Angel was still awake when I arrived back at the Crystal Cavern, writing into a journal. She glanced up as I padded in, closing the book and leaving it on her lap so she could sign. “How did the recon go?”

“So… I’ve got a theory.” I went over to the hearth and lay down in front of it, grunting with satisfaction as the heat began to bake the skin of my back. “Imperator Argent, aka Nicolai Kaban, works for a Russian organized crime outfit, right?”

“Right.” Angel tilted her head curiously.

“But here’s the thing…” I crossed my foreclaws, head reared up to look at her. “Those guys who hunted us back up north, they were Russian-speakers. Pro hunters, with gear and equipment not normally accessible to the average Hell Pig. The guy who led them was a Sponsored. I saw him in Oil Town, on the fortress that I assume guards the entry to the Demise and Karkinos’ arena. The place is armored to the tits”

“Huh. So that’s where they came from.” Angel frowned. “Do you think they’re connected?”

“Kaban is Russian mafia, Solonov is probably his boss, the Pigs Elites are from the same general ethnic group when none of the other Hell Pigs seem to have any particular affiliation,” I said. “They’re trucking something out of Oil Town Seven that isn’t oil, and taking it east. They could be delivering supplies to the warfront… or they could be trading with the Centurions on the sly.”

Angel blinked a couple of times. “Why would they do that?”

“I don’t know. But if the Hell Pigs rank-and-file are experiencing an artificial oil scarcity, that might be why.” There were a few different scenarios playing through my mind. “Could be a resupply to the front lines, like I said. Could be that the Pigs stationed at Oil Town are greasing their own palms, going behind King Pig’s back to get Centurions metal. Could be King Pig is willing to forfeit some of his resources for resources his gang needs. There’s a lot of things it could be, but… the operation there looks pretty fucking sophisticated, whatever it is. More sophisticated than I was expecting.”

Angel smiled ruefully. “I told you. Maybe we should have stuck with the Maroons after all.”

I rumbled and shook my head. “No, but I think we need to flex that alliance and see if Merc meant it. Because I think I know how we can get into that fortress and disrupt the entire southern warfront.”

***

After Angel and I hashed out our ideas, Angel sent Merc a note via the player private messaging system with an offer she was unlikely to refuse. There was no risk to her, because we didn’t need the Maroons to fight. All we needed was for them to LARP.

We took two days to scout the Hell Pigs patrol and supply routes, and narrowed our target to a supply road that took the convoy west down a narrow valley passage, sheltered by trees and gullies to either side. When the day of the op rolled around, me, Lulu and Angel felled three large trees. Two of them were left in place as big-ass logs. We dragged the other one onto the road, barely processed but stripped of bark, and hammered great big wooden spikes into it. Angel took a knife and carved a message on the front, then switched her guerrilla gear for her full Iron Centurions uniform, complete with face-masking helmet. Then we set up the other logs with sturdy ropes, found our positions, and waited.

Sure enough, the whoops and calls that accompanied the Pigs echoed through the trees at roughly the same time as they had the previous day. I rumbled low in my throat, fighting the deep and primal urge to twitch the tip of my tail in anticipation. The bladed edge rested lightly against one of the trap trigger ropes.

"Ready?" Angel signed to me. She had her rifle braced against her shoulder, ready to sight and fire at the other trap trigger rope across the pass.

"Butt muscles clenched and loaded," I replied. "The tail is armed."

Lulu giggled. Angel snorted softly.

These pigs didn’t giggle and shriek like Clive’s posse as they thundered into view. They were led by the Hyperboar guy, with horned helmets and flashing white bone face jewellery. The leader had a back-mounted flag - yellow, with a charging boar in black. A traditionalist, it seemed.

"Woah woah woahhh!" The man in the lead held a hand back as he reined his crackling blue mount to a screeching, skidding stop in front of the spiked log. "Hold up! Something's fucky!"

My eyes flicked to the outriders on top of the pass: two men to either side, also on feathered raptors. They halted slightly ahead of the main posse, javelins ready to launch down. We were above and behind them, waiting as the rest of the patrol straggled into the funnel we had created.

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"Huh?" The sudden alert distracted me, briefly. I checked my Stream panel: sure enough, it was crowded with viewers and comments. The comment stream was flying too fast to keep up. People were betting like mad. Three people against twenty Hell Pigs and dinosaurs, and the odds were soundly in our favor. For once. The only one with bad odds was 'Angel hits the second rope'.

"Oh ye of little faith," I thought to the crowd. I closed my HUD and waited.

The Hell Pigs were milling around the log in alarm, grouped up as the leader pulled a torch and lit it so that he could read what Angel had carved on the log. "What does this… ‘There is no hell greater than what is about to happen here.’"

"Now." I swung my tail, back, lining it up like a batter at the pitch, and lashed it down.

Angel’s bullet hit the rope and split it, just as my tail sheared through hemp and sent the logs we'd set up tumbling into the ravine.

