New Mexico, Spring, 2055
It was the sort of small, one dusty road through the center town that was common in the southwestern desert.
New Mexico.
That was the name of the old American state it was located in.
As for the town?
Its name was lost along with the green road sign torn apart by claws and rotted by rust.
Alin would’ve had to look on the map because he couldn’t remember it at the moment.
Not that it mattered the place had been long abandoned, likely dating back to the early years post-spires according to the information they had gathered from the population of another small, dusty town many kilometers to the west.
“Say, Boy?” Chrome sat in the opened cockpit of her golem.
“Huh?”
“How come your dad’s tech doesn’t measure distances in miles, like the road signs?”
“Because it’s dumb.”
“Good point.”
He continued to scan the town through binoculars.
Ancient tech, but brand new from a sporting goods store in Vegas.
It was terrible.
Unintuitive.
The glass got dust and dirt on it.
Even his eyelashes left scratches and residue.
He missed his power armor.
Cybernetics functioned at the speed of thought.
Now, he had to manually adjust a stupid knob.
“Mutated rattlesnake inbound on our position.” Kat’s voice came in on the radio.
Another piece of ancient tech.
Static and crackle.
They had practiced, but he still had to strain to catch everything.
He suppressed a shudder.
Snakes were his greatest fear.
Heights had been his other one, but he had conquered that a long time ago.
Oddly enough, those had also been his dad’s big phobias.
“Anything coming up on us?” He continued to scan the empty town.
“Nothing on sensors,” Chrome said. “Hey! You guys seeing anything coming?”
A dozen meters behind them the pickup truck filled with other Mist Spekters watched their backs, guarding against dangerous wildlife and monsters.
Brittney had mage eyes roaming their surroundings, but kept them well away from the town lest she spook their quarry.
The mage was one of the few Mist Spekters that hadn’t become rangers.
In her case, she hadn’t even tried.
Understandable considering her past history, to put it mildly.
Alin wouldn’t have chosen her or Michael, but his dad had, so that meant it was good enough for him despite his personal feelings of animosity on behalf of Chandra and the rangers on the wall because of the former Meat Parade flesheaters.
For obvious reasons, only he knew the full truth.
Galen had a partial picture as the company’s captain.
Brittney and Michael wanted to make amends beyond serving as wardens in his dad’s rehabilitation prison.
He supposed that showed that his dad’s efforts had worked.
The risk was greater for them without access to Captain Mouthy’s safety net.
“I don’t detect any threats, Chrome,” Brittney said. Her sonorous voice carried across the still air.
Alin shifted.
Prone position meant his Threnium chest and back plate poked in ways he was unfamiliar with.
No amount of practice in mindscapes and reality could take away the discomfort.
His one consolation was the Threnosh onesie underneath it all kept him dry.
“That looks uncomfortable,” Chrome said.
“Says the person with the open cockpit.”
“It gets hot in there without the AC and I can’t run it if I’m in a combat situation because I had to switch out to an inferior power source.”
A complaint she had repeated several times.
Fair, he supposed.
Springtime in the southwest meant sunny days, which meant hot temps in the open landscape.
The wild flowers and greenery were already drying and dying, slowly turning everything into shades of brown.
“At least it’s cold at night,” she grumbled.
“One upside to your magitech steam generator.”
“Observers, sound off.” Galen’s voice crackled from the radio.
Alin waited for his assigned turn as the others chimed in with negatives.
Just like him.
Nothing through the binoculars.
Which meant—
“Alin, you’re up,” Galen said.
“Copy. Moving closer.”
Chrome ducked into her golem’s cockpit.
The top hatch, which doubled as a shield slammed shut with a soft hiss.
Steam belched from two exhaust ports on the lower back of the ovoid torso.
The unfortunate placement was a great source of entertainment for the Mist Spekters.
“Slow and quiet, please.”
Chrome sighed. “Copy that.”
Bipedal legs ended in wide feet with splayed toes.
The golem had tank-like treads on the back of its lower legs that could slide into place for faster movement, but stealth was in order at the moment.
Though, how stealthy could a 1-ton hunk of metal, grinding gears and belching steam be?
