Everyone waited with bated breath for the alarm that would signify the enemy World Eater was changing direction.
The Earthlings waited in various locations around the ship, but a significant number of them were below the command deck or flight deck. The Kingdom’s soldiers were in various degrees of sleep, relaxing as much as possible in order to protect their nerves.
Leete prayed upon mana in all its splendor to get the World Eater to keep on its current path. He watched the readouts and displays, learning all that he could from such little details, its White Breath nullifying their sensors impeccable ability to scan the enemy. However, based upon the information that they were getting, it was the biggest World Eater that Leete had ever seen.
Information was being broadcasted through the ship as they received it.
Just underneath the command deck Kohn had torn apart a shirt and was wrapping his fist with it as tightly as he could. His heavy Arms slowed him down, but it wasn’t something that would stop him from doing what he wanted.
“Instructor?”
One of the Kingdom’s Winged Order Mages was in a meditative sleep which was rudely being interrupted by Kohn and his annoying questions. Unfortunately for him, it wasn’t going to end if he tried to ignore it.
“What is it Kohn?”
“What is the White Breath?”
“The Jzanna do not have Dark Vessels. Their bodies have somehow adapted to the void of the Deep Dark well enough to travel through it, but not for extended periods of time. So the World Eaters release their breath which is filled with warmth, air and moisture. This White Breath allows the smaller Jzanna to swim through the Deep Dark with the World Eaters to the next planet. They protect it, and it gives them passage.”
Kohn watched the front hull screen which was displaying what the ships long range sensors were able to see. To him the World Eater looked like an elongated turtle shell coming out of the top of a dense pea-soup like fog. It didn’t look dangerous, but he really couldn’t tell.
“How big is it?”
His instructor cast a quick spell. “High Mage. Apologies for the intrusion but I think it would be beneficial if you compared the World Eater’s size with the Kingdom’s Dark Vessel. Yes. Thank You.”
Kohn watched as the hull screen turned to give a side image of the World Eater. And down at the bottom of the image there appeared a little blip.
His instructor pointed at it and said to Kohn. “That is a Dark Vessel.”
The Dark Vessel that he was sitting on, the one that took up a significant portion of the Sahara desert in Africa back on Earth. It looked to be at least 1/600th the size of the World Eater that was in front of them.
***
High Mage Leete waited, staring at the screen while simultaneously remembering his daughter singing a child’s lullaby for a performance in front of his family. It calmed him down significantly and even brought a smile to his face.
“Smiling at a time like this is disturbing the other commanders.”
Prince StoneTooth came to the Command deck unannounced, taking Leete completely by surprise. But when he looked around the room, Leete could see what the Prince meant.
“He’s smiling at the Jzanna.”
“You don’t think he’ll attack first right?”
“Of course he won’t. That would be suicidal.”
“But he was insane for a while right?”
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The commanders were chatting amongst themselves, but with a small spell he was able to hear what they were saying about him.
“I hear what you mean, your highness.”
“It looks like the World Eater won’t be turning around to chase us. We’re already in its blind spot.”
The Jzanna were massive creatures and very dangerous, but they suffered from a fatal flaw and that was their absurd angle that they were unable to sense. As long as you weren’t standing nearly in front of them they wouldn’t be able to tell that you were there.
“Yes, your highness. Now we just have to worry about stragglers. Anyone that was too slow to keep up with it.”
“Normally they would have attacked by now if-“
BUMP-BUMP!
The hull was hit twice, making a loud echo run through the ship.
Leete stepped up to command the Prince’s Dark Vessel.
“Full short-ranged sensor spells! Prepare to cast shields! Ready the Shock! Find out where it hit us and how big it is!”
“Yes Mage!” Came from all around him.
Before the first could even finish his spell more impacts buffeted the ship.
“High mage! Other Vessels in the fleet are saying they are also receiving impacts, no damages yet.”
“Very well Telepathy, continue.”
