“The lord is engaged with six beasts at early tier four,” Nallia explained, pointing at a hovering map of magical lights she’d cast. Golden lights for each of the knights were shown along with red clouds for likely beasts and blue for civilians. By now the map was largely golden dots dashing between red clouds, attempting to hunt down as many of the beasts as possible.
“Lady Aira is held up here,” she continued, pointing at a pair of dots in the middle of a red cloud, “she’s the closest but ran into a group of beasts I failed to detect.”
“And the sniper?” Lailra asked, looking over the glowing map.
“Somewhere here,” Nallia said, pointing to a corner of the map, “I haven’t found anything, but that’s on the edge of my detection spell so anything below tier three is unlikely to show up.”
“You’re saying that the protector guy is alone, fighting six of these creatures, with someone taking shots at him?” the National Guard Lieutenant asked, “and those creatures are stronger than anything we’re facing here?”
“That’s correct,” Lailra confirmed, glancing over her shoulder where a wall of ethereal vines were grabbing at any beast that attempted to rush it. Against enemies this weak her defensive spells were quite potent, the tier two beasts rotting away in moments. Even the stronger tier three beasts were injured by the lashing thorns to the point that the national guard could finish them off without much issue.
The beasts weren’t stupid, many of them wary of the clearly magical vines after seeing what they did to others, but between the knights slaughtering them back in the airport and the vines ahead of them, many chose to brave the vines. The natural bloodlust of beasts aided in pushing them to take risks rather than sneak away or try to escape.
“Not sure what we can do to help,” Leewald said slowly, “the Air Force guys out of Patrick or Tampa are limited, since this area is so densely built up. The Army reservists are still getting their shit together, and I doubt they’d have any luck unless they bring tanks.”
“Tanks?” Lailra asked before shaking her head, “never mind, he’ll be fine for now, Orlan lives for times like this.”
“Outnumbered, alone and fighting for his life?”
“Pushing his skills to the limit to help others,” Lailra corrected, “I’m more concerned about those air planes overhead, can’t they go elsewhere?”
“From what I’ve heard the ones who could, have, but Orlando is the largest airport in the region, the others simply can’t handle all the traffic.”
“If we cleared a… runway? If we cleared one out, could they land?”
“It would help,” Leewald nodded, turning to speak with some of his people.
“Any idea which plane has the Lord’s sister?” Nallia asked softly.
“No, they all look the same to me,” Lailra replied, “hopefully she’s on one that went to another airport.”
“It’ll be difficult to get some people to serve as air control, but if you can clear the runway, and keep it clear, we’ll handle that end,” the Lieutenant said, returning after a couple minutes.
“There’s a runway on the other side of that road,” Lailra said, pointing to the east, “will that work?”
“I don’t see why not, not sure if it’s part of the official Orlando International, but if that’s easier for you to manage.”
“I’m sensing the rift is beginning to destabilize,” Nallia spoke up, “it’s likely to close within the next hour.”
“From what I was told, many of the planes above us will have to land, one way or another, in the next half hour,” Leewald replied, the two women going quiet for a moment.
“Lord Orlan says to focus on saving the airplanes,” Lailra spoke up after a moment, Leewald looking confused but didn’t say anything, “have everyone move east, that’ll mean more beasts hitting us, but we should be able to hold.”
“Your boss, lord, whatever, he going to be okay?” Leewald asked.
“If I know him, he’ll be the one coming to our rescue if we need one,” Lailra said with a fond smile, the golden dots on the magical map beginning to move east.
\-\-\-\-\-
Orlan barely had a moment to think, leaning to one side to avoid a swipe from one of the cat beasts before ducking under another coming in behind him. Neither side had been able to land any significant blows on the other as of yet, Orlan only managing a few shallow cuts on the arms of a few of the beasts. The most damaging hit was when one cat tried to pounce on him, Orlan managing to dodge out from under the beast and slam his spear deep into the cat’s haunches, he’d even managed to trigger void strike. Since then none of the beasts had attempted to pounce on him again, the one he’d struck was limping and far more cautious.
On his end, Orlan’s armor was covered in scratches and dents from glancing blows, but they hadn’t drawn his blood yet. His only saving grace was these beasts were cat-like, not wolves, so their teamwork left much to be desired. Rather than swarm and overwhelm him they stayed at range, circling him and jumping in for a swipe whenever they saw an opening. Of course, with their sloth-like arms being as long as the rest of their body this was an upsettingly effective tactic. It wasn’t often Orlan didn’t have the reach advantage with his spear, but when it did happen his normal recourse was to use magic. While he was skilled at casting mid-fight, avoiding six enemies while casting was too much for him. Any time he tried to start a longer cast they’d all dash in, knowing he’d be somewhat distracted with the magic, and he’d be forced to release the spell before it even cast.
