb, he could create a very stable surface for his rifle while still maintaining cover behind the tree. He tried to control his breathing as he covered the squad's retreat. The twin moons cast strange shadows through the branches, making it hard to track the massive wolves that circled their position. His hands were steady on his rifle, but he felt as if his heart might jump through his throat any minute now.
He pulled down his clear glasses, which continued to fog. By pulling them to the tip of his nose, he could lean his head forward and look down the rifle sights, seeing a clear line toward the trees.
A shout from behind made him glance over his shoulder. He could see a man was sliding down the hill toward them, moving with an obvious limp that suggested an injury. Despite his wounds, he carried a massive axe like it weighed nothing.
“You need to get up the hill,” The stranger called. “I’ll fight the group, just go.”
Roberts watched as Sergeant Miller spoke briefly with the man. He saw the sergeant's usual cool demeanor crack for a moment before he started barking orders for a hasty retreat.
One man against these monsters? This is insane.
Years of training kept him moving as ordered.
The squad began moving up the slope in pairs doing their best to maintain covering fire. Roberts kept his position while waiting for his turn to move. He couldn't take his eyes off the stranger as he limped forward into the clearing. The large axe dragged behind him in the snow and left a furrow in its path.
Then something about the man began to change. Steam began rising from his skin where snowflakes landed, and his frame seemed to expand. Roberts could see his muscles swelling beneath his winter gear like an inflatable toy. More changes followed as he grew taller, and his previous limp vanished. The transformed man squared up to face the tree line.
As if answering his challenge, several of the more ferocious wolves moved from their cover under the trees. The beasts were massive and seeing them move in a prowl was terrifying, especially as Roberts realized that their shoulders easily reached his chest. Their eyes glowed an unnatural green in the moonlight, and he counted six- no, seven of them as they circled the clearing.
A wolf lunged toward Roberts' position. He squeezed off a burst of rounds, causing the rifle to crack through the growing silence. Several rounds hit the wolfs chest, causing it to yelp and quickly disappear into the trees where it had come from.
When the man moved, Roberts lowered his rifle and watched in awe.
He had seen combat before, though never against beasts like the wolves. He had even trained in some of the best courses in the Army, but he'd never seen anyone move like the stranger. He exploded forward with impossible speed, no longer showing any traces of his previous injuries. His greataxe cleaved through the air, cutting down a wolf with brutal efficiency.
"Roberts! Move your ass!" someone shouted from behind.
“Moving!” he called in response.
Roberts started backing up the hill, his rifle trained on the battle below. The stranger was a blur of motion, steam rising from his body in the cold air. A wolf latched onto his arm, but the man didn't even flinch. He grabbed the beast by its throat and slammed it into a tree with enough force to snap its spine. Roberts watched in amazement as the bloody bite marks on the man's arm closed within seconds.
Something was wrong with the man's eyes. They glowed red in the darkness, and his roars of rage echoed through the trees, making Roberts' blood run cold. They weren't human sounds.
"Private! Last man, move now!"
He turned and scrambled up the hill trying to keep his boots from slipping on snow. The sound of a yelp and a wet thud caused him to look back once, and he saw the warrior using a foot to brace against the back of a wolf as the large battle axe was wrenched free.
He caught up with the rest of the squad near the top of the hill, his lungs burning from the climb.
Specialist Chen was doubled over, clutching his stomach.
"Are you hit?" Roberts asked, dropping to one knee beside him.
Chen looked up, his eyes wide with confusion. "No, I... something's happening."
Roberts heard Sergeant Miller curse softly behind them. “Do you see a blue screen? They briefed us on this Chen, get yourself together. You’ll be fine. Get on your feet.”
Chen’s eyes darted back and forth as he read something only he could see. "There's all these numbers and... wait, why am I missing health? ‘Cause I rolled my ankle?"
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"I said get moving, Specialist," Miller growled. "We need to get back to the portal before the next blizzard hits."
"Actually, Sergeant..." Chen pointed to their right. "I can feel it. The portal's that way. It's like there's a string in my gut pulling me toward it."
"That's great, Chen. Now use those legs of yours and start walking that direction." Miller waved the rest of the squad forward. "The captain said these awakenings can happen if you kill a monster. It must have counted from something you hit with your rifle and counted when the man killed the wolf. Now let’s get moving."
Roberts helped steady Chen as he stood, watching his friend's face closely. A small part of him hoped he'd get to see his own blue screen soon if what the sergeant guessed was true.
I tagged at least three of those monsters.
Roberts felt Chen hesitate beside him as they began to move. "But Sergeant, my stats... I can see my strength is only six, and-"
"Chen, I swear to God, if you don't shut the fuck up about your stats and start moving, I'm going to put you in a front leaning rest that'll last until your retirement."
The squad laughed, breaking some of the tension. They began moving through the snow, following Chen's guidance. Roberts kept looking back down the slope, watching for glimpses of combat through the trees. His mind wandered to the rounds he'd put into that first wolf. If the warrior killed it...
