Now, Earth
Remy sprinted faster than a cheetah over neglected farm fields to the south. Nila’s call had been brief. His mind was awash with concern over his wife and children. He had a feeling that Nila had been downplaying Megan’s injuries. He wanted to run straight to them, but cursed responsibility thrust another unfair burden on his shoulders.
Nila had said that the fishmen had taken at least a few dozen women and girls. They slipped some kind of organic breathing apparatus and took them into the river. It was Nila’s opinion that they were taking them down the river all the way to the bay.
It was a logical conclusion that Remy had no reason to oppose. The problem was how to stop them and save the people. He only had minutes to decide on a plan. It might’ve been too late already. He had no idea how fast the fishmen could swim. If they were anything like Aquaman then they were long gone. He was hoping that wasn’t the case. Hopefully their human cargo would slow them down.
Remy’s problem was that there were two, maybe three ways that the fishmen could go. The deep water ship channel was the narrowest water way and it was the closest to his current position. The Sacramento River wound its way south further to the east and even split a couple of times before converging, along with the channel a little north of Rio Vista. The river widened at that point and he had no way of setting up some kind of interdiction.
He decided to put his hopes on the channel. It was the narrowest by far and he had some ideas on how to block it off. It was also the most direct route. The fishmen would favor the fastest way out to the bay, wouldn’t they?
Remy’s plan hinged on one thing. He needed ships and boats in the channel. Without them there wasn’t much he was going to be able to do.
The walkie-talkie at his belt crackled. “Cruces, we’re mobilizing. Let us know where you need us. Use the flares if we lose communications.” Officer Lawrence’s voice.
The watch would come to lend aid, but Remy wasn’t going to count on them. The fishmen were the most dangerous things they had yet to face.
Remy covered roughly ten miles in less than ten minutes. He reached the channel and saw nothing out of place. The water seemed calm and placid. He spotted several boats and even one large bulk carrier ship scattered over a couple of miles. A stroke of luck. He ran over to a long abandoned truck next to some farmland and ripped its hood off with his magnetic power. He flipped it over and stepped onto the hood.
Remy took a deep breath. He was about to tax his powers beyond anything he had ever tried before.
He rose into the sky beneath his metal magic carpet. While he flew toward the channel and the abandoned boats and one ship he created several magnetic fields.
The water was too calm. He hoped that he wasn’t too late. He wished that he was with his family instead of attempting to save a bunch of people that weren’t his responsibility.
Remy flew back and forth a couple of hundred feet above the channel as he collected every boat and ship within a mile north and south of his starting point. He peeled their hulls like cans and made a dam at a narrow point. It was a herculean task that had him out of breath. The channel was about thirty feet deep and two hundred feet wide. His metal wall rose about ten feet above the channel’s surface.
He had found several fishing nets so he created small holes in the wall that led into a net as a trap. It was strange working with things that he couldn’t see beneath the water’s surface. He had to go by the feel of the metal. His active magnetic fields functioned as a sort of radar when it came to metal objects. He knew exactly where they were and if they moved, he’d detect it.
Fifteen precious minutes passed while Remy worked. He rested the truck hood on top of his thin metal wall and waited. The minutes ticked away and he started to fear that he had been too late or that the fishmen had taken a different route.
He spotted the churning water several miles up the channel. Superior vision revealed dozens of fishmen swimming just below the water’s surface. They appeared to be carrying people lashed to their backs, like a sack of meat.
Remy grew angry. He grew angrier when he remembered that his family could’ve suffered the same fate. That his wife was hurt and he had no idea how badly.
The fatigue of building an impossible structure fell off of Remy’s shoulders. He loosed the chains around his arms and called forth the cloud of metal around him. He lifted up on top of the metal magic carpet and floated forward.
Oh, he almost forgot. He ignited a flare and sent it up to hang in the sky within its own magnetic field. It’d stay up much longer than normally. The watch wouldn’t miss it.
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“Mother mcfuck this shit!” Johnny said.