That left his skill with the spear, his physical abilities and inherent magic. While the beasts were stronger than their tier would indicate, as was common among beasts who almost universally used core-ward souls, Orland was still stronger with his mostly tier six body. In addition his sphere-ward soul provided more unique inherent abilities. These beasts seemed to have some resistance to detection magic, and possibly some magical senses of their own, but Orlan’s own rift step provided more use in close combat by itself. And void strike made even shallow wounds deceptively dangerous as the corrosive mana was injected by each wound. The small scratches he’d landed so far hadn’t allowed him to push much in, but it did mean he’d eventually wear his enemies down.
Orlan was confident he could win, given time, which is why he sent his knights to secure someplace for the airplanes to land. The only wild card was that damned sniper. If he remained still for more than a couple seconds another heavy round would come rocketing out of nowhere. The range was long enough, and Orlan’s instincts good enough, that sensing the shots wasn’t difficult. But between having to dodge the relentless attacks of the beasts it was only a matter of time before he was in a position the sniper could manage a clean hit.
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And, as predicted, a few minutes after he’d sent his knights to secure the runway he was forced to dance back from a series of attacks from the beasts, putting him off balance when he sensed a sniper round incoming. While he couldn’t manage high tier spells in this frantic combat, he could snap out a tier two shield, which should slow down, if not outright stop, the tier one bullets.
So he was surprised when the bullet shattered through the shield as if it wasn’t even there, punching through his armor and digging a half inch into the meat of his shoulder. The shock, more than even the pain, caused him to stumble, allowing the cats to score several more scratches across his armor before he got back into the flow.
“Lailra,” he said over his telepathic channel, “that sniper’s bullet just punched right through my shield.”
“Are you okay?” she asked, sounding as shocked as him.
“I’m fine, the bullet is only tier one, barely managed to puncture my skin,” he assured her, “but it went through my shield as if it wasn’t there.”
There was a few moments of silence, Orlan focusing on the fight but figured she’d was talking with others.
“Nallia thinks it might be Gandiva,” she eventually came back.
“That’s a bow,” Orlan grunted out, forced to rift step away from another bullet, the sniper was getting better.
“They managed to pull runes from Brisingamen for a mild mental spell,” Lailra pointed out, “maybe they pulled some shield piercing runes from Gandiva?”
“I’m not a good counter-mage,” Orlan grunted, spinning his spear to fend off one beast even as he dodged a swipe from another, “and I don’t have time to cast anyways.”
“One moment,” Lailra said, going silent again for a few minutes, “the Lieutenant of the National Guard is offering to send a team, he calls it a squad, to hunt down that sniper.”
“Against a tier two human their rifles should be effective,” Orlan agreed, ducking under a swipe, “and even if all they do is spook him into not shooting, then I should be able to clean up here.”
“I’ll take him up on the offer then.”
\-\-\-\-\-
“Sarge, why are going here?” One of the troopers asked as they ran away from the rest of the national guard, “the fight with those creatures is back there.”
“Got orders to hunt down a sniper who’s taking shots at the protector,” the sergeant replied.
“The guy who the government has a warrant out for?”
“We’re not police,” the sergeant snapped, “he’s killing those creatures, we need him to keep killing them.”
“Well, any idea where this sniper is?”
“The protector guy is there,” the sergeant said, pointing down the runway where several of the cat creatures could be seen circling a single figure, before turning to point the direction they were running, “and he says the bullets are coming from somewhere over there.”
“The postal building?”
Before he could answer there was a crack as the sniper fired again, now that they were further from the main line they were able to make it out from the rest of the fire.
“Anyone see it?”
“Roof of the postal service,” another soldier replied, starting to pant, “north-eastern corner.”
“Over the loading bays?”
“Yup.”
“And he’s taking shots at… damn,” the first soldier said as they crossed the western most runway of the airport, “that has to be at least a thousand meters.”
“Fire and advance!” the sergeant shouted, the national guard soldiers lifting their rifles and beginning to fire on the building, quickly forcing the sniper to duck back, “let’s go!”
With grunts of confirmation the squad began running again, hoping to chase down the sniper before he could get away.
\-\-\-\-\-
“They expect us to land down there?” the pilot said skeptically, looking down at what looked like a warzone. Spells and attacks lashed out from the nearly dozen women knights who had gathered to keep the runway clear, supposedly they’d ensure there were no obstructions, like runways, but with the blood splatter, smoke and general chaos it was hard to tell if the runway was actually clear.
