Calculating…

Calculating…

Victor felt the manawoven threads in his right arm and across his back tighten slightly, pulling his aim just a hair to the side as he pulled the trigger. A thin beam of yellow energy lanced neatly through a gap in the canopy above and the chests of two giant birds at the exact moment the paths of their dives converged.

Lightning flickered around the corpses as they bonelessly crashed into the branches above and disappeared.

“Show off.”

“Eyes ahead.”

The small five-man squad marched in single file formation, picking their way through the loose underbrush of the ancient forest. Their camouflage fatigues blended in with the giant ferns and tall roots that surrounded them, but the disguise didn’t seem to matter to their jungle host, as they had been attacked repeatedly ever since setting out.

Wilcox took point. The giant of a man swung a machete that would be a full sword for anyone else, clearing a path for the rest of the team. Elen Bower, the one who called Victor a showoff, followed next, her eyes constantly scanning the trunks around them for any threat. Her hands nervously twitched next to the sheaths of two straight daggers she wore on her belt and a bandolier of throwing knives wrapped around her torso.

In the middle of the group were the two scientists on the recon team. Doctor Emir White never once looked up from the tablet he was collecting readings on, and Doctor Sue Anit set the pace of the team when she regularly stopped to collect samples of dirt, plants, and small insects, all of which disappeared into a spacial container after being carefully cataloged and notated on yet another tablet.

Victor took up both the rear and the flank of the group. His AI command band piloted two armed drones that swept the forest beside them as they advanced, and he provided ranged support fire with his long rifle.

Ahead, Elen pivoted, drew, and drove one of her knives through the skull of a two-meter-long snake all in one smooth motion as it leaped from cover.

“How are we looking, White?”

“Slowing down. I think we’re still heading generally out of this stuff but it’s definitely leveling off.”

Victor glanced up and squinted at the angle of the afternoon sun through the trees. “If there’s no change in thirty, we turn back. Days here feel a bit short.”

“Twenty-two point three standard hours,” Sue chimed in.

“Sec.” Wilcox sheathed his machete onto his belt and stepped forward. He bashed his fists together once and dim lights from his fatigues began to light up in a line from the back of his hands and up his arms, meeting on his spine over his shoulders and then glowing down to his legs. He squatted in front of a trunk that blocked the game trail they followed, got his grip, and heaved, lifting it.

Sue dove in, dexterously grabbing small insects and worms from underneath with gloved hands, completely ignoring the several-hundred-pound trunk Wilcox was now holding over her head. The large man shook his head with a snort and took one heavy step at a time, turning and hauling the tree out of the way.

Threat detected.

One of Vic’s drones flew in under the trunk as well and emitted a small beam of light, piercing a large green and gold centipede that was making its way up the wood.

Threat dissuaded.

Victor had never encountered an AI with such a penchant for understatement as this one.

“Well.” Sue finally stood up after a few more minutes of eagerly pocketing another assortment of the local flora and fauna. “Poisonous fungi. Poisonous spiders that eat poisonous worms that eat the poisonous dirt. You take us to the nicest places Vic.” She smiled radiantly at him while doffing her gloves expertly, careful not to touch their outsides.

The strange part was, it was a nice place. Utterly beautiful. Simultaneously familiar and alien, every plant and animal seemed to have an analog or close relative back home but each with just a little twist. Eagles that channeled lightning through metal tips on their wings. Giant broad-leafed deciduous trees with root networks like mangroves. Like a pallet swap, some fish had fur, some birds had scales, some insects had… also fur and scales.

The entire ecosystem was completely unified in two things: diversity of features, and being completely and utterly drenched in some sort of poisonous energy. The scientists on the team had speculated about it in comparison to the mana back home but-

Additional threats detected.

“Ware, we’ve got incoming. Assessment?”

Multitudinous large heat signatures approaching from solar east. Arrival imminent.

“Mutiwhatinous?” Vic muttered, then shook himself. “Form up! Coming in on our left.”

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The group pivoted with practiced motions. Vic stepped around and out to the right, Wilcox stepped into the point position for the new direction, and Elen stepped off further to their left, leaving Wilcox room to swing his machete. The two doctors stepped back and took shelter around the fallen trunk with the two drones hovering over their heads in a guard formation.

Even the drones were twitchy, quickly pivoting back and forth trying to get the first visual lock on whatever the threat was. Beneath them, Sue and Emir huddled over the tablet, trying to make sense of what they were seeing.

“Uh, sir you may want to see-” Emir started, his eyes wide.

“Everyone hold your breath!” Sue screamed, then inhaled deeply and took her own advice. Vic, Wilcox, and Elen reacted with honed reflexes, each taking a deep breath without questioning.

In the next instant, Vic saw it.

Like a storm on the ground, a rolling translucent haze was barreling through the forest. Its surprising progress was marked only by tree after tree being swallowed within its depths. No sooner did the team notice it than it was upon and past them. Visibility was weak: Vic could just barely make out Elen far to his left and didn’t dare look back to check on the scientists.