Fortunate that their targets weren’t morning people.
Not to mention how complacent their targets were thanks to how easy the marauding had been lately.
Alin pulled an ancient AK-74 from his bag of holding.
Inferior in every way to the Threnosh recoilless rifle, but necessary to maintain the cover story.
He had an entire bag of holding filled with just spare magazines, yet he still had less than a tenth of the ammunition compared to his old standard loadout.
That wasn’t the worst of it, despite plenty of practice there was no way he was going to approach the accuracy he had with the integrated targeting system.
An ancient red dot sight was a poor substitute.
Chrome’s golem left deep prints in the ground as it crunched dry grass and dirt.
He took care not to trip as he followed behind her at just enough distance to maintain cover and avoid getting scalded by the periodic steam farts.
“Sensors picking up heat and movement underground. Small. Probably animals. Maybe snakes. You want to hop on?”
“No thanks.”
“Sure, sure. If you get spooked, I’ll turn around so you can jump into my arms. You’re not in sealed armor. If you aren’t careful a snake could slither right up your pants.”
“Tucked into my boots, thank you.”
A thousand meters took longer to cross when walking.
Once again, he missed his power armor.
“Hold up.”
A few hundred meters out from the dusty town.
Old buildings looked in pretty good shape for having been abandoned decades ago.
The spires kept them in the state they had been back then to use as encounter challenges or spawn zones.
The easiest way to find the marauders was to simply walk up to a building and look up its ownership details. Naturally, that didn’t account for the occupants seeing you coming and shooting you.
He had a better way.
The gray billowed out from the openings in his helmet.
That was another adjustment.
It really hampered his vision and breathing, but that was the trade off wasn’t it?
Ease of wear weighed against the level of protection.
He was looking forward to the day when he could purchase an open-faced helmet enchanted to provide the protection of a full-faced helmet.
Couldn’t do it right away.
Had to maintain the cover story.
Then again, he did have magic shield charms, so maybe a full-faced helmet wasn’t really necessary?
The gray swept through the western edge of the town quickly.
The town widened from the point the interstate entered it.
Galen and the command staff thought that the marauders were likely to claim buildings that provided them with what they needed.
So, motel, gas station, auto repair shop and food place.
The western end and eastern end.
One could find all those buildings clustered in those two locations.
Alin pushed into the buildings in the western end.
They weren’t high level enough to stop him.
“West buildings are empty. Just weak encounter challenges.”
“Understood, keep pushing through. We’ll tighten the noose,” Galen said.
It was a narrow town, not more than a few hundred meters on either side of the one road at its widest point, which meant he could cover the entire width with the gray without difficulty.
He followed Chrome as she tromped her golem through dusty, cracked asphalt of long-abandoned roads and narrow alleys.
They moved using building corners and rusted cars as cover.
“Oh! Got something. Zooming in. Yup. Barricades!” Chrome said.
“Give me a sec.” Alin pulled binoculars out.
Chrome was right.
Rusted vehicles and random detritus, including pieces of chain-link fencing topped with barbed wire, had been used to partially block access to the cluster of desirable buildings on the eastern edge of town.
Odd that the barricades had only been placed facing the inside of the town such that they hadn’t been able to spot them from outside.
“I’ve got eyes on barricades.” He took out a map, paper, and quickly radioed which buildings were protected. Not for the first time he wondered if they could arrange a fake battle with one of his dad’s teams or the rangers in which the Mist Spekters could get away with a few pieces of gear.
“Proceed as planned,” Galen said.
“Do we need to get closer?” Chrome said.
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
“No, this is fine.”
He pushed the gray toward the occupied buildings.
“Dude, these ‘Night Riders’ are just dumb,” Chrome said. “I’m not seeing any sentries. Are they all sleeping?”
“Well, they do only come out at night.”
Fortunately, that wasn’t for any sort of supernatural or horrific reason.
They were the standard Earthian motorcycle riding marauders.
Less standard was how they were plying their marauding across the southwest with secret backing from the old American government.
Well, not so secret when his dad existed.
He poked and prodded at the buildings.
Ownership felt like over Level 40.
Two, maybe three people.
Not enough to keep him out.
