CHAPTER 14: GENESIS BEASTS

Bellator took a shaky breath before glancing around at his companion's eyes ending on Hiro, "Got any more of that lightning to throw around?" When she shook her head his look turned disdainful. The small amount of hope that had glimmered on his face disappeared. "What good is three gold concepts if you can't power them?" He muttered.

Moria shot him a look but Duffy was the one who came to her defense, "Your power reserves were not at their maximum when you first changed either Bellator. We don't even know what happened to her down there yet." They shook their head watching as the fire from the dragon breath was slowly put out by the moisture on the ground. The beasts resumed their rush toward them. "This is not good. Natia, get back to the ship, and be ready for an 'S' maneuver."

Ghram shot him a startled look but didn't say anything as she turned her flight to the ship. His countenance turned grave as the creatures came. He drew a pistol from his pack. "I'm not going to be good for a lot of restoration," he told Duffy who just nodded in response.

This battle started very differently from the last. Natia had slowed the charge of spider-goat centaurs, but it wasn't enough. They swarmed around them. Duffy had set their gun on a wide scattered shot and could hit several at once, but there were at least one hundred in the horde that had pushed through the fire. Moria used one hand to keep a hold of the orb while the other made water shields to deflect bullets and lasers away from her team.

Ghram shot anything that got past Bellator and Duffy. Bellator did the most work. His sweeping blades of wind had not been very effective against the giant Bison, but they were highly effective against the small horde. He pushed them back again and again, each time several would not get up again as they got sliced by the primary attacks.

In the end, it was a losing battle. There were too many of the creatures able to move at inhuman speeds to dodge attacks and avoid the main cuts of Bellator's wind blades. Plus the little monsters were tanky. Their fur protected them from many glancing blows. A group of twenty or so with rifle-looking weapons stood well back keeping pressure on Moria's shield-making abilities. Duffy had them slowly giving ground to the monsters bringing them closer to the ship.

Hiro was unable to contribute much. Her power had been spent and spun into the containment of the anomaly and into her own healing. She did her best to stay out of the way. She ended up standing behind Moira. Moving out of her way every time she turned or needed more space. She could feel the water clinging to them both and felt a faint connection to her through their earlier magic work. She could almost predict where Moria was going to move and was able to keep pace with her. Occasional flashes of blue and yellow on the ground where she stepped told her that her concept of precision was helping her out at least a little.

Hiro had the advantage of being behind the line of attack. She could watch the group's back. The rest were hard-pressed to deal with the creatures in front of them. So she was the one who spotted a group break out of the line of grass between their group and the ship. The wings had begun to hum but Natia had not taken off yet.

The group had retreated closer to the ship. Giving ground to the massive hoard and making them jump and crawl over the bodies of their comrades. The edge of uncut grasses was therefore close. Hiro shouted a warning, "BEHIND US!" She struggled to call up her armor and weapon but the light inside her refused to show itself. With the storm banished she had begun to absorb some of its rays while they had been standing around waiting for Natia. She felt the weak energy but ultimately she wasn't the one to respond to the newest threat as she had hoped.

Duffy immediately switched targets from the flank and Bellator swung his sword wider to compensate. The group of fifty behind them rushed from the grasses in their surprise attack. They ran and then used their goat legs to leap high at the group. Their torsos swung their odd weapons. Thankfully none of them had projectile weapons. Their small group was now pressed from each side.

As the cleared area around the group shrank, the ship took off. The rear of it remained open. Duffy called out, "Be ready for the scoop!" Then he spared a glance at Hiro who was steadfastly mirroring Moria to stay within her protective water barriers. "We're going to have to jump. You ready?"

Hiro nodded privately thinking this was some action movie bullshit. Jumping into a flying plane was honestly the most normal thing that had happened all day. Well at least to video games and movies kind of normal. She prepared to move nonetheless. She would do her best.

The Dragonfly ship came near and a horn blew out across the prairie. The goat-spider centaurs surged forward with more ferocity than before. Over the horizon, a large flying fish appeared. It looked like a sucker fish and a puffer fish had a baby and then dressed itself up in lionfish spines that acted like wings. It was speedy, faster than their ship. It was blown up like it was full of air, puffer spines out.

It undulated in the air while the mutated centaurs rushed them no longer caring about casualties or tactics. With the uptick in the battle's tempo Hiro's group could no longer keep up. The lines of battle shrunk yet again. First Ghram went down. He was screaming in the swarm of monsters, Moria shooting water to blast some off and create a stable barrier to keep him from being overwhelmed.