“Unless you’d rather put down in that lake,” the co-pilot replied, nodding to a small lake just south-east of the airport, “we’ve got maybe fifteen minutes of fuel left.”
“Well then, here goes nothing,” the pilot shrugged, thumbing his radio, “got it control, beginning decent to land.”
“Attention passengers, we’re being told a runway has been cleared,” the co-pilot said over the intra-plane at the same time, “we’re going to try our best, but be ready for a hard landing.”
With that the pilot pulled on the yoke, bringing the plane around. They were the lowest in altitude, and likely in fuel, having been circling for the last couple hours. The planes that had been ahead of them had left for other municipal airports, since they hadn’t had the fuel to loiter. Unfortunately those airports could only handle so many airplanes, and his plane had been just past the cutoff. The only reason they hadn’t run out of fuel already was due to them turning off two engines, running the other two alone and maintaining a slow speed.
Most of the others had done the same, trading speed for efficiency and endurance. Any planes with the range for it had left for Pensecola, but that still left nearly a dozen aircraft stuck over Orlando.
“Flame out on one,” the co-pilot reported as the pilot lined up on the runway and reached for the landing gear only for the pilot to block him.
“Wait for my signal,” the pilot said, struggling to keep the aircraft lined up with only one engine. The co-pilot realized he was trying to preserve airspeed to ensure they made the runway, barely even using his flaps.
“Now!” the pilot said as they crossed over the fence, the other engine flaming out at nearly the same moment. Slowly the massive aircraft drifted down, the gear extending with painful slowness, their speed dropping off. He heard the passengers cheer as they made it over the runway, but that was only part of it. The stall warning went off, they were about to fall right out of the air, gear or no, when he heard the gear lock in place. The pilot immediately pulled the flaps to full and allowed the airliner to drop, slamming into the tarmac, without the ability to reverse thrust they had to rely on the brakes to stop. Both pilots stepped hard on the wheel breaks, wincing at the loud squeal that echoed through the cabin.
“Turn off there,” the pilot said, pointing to one of the turnoff points, and the co-pilot nodded, easing off the brakes and helping turn the plane off the main runway. A few moments later the last of their momentum took them just off the taxiway, but stopped them before they went too far.
Both men took a long breath, pausing to wipe the sweat from their foreheads while they heard the emergency doors being pulled.
“Now we just need to run for the national guard,” the co-pilot said. The pilot didn’t respond, simply groaning and pulling at his harness.
\-\-\-\-\-
Over half an hour after Orlan first engaged with the tier four beasts, and ten minutes after the sniper was scared off, he took the first one down. Both of its front-limbs were eaten away by repeated void strikes, leaving the beast to limp away. As soon as it turned away Orlan struck, rift stepping above it and slamming his spear down into the base of its neck, pumping void mana directly into its spine and killing it almost instantly. The other beasts got the message, if they tried to run, they’d die. Five minutes later a second went down, its front legs ravaged to the point of uselessness, allowing Orlan to stab it in the heart.
Whether it was fear or anger, Orlan couldn’t tell, but the last four beasts fought even harder, barely giving him a moment to strike back. Both the beasts and Orlan were getting tired by this point, even the seemingly endless stamina of high tier bodies pushed to their limit. Combined with Orlan’s almost literally endless mana, given he wasn’t slinging around major spells, the battle seemed like it would go on forever.
Once the rift closed, however, it was only a matter of time till Orlan’s knights came to back him up. And sure enough, Nallia and Lailra were the first to arrive, finding Orlan panting, covered in blood, both his and from the different beasts, staring down the last two cat beasts. While lower on mana than him, the two senior knights still had more than enough to handle a pair of injured, exhausted beasts.
“Damnit, I can’t tell how injured you are,” Lailra said as she wiped various layers of dried blood from him.
“At least I’m conscious this time,” Orlan said with a tired grin.
“Ya, that way you can carry yourself back.”
“On that point,” Nallia spoke up, “how are we planning to return to the Protectorate?”
Both Orlan and Lailra looked at her and blinked.
“Right, we took an airplane here,” Orlan said as if remembering, “a cutter can probably come get us eventually, it’ll have to stop to recharge though.”
“And likely take a roundabout course to stay near land while refilling on mana,” Lailra added, “between that and how little mana there is, it’ll probably take them a few days to even get here.”
“Meaning we’ll need somewhere to stay,” Orlan finished, turning to glance at where the National Guard were busy sweeping the airport for any more of the beasts, even though his knights were already doing that, “any idea what their intentions are?”
“They were helpful during the fight, but once things calm down…” Lailra trailed off and shrugged.
“Guess we’ll find out,” Orlan said, glancing at where a clearly military jeep was pulling onto the runway and turning in their direction.