Chapter 27
SFC Jennet Ming led a group of exhausted civilians and soldiers back to Fort Moore. The Captain had returned first, mentioning a need to complete a level 10 quest similar to the one at level 5. She felt a bit bad for the Captain. He seemed a decent sort, for an american, but he’d obviously taken the easy route the quest offered since he hadn’t exhibited any Yang or Yin abilities during the fight. She did feel an odd sort of belonging while near the Captain though, as if some part of him resonated with her core. She couldn’t quite identify what was bringing the odd feeling on, so she’d resolved to simply ignore it for the time being.
The group had been traveling for about an hour before they met up with the mechanized convoy Lieutenant Soto was supposed to be leading. The First Sergeant had taken some of the other lieutenants and SSG Davis aside to find out why the XO wasn’t with the convoy. Jennet didn’t know what’d been said, or decided, other than sending the Captain ahead. Regardless, she was glad she hadn’t been involved in the apparent tongue lashing. Staff Sergeant Davis even seemed slightly dejected after the impromptu debrief, and the Iowa native ex football star was always in high spirits. Jennet let it slip out of her mind, and focused on leading the convoy back to base.
Just as the convoy turned onto the highway that would take them the rest of the way home, a violent explosion rocked the lead MRAP, sending it careening to the side. A series of earth barriers sprung up between groups of vehicles, and a small group of elves changed out of the nearby forest, intent on taking as many lives as possible.
Jennet had been watching the right side of the road carefully, and had no idea where the elves had come from. The cries of “Contact Left!” and “Engaging!” filled the otherwise peaceful morning air. Her mana and stamina bars had only just started to recover after the violent fight to free the POWs, and she only had enough in the tank to pull out [Heirloom Weapon Mastery] one more time. She’d have to time it’s use just right to maximize the effect. She quickly ordered the other soldiers in the second vehicle with her to stay mounted up and man the turret gun before jumping out of the vehicle, pulling her family sword from its sheath across her back.
The elves were quick, but not as much so as the ones they’d faced while rescuing the Captain. If Jennet had to guess, they might have been roughly equal with her if she’d spent her points more evenly rather than investing three levels worth into [Constitution]. That gave her hope. They likely weren’t fighting more high level warriors, but some higher level slaves.
Most of the convoy was low on ammo, and the 12 elven warriors that she managed to count soon closed into melee weapon range. Unfortunately for the elves, most of the convoy soldiers had leveled once or twice from the fight at the airport, and had full reserves of stamina and mana. Jennet found herself parrying sword strokes from two elves, one she wasn’t sure if she’d included in her initial count or not. She was quickly running out of steam, but she managed to keep blocking strikes, allowing a lieutenant from one infantry unit or another to gut one of the elves cleanly by slicing his combat blade across its stomach. The stench of spilled guts and blue blood was enough to make her gag, and she missed a critical parry with the first elf, taking a deep gouge along her left biceps. Almost instantly she lost feeling in her arm, dropping her sword in spite of her best attempts to grab it with her right hand.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Jennet saw her life flashing before her eyes. Without her sword, she was literally incapable of defending herself against the attacks of the last enemy. She did what she could to get her injured arm between her and the elf, but she knew it would likely be too little too late. That was before a hail of golden bullets chewed into her assailant. SPC Wallace had been in the lead vehicle, but had somehow survived the initial blast, and lay on the grass roughly twenty meters from the smoking MRAP. The curious specialist she’d mostly ignored had just saved her ass.
Other spells and abilities went off at intervals down the line, most ripping into unsuspecting elven targets. The elves, for their part, managed to survive the initial onslaught, unleashing abilities of their own, but they were outnumbered by close to 30 to 1. A few more soldiers died, giving their lives to save friends and buy precious moments for others to regroup, but sometimes that was the cost of war. In the end, the American soldiers won, killing the last of the elf attackers.
When it was all said and done, the First Sergeant spent a few minutes checking in with men up and down the line of vehicles. The wounded and dead were loaded into what space was available, and the convoy rolled on. When the ‘welcome to Fort Moore’ sigh came into view, the exhausted soldiers sent up a cheer. After almost 26 hours of nearly continuous fighting, Savage Company and their reinforcements had returned home. And they still had a home to return to.
Jennet knew that the real war had likely only just begun, and that there would be far more desperate times ahead, full of challenges and triumphs they couldn’t currently understand, but she did feel a sense of relief. Their efforts had secured the lives of 106 civilians, and kept the installations at Fort Moore operational. Only time would tell if her hard work and sacrifice was worth the cost.
*******
Lyndis Soto marched tiredly through the front gate of Fort Moore, the 5 men and woman from Jaws company trudging after her. She’d finally turned her comms back on half an hour ago, and knew that her company and commander had already returned. A special detail had been assigned to meet her and take over transporting the prisoner, for which Lyndis was thankful. The elf hadn’t said a word since surrendering, and honestly, she hadn’t bothered to ask any questions. That wasn’t really her job. Some lucky 35M Human Intelligence collector would ask the questions.
After turning over the prisoner, Lyndis and the other 5 exo-mecha pilots headed for Hanger 1, eager to get out of their exo-mecha and breathe some fresh air. The Captain and the First Sergeant were waiting to debrief them all on what’d happened since the attack first materialized. Lyndis knew Captain Miller had a whole debrief of his own planned, and the three members of Savage Company command would be sitting in on that briefing. After that, Lyndis would finally be able to take a shower and get some sleep. The level 5 quest was burning a bit of a hole in her figurative concentration, but she had a feeling a certain captain friend of hers might be willing to help her with that. For a time at least, she could finally breathe easy.