"IT'S A-!" The Pig's voice was drowned out by the sound of wood thundering down into the pass. The logs smashed into man and raptor alike, sending panicked the Hyperboar and two dinosaurs plunging and screeching to the mud with broken backs and shattered riders. Angel pivoted her rifle and took out one outrider with a single headshot, then smoothly reloaded and did it again with the next man across.

"We're up!" I plugged my tentacles into Lulu, bounding out as time warped to a near standstill. Soul Drain engaged, and I picked Quicksand. Time sped up again; I caught onto several branches with my tentacles to slow my fall, then flipped and dropped down into the road to cut off the men trying to flee. Several men shouted in confusion as the ground liquified beneath them, plunging their panicked mounts into quicksand to the hip.

The first man in the line of fire brought his crossbow. I glimpsed the bolt level with my face and dodged, took the hit in the upper foreleg instead of my jaw. My tentacle crashed down onto his helmet with enough force to drop a steer. The flimsy bone helmet and his skull both gave way together, sending him flopping limply to the mud.

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In an instant, four others converged on us. The leader charged at me with an iron-tipped spear, bracing it like a lance under his arm. I smacked three men off their riders like a hydra, bellowed a cry of challenge, and called the commander's game of chicken. Instead of trying to dodge the lance, I dove under it, rolled up, and launched myself jaws-first at the neck of his raptor. Dinosaurs weren't built like horses. They were tall, with thin necks, and had less stability - something the leader forgot to his demise as I threw my body to the side and dragged the raptor, squealing, to the dirt. The leader flipped off and tumbled to the ground with a yell, only to take a spiked tentacle to the forehead.

"Centurions!" Angel shouted as loudly as she could, her voice ringing through the trees: a cry taken up by the Maroons, who imitated and threw their voices with the same rallying cry, male and female, as I bounded into the pack and dealt death from all sides. "CENTURIONS!"

Maroons troops began firing on the survivors, raining arrows and crossbow quarrels onto the squealing Hyperboar and its panicked rider. I charged in under the cover to clash with the other Brute. The huge blue razorback looked just like the one that had chased my ass on Noobie Beach. It seemed a lot less intimidating as I latched onto its throat with my jaws. It let out a garbling, squealing cry and backpedalled, frantically discharging bolts of electricity. In this game, Electricity was Air element: it did hardly any damage to me as I savaged it, lashing my head from side to side like an alligator tearing apart an unfortunate Floridian.

"Retreat!" One of the few remaining Pigs screamed, scrambling away from the wagons and their precious cargo. "We need reinforcements! RETREAT!"

"Angel! We need to wing one of them and drop him without killing him for this plan to work!" I thought to her urgently as I flipped the screeching boar to the ground. The Pig kicked deep furrows into the mud, trying and failing to gore me with its tusks. All it managed to do was spin us in a circle, a circle that became weak and erratic as its HP haemorrhaged out with its thick, dark blood.

Angel was barely a shadow in the trees - a shadow who sighted down her rifle at one of the fleeing Hell Pigs. She let off a single shot. I saw it whiff, throwing up dirt and mud at the man's feet. He cursed and zig-zagged, heading for the concealment of the tree-line - and took her next shot in the calf. Screeching, he went to ground.

"Lulu! Grab him!" I let go of the weakening boar's jugular to pounce it. Two tentacles punched in through its chest, the bladed ends burying into its lungs and choking the next scream. Its eyes were wild as it shocked me again and again... but it was four levels lower than me, and the electricity mostly just rolled off my body.

"Say hello to all the other pigs in hell for me," I thought at it, lunging to grab the front of its throat. I raked it with claws as it kicked and struggled, letting out piercing cries that made it sound more like someone being murdered than an animal. But moment by moment, its lifeforce drained away - and all too soon, it fell limp.

"Ooh hoo!" Lulu slithered up to me and the Hyperboar, dragging the sweating, bleeding, furious Hell Pig along behind her. She had bound his arms to his sides, pulling him along the ground.

"Good work, Deputy," I said. "Just hold onto him."

One by one, the Maroons melted out of the trees. Every one of them were dressed the same as Angel - Centurions uniforms from top to bottom, their faces hidden by rough cloth masks. Angel was last to join the gathering crowd. She marched up to Merc, pulled her helmet to bare her pale face and white hair, and saluted crisply before she voiced aloud. "Primus: do you need this man, or do you need him destroyed?"

"At ease, Vigiles." Merc recited her lines with a touch of irony, but she had been a high-up in this guild and parroted the rituals smoothly and naturally. She gave a cold look down at the captured Hell Pig, who's eyes were now very white and very wide. "Destroy him."

"Wait! I've only got two lives left! I'm-!" He screamed as Lulu engulfed him, and began to bob up and down around him, cooing cheerfully.

"Got him on oxygen?" I sat down next to the corpse of the Hyperboar, like a proud hunting dog.

"Oo!" Lulu trilled.