“Congratulations. That was the dumbest one, yet,” Mads said flatly.
“Quiet,” Gene said. “You’re making us look bad,” he whispered.
The watch pulled up as close as they could to the channel. Fortunately there was a dirt road that ran parallel so they were able to get within a couple of hundred yards of the impossible wall sticking several feet out of the waters surface.
The three trucks kicked up dirt as they braked and people got out.
“Do you think that wall extends all the way to the bottom?” Olo said.
“It has to right? Otherwise what’s the point,” Bastien said.
“Alright people let’s…” Officer Lawrence lost whatever she was about to say as her brain finally processed what she was seeing taking place over the water.
Remy Cruces floated above the river on what looked like a car hood. Metal debris orbited around him.
In the water below, fishmen surfaced to hurl javelins, which were blocked by the debris and the whirling chains that spun from the end of his hands.
“There,” Officer Lawrence pointed to the bank.
“Are the fishmen carrying… people?” Keisha said.
“Priority is to rescue them,” Officer Lawrence said.
The group of fishmen turned south in an attempt to get around Remy’s river wall. Remy sent a large sheet of metal stabbing into the soil in front of them. They turned west, in the direction of the watch.
“Cruces sent them our way. Stay tight. Tanks in front. Shooters stay with the trucks and wait for my signal.” Officer Lawrence moved with the forward group despite the fact that she was armed with an M4 Carbine.
“Crapcrapcrapcrap,” Olo muttered as they ran.
“C’mon man you’ve got this. All that digging and lifting has upped your strength and stamina. You’re stronger than the first time we fought a fishman. We’re all stronger,” Gene said.
“Yeah, but it doesn’t matter if we aren’t strong enough,” Bastien said.
The fishmen saw the watch coming. They turned back to the south. They were only fifty yards away.
“Magic users, don’t let them get away. Watch the people!” Officer Lawrence barked.
Gene raised his hand and aimed several yards in front of the fishmen. “Fireball!”
A small, burning orb was accompanied by a couple of others as it arced across the air. They exploded in front of the fishmen and showered them with dirt and rocks.
Officer Lawrence raised a hand and chopped it down toward the fishmen.
A loud bang dropped the furthest fishman. It lay still with the unconscious person still slung over its back.
More shots rang out and a couple fishmen dropped.
Officer Lawrence took a knee and started shooting.
The fishmen were pinned down so they did the only smart thing they could do. They used their captives as shields.
“Cease fire!” Officer Lawrence barked.
One fishman made the mistake of peaking an eye out from behind the little girl it was holding up as a shield.
Bang.
Its brain exploded out of its ruined eye socket.
“That was Mads,” Johnny nodded smugly.
“Tanks! Go, get their aggro! Everyone else stay close behind. Work together!”
Gene pounded Olo on the back of his steel plate. “We’re right behind you big guy.” He drew his longsword and readied a spell with his free hand.
Olo screamed when he got in range. “On me!”
The other tanks across the front line did the same with their taunts.
The closest fishmen dropped their human shields and charged. Some even forgot to draw their weapons.
Gunshots rang out and a few dropped full of holes. Others merely took a little damage.
Olo hunkered down behind his large, rectangular shield while he thrust out with his spear.
“Magic Missile!” Gene shot the small, purple orbs from his hand. They burned across the fishman’s face.
The distraction allowed Olo’s spear to take it in the chest. Scales like armor bent then gave way under the combined force of the fishman’s momentum and Olo’s 50% Enhanced Strength passive.
“Keep moving!” Keisha roared. The big woman struggled as a fishman charged into her shield. Her feet slid across the dirt as it pushed her back. “In The Zone!” She halted the slide and thrust aside the fishman with suddenly greater strength on top of her passive. She wielded a two-handed sledgehammer in one hand. The fishman darted with surprising quickness, but she crushed its head with a precise overhead smash.