The only question was how fast they’d notice a breach.
No additional magical protections, nor Skills.
He pushed gray tendrils through gaps in doors and window screens until the entire motel was filled with the gray.
Men slept.
A few lounged in common areas or rooms, playing cards and throwing knives or axes at crudely-drawn targets on the walls.
The Night Riders hadn’t taken anyone from the town to the west.
They had ridden in, beaten up some people and smashed windows as an introduction.
The terror would only ramp up over the following nights.
Normally, the marauders would’ve been already dealt with by a skyship or his dad’s teams.
Leaving them to the Mist Spekters was an opportunity to build their reputation with what was essentially an easy starter quest.
One made trivial by the gray.
Men asleep would stay that way as he drained them of their energy.
Those awake went to sleep.
Only the Level 40’s stirred or fought.
They staggered and stumbled around for 5 minutes as he slowly drained them of their vitality.
One reached for a small flask of glowing liquid on a bed table but had his hand slapped away by a ghostly figure hidden in the swirling gray.
“And they’re done.”
“Aww…” Chrome huffed. “I didn’t even get to do anything.”
“You were a good meat shield.” He knocked on the side of her golem’s armor-plated leg.
“Alright, good job, Alin. Keep them out. Moving in to secure,” Galen said.
Half an hour later the 20-odd Night Riders were snoring in the parking lot in the shade provide by the motel.
They were bound and cuffed.
A handful had been wrapped up with heavy-duty chains taken from the hardware store.
They bulged with grotesque muscles, veins shifted underneath their skin like fat worms.
“So, that’s what supersoldier serum looks like in person,” Steph said.
“Don’t even think about it,” Luzi said.
“Not even a little? Like, a sip?”
Alin decided to squash the gleam in his gladiator friend’s eyes. “It doesn’t work that way. You have to finish the program. Depends on how good the alchemist is and the quality of the base ingredients, but it takes many drinks over weeks of pain-filled growth and other changes.”
“Superstrong muscles means shit if your bones and tendons don’t change too,” Luzi said.
“Right, and your organs too, in order to deal with the demands. Even with all the improvements, your body can’t really handle it for long. It depends on when you go through the process, but it’ll typically cut 20 to 40 years off your natural lifespan. The old government moved away from making alchemical supersoldiers when the animal hybridization garbage proved to be an improvement in every way. They started handing the serum out to groups like these losers to get them to do their dirty work for cheap.”
It was a simple racket dating back to time immemorial.
The old government secretly backed marauder types to terrorize communities in order to push them back into the old American fold while at the same time creating hundreds of little fires all across the land for his dad to deal with.
Unfortunately, for the old government they continually underestimated what his dad was capable of.
Not to mention the rangers’ skyships.
Said little fires, tended to get stomped out before growing any bigger.
It wouldn’t be long before the old government would be forced to move up the ladder of escalation, which was always dangerous for everyone involved.
They must be very frustrated that they weren’t being allowed to wage the war they wanted in the way they wanted.
Hopefully, that frustration wouldn’t boil over into stupid before he found the main ritual site.
A whistle drew his attention.
Alana beckoned him over.
The mist mage was part of the command staff.
A former Golden Eagle, now a Mist Spekter, while technically being a Rayna’s Ranger.
Dark-haired and fair-skinned she had been constantly surrounded by a thin layer of cooling mist whenever out in the heat of the sun.
“I’m keeping them fogged up,” he nodded down to the unconscious prisoners, “but don’t relax.”
“Aye, aye, Lt. Alin.” Steph saluted.
He left his friends and the others standing guard over the marauders to join Alana and Galen underneath the shadow of a palm tree.
Strange that the lone tree had remained all this time.
What stories could it tell?
Maybe he could ask one of the druids or green mages.
“Captain,” he saluted.
Galen almost rolled his eyes.
Old habits were hard to break while new ones were hard to start.
“At ease,” Galen said. “How long can you keep the Level 40’s under?”
“Hard to say without knowing their full Skills or spells. But, it doesn’t matter.”
What remained unsaid was that they were being watched.
By the satellites and a lurking skyship that would shadow them nearly constantly until they got closer to the heart of enemy territory.