"Sergeant Miller, wait." Robert’s voice cut through the night. "I have an idea."
Miller turned, his face hard in the moonlight. "This better be good, Specialist."
Roberts knew that tone. Whatever he said next was better be worth stopping their retreat. Below them, another wolf's dying yip pierced the night air, followed by the sound of splintering wood.
"The mission brief mentioned Mana Stones, sir." Roberts kept his voice steady despite the tension he felt in his chest. "They form when monsters die. If that guy is killing wolves that we shot..."
Miller's expression shifted. "You want to collect stones from a battlefield with that mad man still down there?"
"I can stay behind, gather what I can, then catch up." Roberts tried not to think about the inhuman roars he had heard echoing up the hill. "Chen can guide you all back to the portal, and I can follow your tracks in the snow."
The sergeant studied him for a long moment. Another crash echoed through the trees, followed by the sound of breaking branches. The strange warrior was pushing deeper into the forest, chasing the remaining wolves.
"You hit any of those wolves, Roberts?"
"At least three confirmed, Sergeant. Maybe more."
Miller cursed under his breath. "Fine. But you wait until the man is gone. Don't approach him, don't try to talk to him. Clear?"
"Roger, Sergeant."
"Twenty minutes. Then you haul ass back to the portal, stones or no stones." Miller turned to the rest of the squad. "Chen, lead the way. Everyone else, weapons ready."
Roberts watched his squad disappear into the darkness, then dropped to the prone beside one of the trees at the top of the hill. The sounds of combat grew fainter as the warrior pursued the wolves deeper into the forest. He remembered the briefing about Mana Stones, how they looked like crystals about the size of a pinky. They could vary in size or width, but not by much. Mana Stones would glow with a blue light and formed in the body of the monster after death.
Five minutes passed before the forest fell silent. Roberts counted to one hundred before moving down the slope, his rifle at the ready. The battlefield was a mess of broken trees, churned snow, and blood.
So much blood.
The first wolf corpse he reached was the one he'd shot. Its chest was a mangled mess of bullet holes and axe wounds. He took a deep breath and laid his rifle muzzle against the corpse’s hindquarters to keep it out of the snow. Pulling out the knife that was strapped to his bullet proof vest, he stabbed it into the wolves chest and began the grizzly work of opening up the monster. His hands shook slightly in the cold, and it was a sickening thought to realize that they were growing warm as he searched the recently slain monster.
Half-buried in the beast’s chest, a crystal the size of his thumb pulsed with soft blue light. He wiped it quickly clean on his pant leg before pocketing it and moving to the next corpse.
The second one had been nearly cut in half. No bullets, no stone.
The third wolf, the one slammed against the tree, yielded another stone.
A distant roar made him freeze. It sounded further away now, but still...
Roberts gathered two more stones before deciding not to push his luck. As he turned to leave, he felt a pain in his stomach. He saw several blue screens materialize in his vision, through closed eyes and gritted teeth. As the pain in his stomach subsided, his grimace was replaced with a grin.
His personal, and squad’s, mission accomplished, he began following his squad's tracks, trying not to think about what else might be hunting in these woods. Or that the human chasing the wolves was probably scarier than the monsters he’d seen so far.
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Jonathan sat with his back against a fallen tree, watching sparks rise from his small fire to meet the falling snow. The rage had burned out of him an hour ago, leaving behind the familiar ache of healing injuries and bone-deep exhaustion. His borrowed winter gear was torn and bloody, though most of the blood wasn't his.
The twin moons still hung in the alien sky over the rocks at his back. They cast their mixed light across the now-silent forest. From his sheltered position, he could see the moss pulsing like a heartbeat and the snow continued to fall. He had woken from his {Rage} state during a blizzard, driving him to find shelter between a rock outcropping and a thick layer of tall pine trees.
He pulled Marcus's dog tags from beneath his shirt, letting them catch the firelight. The metal was warm against his palm, and for a moment he was struck by how beautiful this place was, despite its dangers.
Marcus would have loved it.
Jonathan closed his eyes, letting the memory wash over him.
The recent memory of gunfire brought him back to the current situation, and he thought about the squad he'd helped earlier. They were just young soldiers that were well-trained but unprepared for what they were facing.
Like Marcus had been.
The military was changing, but too slow. These Rifts didn't care about traditional training or tactics.
Jonathan stood with a grunt. He couldn’t believe how great his body felt, despite the exhaustion in his recently healed muscles. He kicked snow over the dying flames and watched them fade to nothing.
The portal pulled at his gut, but he ignored it. If he didn’t fight what was in those darkened woods, more soldiers would be sent in. More sons and daughters putting their lives on the line, and while he couldn't save Marcus, he could try to keep other families from getting that knock on their door.
His greataxe lay against the tree, its blade clean from the snow. A wolf howled in the darkness, then another. And another.
Good.