Keisha charged into the fishmen. She blocked attacks with her shield and crushed limbs and joints with her hammer. She did everything with amazing quickness, power and precision. Her active skill granted her what every athlete desired. A complete awareness of what was going on around her along with the boost to all of her physical attributes. She had experienced it a few times back in her throwing days, but doing it in battle dwarfed that rush.
The watch followed in her wake as they scattered the fishmen formation. Her active didn’t last long and they had to take advantage.
“Bruh, you got to get to her level,” Johnny said appreciatively as he tapped Olo.
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Gene noticed the fishmen to the rear of their group were grabbing the discarded people and trying to escape.
“Officer Lawrence! They’re trying to get away!” Gene called out.
Officer Lawrence sighted her assault rifle before lowering it. “I don’t have a shot.”
The people were slung over the fishmen’s backs.
“Rogues! Slow them down!”
“Shit,” Johnny snapped. He took a deep breath and disappeared from notice along with the other rogues.
“Double shit,” Bastien said as he pointed to the river.
More fishmen had emerged and they were headed toward the watch. These weren’t carrying captives. They had their weapons out and their eyes burned with fury.
Officer Lawrence looked back to the trucks and waved her hand over her head in a circle.
“Grab who you can! We can’t take that many on!”
Gene’s eyes went to the handful of fishmen running away to the south. They were already a hundred yards away. Johnny and the other rogues were nowhere in sight. Although he supposed that was the point.
Gene felt a hand roughly push him forward.
“Standing around gets you killed. Get your head in it!” Officer Lawrence snapped.
Gene blinked and the fishmen pushed through their line.
Keisha’s active ran out and the sledgehammer suddenly looked heavy in her hand.
A fishman used its superior strength to slap aside Charlie’s shield and stab him in the side with a tooth-like sword.
Officer Lawrence hit the fishman with an accurate burst from her assault rifle as she charged. “I need a healer!” She dragged a screaming Charlie back.
“I’m here.” Bastien’s voice shook, but he knelt next to Charlie and laid a hand over the stab wound. Bastien whispered a long prayer as a faint glow surrounded his hand.
Officer Lawrence stood in front of the pair and squeezed off three round bursts at targets of opportunity.
“Some help!” Olo called.
Gene snapped out of it. His friend and teammate was fending off two fishmen. One with his shield and the other with his spear.
“Shield Bash!”
Olo caught one fishman by surprise and stunned it
The second fishman grabbed Olo’s spear and yanked it out of his hands.
Gene hit the fishman with barrage of magic missiles.
Olo pulled out his Glock and emptied the magazine into the fishman.
Gene dashed forward and stabbed his longsword into the stunned fishman. Its scales were like armor and resisted the sword point for a moment. Only for a moment.
Gene pushed the blade halfway in the fishman, twisted and withdrew out of the fishman’s weak retaliatory sword strike.
“You’ve got to work on your shooting,” Gene said.
The fishman Olo had shot only had three bullet holes in its chest.
“You wasted fourteen rounds.”
Olo flicked the slide release and holstered his pistol. He had only been assigned one magazine. It seemed for good reason. “Thanks for the help.” Olo’s eyes had a glazed look as he went to pick up his spear.
“Shit!” Gene pointed.
Keisha’s post-skill fatigue had finally caught up to her. A fishman battered her shield and knocked her to the ground. The other tanks drew what aggro they could from the rest of the fishmen.
Rebekah, Specialist Court, to Gene and the rest of the kids. Stepped up to the fishman about to stab Keisha and blasted it at point-blank range with her shotgun.
“Grab the people. We are falling back!” Officer Lawrence barked.
The fishmen reinforcements were getting closer. Remy was sending chunks of metal in an attempt to block them. It was slowing, but not stopping them.
“Mage Shield,” Gene said. A translucent, green buckler formed in his free hand. He shook his head. “You know when I bought this spell I pictured something different.”
“You probably need to level it up,” Olo said.
“Amber’s shield actually covers her whole body,” Gene griped. “Whatever, man, let’s go. We’ve got to help out.”