“The reason I ask is that I’m thinking of leaving their gear and motorcycles for the town. It’d be a generous thing for the Mist Spekters to do,” Galen said.
“Plus, they don’t have anything worth keeping. Aside for the supersoldier serum,” Alana said. “Some of it looks new. Temporary, but with a significantly more powerful boost. At least that’s what we’ve been able to initially appraise.” She sighed. “We’ve already put them up for auction.” Her eyes drifted to the nearby spire, gleaming iridescent in the bright sun.
“I think you can keep one for study, if you want.”
Unless his dad already bought them all at a huge mark up.
That was one of the ways they were going to get funneled Universal Points without generating suspicion.
“Just the motorcycles would be really valuable for the town,” Galen continued.
“We can’t be too generous.”
That would be suspicious for a fairly new mercenary group, adventuring band, whatever, without an obviously wealthy backer.
Their current level of equipment and supplies had been carefully considered to fit their cover story.
“True, but I believe I can negotiate a clause that will give us a percentage of the price if they decide to sell some of the haul we’re so generously giving them,” Galen said.
“That sounds good.” He shrugged.
“So, we head on back to town, collect the bounty from the people, the Quest rewards from the spires and move on tomorrow?” Galen said. “It’ll give us a chance to build the rep we want plus get future references and testimonials for our page.”
“Roaming murderhobos tend to cause chaos in the places they visit,” Alana said. “We’ll stand out by not being like that.”
“It is our ethos after all, pure professionalism,” Galen said. “We’ll head back soon. We found a few trailers we can use to carry the motorcycles.”
“I’ll stay here to keep them asleep.”
He didn’t know the details, but his dad was going to take care of the Night Riders.
If he had to guess, his dad had already reached out to the other, dry, dusty desert town.
He hoped the people would listen and take the offer to move to a safer place.
The projected outcomes for isolated settlements like them weren’t good past a certain point of escalation from the demigod-puppeted old American government.
The rabbit people they had in secret could become the stuff of nightmares if they ever decided to use them for more than sacrificial fuel.
----------------------------------------
Salt Lake City, Spring 2055
Technically, beneath the city.
A warren of tunnels that ran deep and sprawling.
Some of it had been in place pre-spires, but most had been created by the spires.
A dungeon of reddish rock with a taste of salt in the air thanks to seepage from the eponymous lake to the north and west.
‘Warren’ was, perhaps, a description that was too apt.
For the demigod had turned it into a secret breeding ground for the rabbit people.
Their thoughts were simple.
Dominated by three things.
Eat, breed and kill.
The lines between what were acceptable targets for each blurred in a way that was enough to make a man vomit.
Viewing their ancestral memories once had been more than enough.
He killed them all with a thought.
Thousands of minds turned off in an instant.
The bodies followed quickly as double hearts shut down and quad lungs emptied.
The people of the city above weren’t allies.
Neither his, nor the old American government’s.
Hence, why Suiteonmeiades had planted a warren beneath them.
It was as far west as the demigod had dared expand war operations.
That was the difference between him and them.
Allies or not, he wasn’t going to allow a horde of murderous rabbit-like humanoids to rise up and devour people.
Nor was he going to do something so crass as to charge them for the aid.
He continued his stroll down the dimly-lit tunnels.
One task finished.
A few people remained.
Thoughts grew frantic as they finally noticed.
American soldiers and pantheon-provided automatons that were much more than advertised.
For one thing, the automatons had biological brains.
Sapient.
Some human from other worlds judging by the memories locked behind a metaphysical cage made out of an esoteric mix of enchanted machinery and magic spells.
The bars were made out of Threnium if he was to make a physical comparison.
Gears whirred and clanked.
Enchanted hearts akin to engines fired.
Automatons marched through the warren under thoughts more independent than the demigod had led the Americans to believe.
The soldiers reacted with confusion.
“Who ordered this!” Captain Dustin Moore snapped.
He had been under the impression that he had priority command over the automatons.
Paranoid thoughts filled his head without an additional push.
Demigod pulling a coup? Or the spooks? Can’t be anything I’ve done? Can it? I always follow orders.
