Despite Todd’s best wishes, they ended up having to hike up the Guiana highlands to reach their final destination. At least they weren’t climbing the mountains and they had Letiche as a portable air conditioner.
“You still haven’t told me what this is all about,” said Todd as they passed by a patch of pitcher plants.
“Before the war began, Garrick sent Zariah here. We are retrieving her,” said Uncle. Letiche reached out to the glasswing butterflies that flitted about them.
“Zariah? The talk show host? What does she have to do with anything?”
“She is one who abetted the Pantheon on the public stage.”
“Yeah, but, it’s not exactly pertinent is it?”
“If it is as I suspect, then this war is already over.”
“Over?” said Todd before a cryoblast knocked him down. The ice seeped through his shirt and crystallized his skin. He melted it away by heating up his body.
“We’re here. They won’t detect us because we lack a heat signature. You’ll have to swat these flies on your own,” Uncle said as he continued to walk with Letiche.
“Flies?” Todd was pelted by another cryoblast.
The stiletto drones were silent but the swarm that darted around the trees shook up the foliage and scared off the fauna. Todd amped up his body heat to melt the blasts as they landed on them. Between the slush and the sweat, Todd was drenched. When it came to attrition, machines would last longer than the furnace inside him could burn. He had to go on the offence but even a single ember could slight up the canopy. Even the grass around him was already wilting. The movement of the drones meant he would have to submerge the whole area in a haze to heat them up; regardless, a machine is not as easily melted as a man.
Todd concentrated an orb of artifacting in the sky above. The drones fired at the empty heat signature in their mindlessness as they had no one to control them. If it was his own body, Todd would tire himself out, but this orb used less energy to ensure that the drones would run out of ammo first. Probably. Todd ran to catch up to Uncle while they were distracted. Being away from Letiche, in this humidity, after near self-immolation, was quite unpleasant.
When Todd finally caught up to where they stood, he held onto Letiche for dear life. Her rejuvenating vapors made him realize how dead he really was. Gasping and melting, was this what his incapacitation was doing to people? He thought it was relatively harmless but it might be worse just dying.
“Your brother killed Four-Leaf and Lady Teumess,” he remembered. Guess he'll have to ask Kenny what that was like.
Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.
“We’re here,” said Uncle when they were on the edge of another clearing, this time with a cabin instead of a villa, “There are more flies to take care of but I’m holding the child. Can you take care of them for me?” Uncle sat down on a log with Letiche. The glass butterflies had returned to them, but besides that, Todd did not see anything else. There weren’t any more drones and the cabin was silent.
Something ghoulish swooped past behind Todd. He could not see it, but a deathly chill gnawed him to the bone and faint laughter echoed inside his mind. Uncle had picked out a white sobralia for Letiche, as if they didn’t notice. Did Todd just imagine it?
What he saw next was no hallucination. Spots in the dirt started to crack and split open all around to reveal skeletons of animals: snakes, opossums, monkeys, armadillos, anteaters, otters, and cougars. All shambled out of their unmarked graves and began their approach from all sides.
“What’s happening?!” yelled Todd in a panic.
“Zariah has consorted with a daemon,” answered Uncle, “her affinity puts her in a precarious position with the realm of spirits, so it was easy enough for one to come for her; in her desperation, she accepted an offer of power as expected. Now she can rouse the spirits of dead animals, albeit poorly, these cadavers can barely walk.”
Uncle may be calm about this, but Todd didn’t want any of these things anywhere near him. Just looking at the freaky anatomy gave him the heebie-jeebies.
A snake fell from a tree onto his nape—hundreds of spindly ribs all scratched his back—and he burst on reflex to get it off. Skeletal frogs hopped toward his fleet and he blasted each one with flame darts. Each dart left pits of slag in the scorched grass. An anteater from the side stood up and fell to drag him to the ground. It pushed its long, bone snout into his face as it pinned his shoulders with its claws. He focused heat into the palms of his hands into an explosion that shook the trees.
He stood back on his feet to continue blowing up all manner of undead animals. With them all being flimsy puppets, it was more like a carnival gallery than any real danger. No wonder Uncle wasn’t worried.
Since this was a clearing, and against targets that couldn’t feel pain, Todd didn’t have to hold back as much. He shot iguanas with flaming finger guns, tore apart toucans in a heated whirlwind, and turned sloths to ash.
All that was left was the cougar. From its measured steps, this one seemed to have more spirit in it than the others. The way it dodged a flame dart confirmed it. Or perhaps, with the others destroyed, the energy gathered into one animal that got to observe the mistakes of the others.
The cougar readied to pounce, and before Todd could ignite, a claw swiped across his abdomen. A glancing slice that cut his clothes and just enough of his skin to bleed. This thing really had learned from what it saw. It was different from the rest: this one had a predator’s instincts.
Todd cauterized his wounds to stop the bleeding, even if it hurt worse than being cut. However different this thing was, it was still just the ghost of an animal. Humans are the greatest predator, that is what Uncle taught him, and Todd had seen much worse monsters than this in his time with the immortals. This was nothing. If it saw a few tricks then just try something new.
The cougar readied to pounce oncemore. It leapt and was perforated with detonations across its frame that forced it to slam its paws into the ground to brake. It dashed to the sides, then back, but the results were the same. It dodged around the flamedarts, and knew not to stay too close to avoid explosions, motion detected mines turned its speed against it. Todd filled the air with sparks so that every time the cougar leapt, it would cause a combustion. It kept trying to dodge an unavoidable attack until it was a pile of swiss cheese. Just to be sure, Todd concentrated one final pyre that turned the dry bones into ash.
“If you’re done,” said Uncle, “then we can finish this once and for all.”