Bellator switched from area control to try to help him. His maneuvers backfired, allowing a surge through their defenses. The monsters started climbing the big man pulling him down as well. Moria shot another barrier of water out to keep some of the monsters off him. She was sweating trying to maintain the barriers rather than throw them up when needed.

Next, Duffy went down as they had a free shot at his back now Moria was more focused on keeping their downed party members alive. She sent a third barrier over Duffy then screamed as the water surrounding her and Hiro shot out and made a final barrier around the pair of them keeping the monsters at bay. Hiro could still see their fellows moving and fighting even from the ground even as the press of monsters kept them from getting up.

Moria was grunting, strained by holding so many barriers, reaching her limit. Hiro didn't know what to do. Standing helplessly behind her as both the chimera fish and the Dragonfly ship approached. She put a hand on Moria's back and sent her as much power as she could. Moria drank it up as fast as she pumped it out of her. The water bubble surrounding them kept the monsters from getting to them. Every attack was swept away in the current she created around. It shrunk by the minute.

The sucker-puffer-lionfish chimera arrived at the same time their dragonfly ship did. Their ship immediately began to beam down lasers blasting the monsters on the ground. The ship tried to hit the fish too but a barrier prevented it from taking any damage. For a moment the arrival of the ship looked like a turning point. Its blasts even freed Ghram allowing him to struggle back to his feet amid the blasts and hastily retreat to the bubble Moria still held.

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Then the sucker-like mouth of the massive fish opened and a stream of flying sharks flowed out as it deflated. They were sharks, with flying fish wings but moved as if they could swim in the air. Most of them headed to the dragonfly ship. They did little damage but forced it to switch targets to keep them from getting in the open bay waiting to scoop the group.

Curses streamed from a bleeding Ghram. as he did his best to support Moria and help take some heat off the two still pinned down on the ground. He laid one hand on Moria to send her more power while shooting at the ones trying to break through the barriers that kept the pair on the ground from getting completely swamped.

Hiro had dropped the idea of summoning armor and instead tried to summon a sword or dagger. She had no confidence in summoning a bow and arrows. She didn't want to count on maintaining the light that she was no longer touching. Nothing she tried worked. She had spent hours to get the swimsuit to appear. In the heat of battle, she didn't have the control she needed. She was sending all her water power to Moria.

She was about to see what she could do with magnetism when a massive wave of green light spread from the chimera fish. All of the monsters seemed to freeze as the light touched them. The two still down on the ground struggled upright through the frozen monsters. Blasting the goat spiders back, they didn't resist. They were flung away like ragdolls.

A feminine voice rang out over the silence. "Now my pets, what is the hold up?" A humanoid figure had appeared before the now deflated chimera fish. She looked vaguely like a human in proportion, but she had light tan fur and claws at the end of her hands. Her face held golden eyes that reminded Hiro of a bird of prey. Her ears were long and looked akin to bat ears, but they matched the color of her hair and fur. She was dressed in a long green dress open in the back to reveal wings moving as fast as a hummingbird. Clawed hand-like feet poked out from below the dress.

Her golden eyes settled on each of the teams in turn. They lingered on Hiro for a moment longer than the rest before she settled her gaze on Moria. "If you want a job done right, you have to do it yourself." She sighed as if greatly put upon. "My creations are marvelous, but they are still babies. I thought they could handle a tired group of Sparks on their own. But alas. I must assist my creations." She began to float down toward them. Slowly. The sharks circled the ship above but even the sky had paused its massive battle.

Bellator and Duffy moved through the throng to stand in front of Moria and the rest. Both were in a defensive position. They were covered in cuts and injuries, bleeding from multiple wounds. Hiro was surprised they were standing. If a human back home had some of their wounds they would be in the ICU.

The beast woman paused feet level with their heads a few lengths back. She looked down at them imperiously. "I suspect you know who I am and what I'm here for?"

Duffy spat some blood on the ground before replying, "You are Genisis and you're here for the anomaly. We have standing orders to arrest you and bring you into Headquarters. You have broken the Spark accords and I will happily accept your surrender." Hiro's eyebrows raised. What a line.

The beast lady hadn't expected this response and laughed, "Well look at the," she tilted her head, "gonads on you." She smiled fangs revealed in her face. "If you play your cards right you could even come join the winning side." Her face went serious, "But I need that anomaly. Give it to me and I'll consider leaving your little group alive. I'll even give you all the opportunity to come with me and become useful. If not, I always have other uses for Sparks alive or dead." She stretched out her hand and the orb above Moria's hand tried to jump out of her hand. Moria's control caused it to spring back.