One by one he dismissed them until falling on the last.
Enemy action.
“It’s the rabbits!”
“They’re dying!”
“Requesting back up!”
Frantic calls poured in over the radio.
Captain Moore cursed.
He had expressed slight displeasure with the disposition of the soldiers under his command.
Either too green or useless rejects.
Paranoia crept in again.
Someone has it out for me. That’s the only possible reason I got saddled with this job in the first place. Out of sight, out of mind. It almost doesn’t matter how I do. I won’t get the right notice and credit. Fucking backstabbing—? Who? Ramirez’s dad was on the planning committee for this op. Next promotion was between him and me… or Dalberg. He’s on the list, but he doesn’t have connections like me. Shit!
“Tell them to stay put and assume defensive posture!” he snapped at the radio operator.
The words went down the wires.
Only way to maintain contact through tons of stone and earth when command hadn’t allocated him any of the superior communication crystals.
They really want me to fuck this up.
“Send another squad to the portal room.”
One way emergency evacuation.
The demigod would have to personally open another one to get a team back.
One he would definitely not be leading.
His orders hadn’t specifically prohibited the use of the emergency evac, but he had read between the lines.
Only evac if I’m looking at a fate worse than death.
He was weighing his next moves when the lights in his head shut off in an instant.
“Captain?” Corporal Jeff Ellis said.
The young man heard the thud and turned to see Captain Moore laying flat on the dusty reddish floor.
He didn’t have a chance to utter a word before he too, went dark. His head thumped on the table once before he slid bonelessly out of his chair.
One by one the other soldiers crumpled to the ground.
Cal stepped into the command chamber and took a moment to plant a simple thought into the soldiers’ heads.
As soon as they woke up they were to walk to the surface, unarmed, to surrender and confess to their activities.
It would be quite a shock to the people of Salt Lake City to learn of what the old government was up to beneath their feet without their knowledge.
A potential disaster averted and animosity furthered.
He’d reach out again in a few weeks.
They would refuse, not that he was keen on a close alliance.
The difference between his morality and ethics to theirs would always be too wide a gap to easily bridge.
Honestly, it came down to two things for him.
He believed that polygamy was fine if between consenting adults. He also believed that the age of consent should definitely not be in the teens.
For their part, they remained sore over the free and easy immigration service.
A request was as easy as an Omninet or spires message away.
They could control the latter by keeping guards around the spires in their territory.
They couldn’t stop the former because no matter how many times the leadership confiscated phones and tablets from the most vulnerable, they somehow kept getting their hands on them.
He strolled down a short tunnel, passing sleeping soldiers.
The automatons were on high-alert now.
Brains whirring in an attempt to diagnose the threat.
Two stood guard at the portal room’s open doorway.
They simply failed to notice his approach.
He considered their situation for a moment.
It was truly horrific.
Sapient brains placed inside metal bodies.
All physical sensations forever removed.
The only pleasure they could feel was from orders properly executed.
Some had chosen it.
Most had not.
They deserved the right to choose.
But first…
The portal chamber was the other reason he had come to this place.
Admittedly, it was a long shot, like sinking a three-pointer from the opposite side of the court.
The portal was a large brass wheel set between two brass posts.
He had to admit that it presented a more impressive look than the portal stones his side used.
Like standing in front of a fine art sculpture in a museum.
A control panel on the right pole beckoned.
Simple.
Just a single button.
A large, lustrous ruby.
He pressed it.
The wheel spun.
Golden light started as a pinprick in the center, but quickly widened until it was the same size as the wheel.
There were two likely outcomes as discussed with Ms. Teacher and the magic users on his team.
Since the other end of the portal was somewhere in D.C. according to the information he pulled from American brains he would either be unable to enter it or he’d be able, but then be shunted outside of D.C. territorial lines.
Unlike the portal stones he couldn’t see anything on the other side.
Just a flat, opaque golden circle glowing brightly.
He reached out and stopped.
“Yup.”
Just like the invisible boundaries around old American-controlled territory.
There was no sensation.
He simply couldn’t move past it.
“Good to know.”
He regarded the automatons standing guard outside the open doorway.
“Hello. Let’s make a deal.”