The ground rumbled.

Vic’s ears began to ring.

A blurred form shot past in the fog off to his right. Then another, closer and clearer. Some sort of deer analog, leaping and bounding. Vic turned his gaze back forward, then dropped to his knees and rolled left as one passed right by where he had been standing.

Thirty seconds of dodging and close calls followed. No one dared to attack while they were being ignored in the frenzy. The fog grew thicker and thicker and Vic’s lungs began to burn from the strain. He lost sight of Elen first, then Wilcox.

Drone Two disabled.

A male shout rang out from behind him, barely heard over the roar of what was turning into a full-on stampede. They could not fight this. With vision almost completely lost, Vic took shelter behind the largest tree nearby. Twice, the giant trunk shook with impacts of fog-blinded beasts smashing into it, while dozens, possibly hundreds of forms broke on either side of it.

Drone One lost.

Vic didn’t know if the drones had been damaged in the stampede or by the energy in the air. Manatech devices reacted unpredictably to this foreign energy and there was just so much of it right now.

Thinking about the replaceable drones helped keep his mind off of his own straining lungs and the unknown status of his team. Vic fought to keep his heart rate low while taking shelter, and knew the rest of his team was smart enough to do the same. He couldn’t speak for the scientists behind him but that was presently out of his control.

Spots began to appear in front of his straining vision as the roar and crash of the fleeing beasts immediately passed him, slowly fading off into the distance. There were no stragglers to the herd. The fog followed them shortly after. It must have been related to their presence somehow, but Vic couldn’t grasp the connection.

Vic couldn’t stand it anymore and took a breath once the worst of it had passed. Probably before he should have, but the alternative was worse. He needed to recover his faculties before whatever was chasing the herd arrived.

“Status.” He subvocalized.

Unclear. All drones lost. All detectable threats have passed. Mana storage: twenty-two percent.

His AI band spoke to him through vibrations across his upper arm, generally undetectable to others without specialized equipment.

“Status.” He repeated, this time projecting his voice in a low tone that he hoped wouldn’t carry beyond the rest of his team. Looking left, he saw Wilxoc sitting with his back resting against another tree, much like himself, but the man wasn’t moving. Elen was already quickly picking her way over the now-destroyed path to get back to them. Fallen branches, torn from their owners by the high bounds of the beasts, littered the ground along with giant roots pulled up from the ground and even a few fallen trees. The two scientists were nowhere to be seen.

Elen gave a thumbs-up back at Vic just before she reached Wilcox. Vic kept his eyes on the treeline ahead of him as he made his way over to the pair, slower than Elen had been going so he could cover them if needed. No movement yet.

By the time Vic reunited with his team, Elen had roused Wilcox, who had passed out rather than breathe in the air. The man was stubborn, to say the least. Squatting down beside them, Vic spoke in a whisper, “Glad you two are safe. Take a minute to get your breath back, then we’ll make our way back to the rest. Eyes peeled, something was chasing that herd.”

“Aye.”

“Yessir.” Wilcox’s words were still a bit slurred.

Vic signaled with his eyes for Elen to precede them back to where they hoped the scientists were hiding, then helped Wilcox to his feet. The man leaned on the tree briefly, shaking his head as he stood up, then steadied himself and nodded at Vic and Elen.

Elen nimbly hopped from one exposed root to the other while making her way back to the original fallen tree. Wilcox followed steadily, crashing through the underbrush and making more noise than Vic would have liked, and Vic took up the rear once more, practically walking backward in his concern. They still had seen no sign of an enemy, but he would not let his guard down.

“What sensors do we have left?” He subvocalized.

Limited. All external sensors offline, including visual and thermal. Atmospheric and kinetic sensors in your suit are still supplying data. Kinetic sensors are unreliable while you move.

Taking the hint, Vic raised his rifle to his eye line and stood at ready, then waited for Wilcox to follow Elen behind the fallen tree and out of sight. Once the forest around them finally stilled-

Motion detected, two o’clock.

Vic felt the subtle pull once again on his manawoven suit, guiding his arms to aim just a bit to the right. He adjusted his stance as quietly as he could to orient in the new direction and waited, not seeing anything. He slowed his breathing.

Vibration consistent with predicted breathing patterns of a large predator detected. Estimated size: at least three meters long.

How could he be missing something that large? The sunlight breaking through the canopy was sparse but intense, creating very few pools of shadows for something to hide in. Vic tightened his grip on his rifle, willing whatever it was to show itself. He imagined he could hear it breathing, a deep growl building low in its throat.

He heard Sue scream from far behind him, causing him to flinch. As soon as he blinked the foliage in front of him exploded and a giant horned cat, nearly perfectly colored to match the forest, sprinted at him. The beast let out a deep hunting roar, and Vic opened fire.