Bellator was clearly affected by her words. first going white then his face grew angry and red. Duffy moved in front of him, pushing Bellator behind him. "None of us want to become your playthings Genisis. What guarantee do I have that if we give this to you you won't just kill us or take us anyway? Let us get on our ship then we can talk."

"You can't possibly be considering this!" Bellator finally snapped. Duffy shot him a warning look as the woman laughed again.

"Of course they are!" she before pointing at Hiro, "You have a new powerful Spark with an annoying translator device with you, one of the most promising healers of the generation," She pointed at Ghram, before switching her focus to Bellator, "and we mustn't forget you young heir. You look shockingly like your sister you know. Well... not anymore. She looks very different now."

Bellator broke ranks screaming and leaped up at her. He swung his massive blade in a powerful strike. The woman in front of them simply raised her hand and all the wind energy was absorbed into her hand before she blasted it back at him in a wave of green energy she had sent out before. Growths appeared all over Bellator's skin as the energy swept through him entering all his cuts. He hung in the air as the beast woman's hands began to move and bones cracked and shifted under his skin. He screamed as she continued to shift his bones and skin as Duffy yelled at her.

"STOP PLEASE STOP! We'll give you the orb! Just don't warp him!" Duffy was panicked as they tried to use their body to block Genisis's view of Bellator. The gruesome sounds paused. Bellator also stopped screaming as he passed out.

"Now you seem more reasonable than this young man. Really, a silver attacking a platinum. Laughable at best. Suicide at worst." She sighed and let Bellator's body drop to the ground. Ghram ran forward and started working on him. "Here's my proposal. I'm not unreasonable after all. I'll let all but one of your little group get on the ship and fly away. Then whoever is left holding the orb comes with me. Truly I only need the anomaly, but you've annoyed me and I could use a new spark to help in my next experiment. Besides, I need some recompense for how many of my pets you killed." She gestured to the wide field.

"We could just fight you until we die or backup arrives!" Moria exclaimed with Duffy shooting her a look.

"Yes, you could, but I would win, even if all my lovelies died, you'd be no match for me. Plus I don't like wasting the lives of my creations or future creations. I'm Genisis dear, I create life. Death, however, now he's the true monster."

"You're just scared he'd be with the response team!" Moria shouted back.

"Oh, I'm sure he will be, but you are mistaken, I have not feared death for some time. It will just complicate matters and I wish to avoid that."

Hiro noticed the gem behind Duffy's ear had been flashing nonstop. Even catching them subvocalizing a few times during Genisis's speech. They turned to the group. "I'll do it." Duffy turned to the team and held out a hand. Their gun morphed into a gauntlet wrapped around their open hand.

Their leader stepped back to the group and used their uncovered hand to reach out and turn off Hiro's translator. It had happily been ruining the tone of the stand-off as it informed Hiro of what was being said. With it silenced they leaned forward and whispered something to Moria. Hiro saw the light behind Duffy's ear flickering like crazy as the AI within was saying or doing something. When they were done, she nodded while giving Duffy a worried look. They reached out and gently took the sphere of water and magic containing the anomaly.

Power crackled into the gauntlet. Veins of blue light crept up Duffy's arms like lines like a circuit board the light seeping out from under the gauntlet as they pushed a force shield of power around the anomaly. It captured everything within, but as Moria pulled her hand away the water splashed to the bottom of the sphere and the lightning pinged around. Duffy struggled to contain it the cuircut veins moving further up their arm until it ran up their neck. Water dripped away slowly from their gauntleted hand. The circuitry within the gauntlet glowed with an increase in power from the electricity.

As soon as she was free from the orb Moria bent down and lifted Bellator over her shoulder. Her slight frame looked ridiculous as she hefted the much bigger man. She wrapped Hiro and Ghram up with a rope of water. Then she pushed herself off the ground with a burst of water. Flying in the air until all four of them were clear of the mob. Landing hard on the open gangway of the ship.

It began closing rolling them further in while turning. She could just make out Duffy standing below holding the pulsing orb. Genesis flew forward saying something. Moria, Ghram, and Hiro worked together to get Bellator inside. Ghram flipped down several seats to make a stretcher-like surface and Moria and Hiro got Bellator on it and strapped well enough not to go rolling off.

Silence descended among the party as Natia took off at full speed.