The man inside her mass thrashed with terror, but there was no escaping the body of a Limne - not for a human, at least. Still, he could breathe. And more importantly, thanks to the way Lulu was discreetly piping in air, he could listen.

"Horrible way to die. Eaten alive by a Limne," Merc remarked. "Anyway... Vigiles, is all going according to plan?"

"Yes Ma'am." Angel saluted again. "Captain Targent is preparing the strike force and the supplies needed to assault Oil Town Seven."

"Excellent. Please let him know that he has approval from the top for this operation." Merc nodded, firmly in character as she turned. "Everyone, let's get this oil truck back to Fort Hope before more Pigs turn up!"

"HOORAH!" The other Maroons, trying their best not to laugh, thrust their spears and bows high. "CENTURIONS!"

"Do you want to kill him, or do you need me to do it?" I asked Lulu.

The Limne quivered. Then, to my great surprise, she tensed up: and turned red as the man inside her mass was suddenly and abruptly crushed.

My jaws parted as I blinked several times. "Jesus Christ, Lulu."

"Oohn!" Lulu made a determined little sound... then began to bob again. Sullenly.

"You... you don't have to eat him," I said. "I mean, you're-"

"Oohn!" Lulu made a shooing motion at me, and began to bob faster.

"Alright, alright…" I glanced at her as she miserably worked on digesting the human. Honestly I felt... worried. Looking back, I'd put the thumbscrews on her to try the whole 'eat a human, learn a language thing'. Even though I figured it would be useful, I hadn't wanted her to compromise something she believed in.

Unsettled, I went to Angel's side. She was staring at Lulu too.

"I thought she didn't want to eat people?" she signed.

"Seems like she changed her mind," I thought back. "Anyway... guess we're going to find out if it helps her communicate better."

Lulu made a ‘bleh’ sound, then went over to the Hyperboar and stretched over it, bobbing thoughtfully.

"Great find, Angel." Merc strode back over to the three of us, carrying a satchel in her hands. Forgetting that Angel couldn't hear her, she threw the bag at her before she was ready. On reflex, I darted out a tentacle and caught it before it smacked my teammate in the side of the head. Angel caught the flash of movement and whirled, her weapon lifting, then angling away when she realized who it was.

"Oh, shit. Sorry." Merc made a little extra effort to speak clearly as she continued. "Anyway, great find. We’ve got over a hundred gallons of oil on these wagons. Talk about a haul. We set aside five gallons of oil for you, and that bag contains every bit of ammo these fuckwits were carrying, plus heals and food. Are you sure you don’t want any more of the oil?"

"We don’t need it. Just make sure it all gets put to good use," Angel replied, taking the bag and looking into it. Her eyes lit up: whatever was in there, she was pleased with it. "Stage two of our plan is going to be trickier. The Centurions are a tougher fight than most of the Pigs."

Merc scratched her nose. "Yeah. Sad to say, one Centurion is worth at least ten of these bastards. It’s the discipline."

"It's not just their relative strength that’s the problem," Angel said. "For this to work, we have to ambush a Centurions convoy as the Hell Pigs... and we somehow have to do it without them seeing Lulu and Noodles. Especially Noodles. We battled Captain Targent and defeated him in the arena; he knows Noodles, Lulu and I are a team. If the Centurions see us together and report, Targent will know something's wrong."

Merc blinked at Angel a couple of times. "You're overthinking it, girl. Targent made an enemy out of you - why WOULDN'T you have gone over to the Hell Pigs?"

Angel's mouth opened, then closed. "... Hmm. I mean, the Pigs tried to murder me, and killed my... my girlfriend."

"Does Targent know that?"

Angel thought about it. Then shook her head.

Merc laughed, and clapped Elijah's arm as he and Hong wandered over to join us. "Then why the hell do you want to hide Noodles? If the goal is to piss him off, then make a big song and dance about the fact you switched sides. Hell, dress up like one of the Pigs and send him a DM of you teabagging one of his men."

Angel looked over at me. I had to resist the urge to nod, or wink or something. "Heck yeah. But let's not tell her exactly why we're doing what we're doing ye: these guys are chiller than most, but I don’t want them knowing that we’re going for Karkinos straight away."

"The goal is to piss him off and see if we can stir him up against the Pigs." Angel smiled back at Merc. "Thanks for riding out to help."

“Our pleasure. And now I’ve got a legion again, it makes me think we need to be bolder in how we handle these bastards.” Merc smiled back, then glanced over at Hong. "We good to roll out?"

"Yes, ma'am." Hong gave Angel an odd look as he saluted. "Wagons are hitched and ready to go."

[Lulu has absorbed Hyperboar! Lulu has learned Electroshock.]

"That's my cue," Merc said. She held out a hand, and Angel clasped it. "Good luck with Stage Two. I'm pretty sure I can already see what you're doing."

“She probably can,” I admitted.

Angel's smile widened, her pale eyes glinting with mirth. "Thanks. And if our strategy works out, you won't just see what we’re doing. You won’t be able to look away."