Back on Earth the job would be called Communications or communications officer, but aboard the Kingdom’s Dark Vessel they use a spell similar to Telepathy to communicate in the Deep Dark. So naturally, rather than find a new word to call that individual, they simply use the name of the spell to call him or her.
“High Mage! Impacts are non-living objects.”
“Impact was forward most part of the vessel.”
“Most likely the objects hitting us-“
“No damages High Mage.”
“-are dead Jzanna.”
The commanders were talking over each other, but Leete heard them all.
“Hold shields and shock ready for now in case a living Jzanna appears. Your Highness, permission to stand down the fleet, collect a dead Jzanna and continue forward?”
The enemy World Eater was still within range of their long-range sensor spells, but because they were in its blind spot Leete deemed it safe enough to continue.
“Isn’t there a chance that living Jzanna could still show up?”
“As your highness said, if there were any living Jzanna in the area they would have attacked by now.”
“Very well. Proceed at your discretion.”
Leete made a quick bow. “Thank you your Highness. Commanders! Find me a small enough dead Jzanna to bring aboard.”
***
Kohn was doing pushups.
They had been waiting for at least a couple of hours and most of the people from Earth had their nerves fried after they heard the impacts on the ship’s hull. They knew something had hit the ship, but after half an hour they could hear Leete announce no enemy contact.
Then they were told to prepare for Jzanna retrieval.
Oh that didn’t calm their nerves down, at all. But a few hours went by and nothing had happened. Other than Kohn just about reaching the end of his patience.
He had tried manipulating the residual mana left over in his body, but it wasn’t much and he quickly exhausted it. He tried asking questions of his instructors again, but they either smacked him or threatened to tie him up and sit on him.
After a while, something finally happened.
The front of the ship that led into the large bay opened up.
Everyone from Earth ran out into the hallways or got a death grip on something firmly attached to the ship. The people from the Kingdom laughed at them.
“What are you all doing?”
“Holding on for dear life!”
“Won’t we get sucked out into space?”
But their instructors just pointed at the opened bay doors at the shimmering light that was located where the bay wall use to be. “There’s a shield for this.”
Some stood back up, brushing themselves off and getting back into a presentable state. Others couldn’t release the death-like grip they had on something.
Ker was cursing his luck when Kohn had grabbed hold of a safety bar and him at the same time. Kohn’s grip threatened to crush his arm and he was already getting that tingling sensation in his fingers from lack of blood circulation. After hearing that he wouldn’t be sucked out into the Deep Dark Kohn exchanged the bar in his hand for Ker’s other arm with an equal death grip.
Kohn shuffled slowly towards the barrier, while holding Ker up like a shield for some reason.
“Let me go you fool!”
Kohn’s instincts were telling him to get away from the glowing shield, but his curiosity again managed to outweigh his survival instincts.
Slowly he got closer and closer to the shield. Ker was still yelling at him, but all of his Kohn’s attention was on the shield in front of him.
Just when he got within range that he could almost touch it a grotesque form appeared from the shield.
The terrible vestige right in his face combined with it moving closer to him and the hundreds of humans screaming behind him made Kohn jump in his skin.
Without thinking about it he held Ker in front of him, the beast’s mouth grabbing up the little man as it continued into the bay at full speed. It knocked Kohn down to the deck before sliding its large, scaly and bubble skin across his body.
It slammed head first into the wall before going completely still. The bay doors closed solid once more.
Kohn stood up, fists in front of him like he could actually box with a horror of a monster that big.
Realizing that it wasn’t moving, he noticed what he instinctively was trying to do and cursed himself for being an idiot.
In the meantime, Ker managed to extract himself from the dead Jzanna mouth. Covered in its spit and with a dark, wet shadow running down his leg he glared at Kohn.
Their eyes met, hatred passing into understanding, apologizing, pleading eyes.
Ker pointed his spear at Kohn…