“I don’t see Johnny.”
“I think that’s the idea,” Gene shrugged.
Tanks and fighters tried to retreat while dragging unconscious women and girls away while Johnny and the rest of the rogues struck at the escaping fishmen.
Each fishman was burdened by at least two or more unconscious people they were trying to get to the river channel. Despite their low level superhuman strength the limp dead weight was awkward to carry and slowed them enough for the hidden rogues to catch up.
Johnny released the breath he had been holding the entire hundred plus yards it took to chase down the fishmen. He had to admit that all that hard labor had paid dividends to his stamina. He appeared right in front of a fishman. It blinked in surprise before Johnny shot it in the face with his Glock.
The other rogues did much the same. They appeared next to or behind the fishmen and shot, stabbed and sliced until all were dead and dying.
“Now what?” Johnny said as he looked at the unconscious people.
“I saw Officer Lawrence signaling the trucks. We guard these people until we get picked up.”
Johnny raised a brow at Officer Ron’s words. The man was the senior rogue on the watch even if he had mixed classes with Police Officer. Far be it for him to question the wisdom of having squishy, hit and hide types doing a protection quest. It wasn’t all bad. They were in the clear as far as the fishmen were concerned. The bastards were all over there fighting the others and not in Johnny’s space.
“Holy shit! Do you guys see that!”
Johnny followed the pointed finger to the channel. Something was swimming just below the water’s surface. It looked big and was moving fast. Headed right for Remy’s wall.
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Remy moved toward the eastern bank of the channel. The watch had shown up on the western side and were taking on the fishmen. He sent a few jagged sheets of metal to slow and herd the fishmen as they tried to get around his wall and back to the water.
Individual fishmen briefly surfaced to launch javelins at him. The metal objects along with his whirling chains blocked all of those attacks. His main problem was the other half of the fishmen group that made for the eastern side of the channel. If they made it around the wall and back into the channel then they were gone. Along with the poor people they had captured.
Remy surfed the sky on a metal magic carpet. He sent chains and other metallic debris scything at the fishmen’s legs. He tripped them up. The unconscious people tumbled and flopped across the mud and grass.
Remy winced. Hopefully they weren’t hurt too badly. Being limp probably helped with that. He hoped.
The strain of using his powers to such an extent grew. He felt the pressure building within his body. His head felt like it was in a vise.
A bone-like javelin somehow made it through his cloud of debris and pierced through the bottom of the truck hood right between his legs. It spurred him to hustle.
He swept over the scattered fishmen and the unconscious people. He created multiple magnetic fields to gather up the objects he had used to trip up the fishmen and sent them to gather the people.
Remy rose higher in the sky. Over a dozen people trailed him. They were borne aloft on chunks of metal, sheets and a pair of chains.
He floated back across the channel. He had to get the people to the watch so they could take them to safety.
The watch was in trouble. They were falling back from the fishmen reinforcements that had surged out of the river. Several watch members were down and some looked dead.
Remy couldn’t help, not while he was already maintaining several magnetic fields.
His arrival overhead drew the fishmen’s attention. They threw javelins, which weren’t able to penetrate his cloud.
The watch surged forward with the distraction. Tanks taunted while the rest attacked with melee weapons and guns. The shooters sniped targets when they could as a couple of watch members where desperately loading unconscious women and girls into the two trucks.
Remy deposited his precious cargo as gently as he could. He hovered above for a moment.
“Mads, there aren’t enough trucks for all these people,” Remy said. “I thought I saw three earlier?”
Mads’ shotgun barked and several hundred yards away a fishman’s head exploded.
Remy followed Mads’ sight line.
“They’re picking up those guys,” Mads said.
Remy saw the third truck in the distance. They too were desperately loading unconscious people. He saw Johnny waving frantically toward him and gesturing at the channel.
“Damn it,” Remy whispered.
There was something big and fast in the water. It was headed straight for the makeshift metal wall. Remy still had a handful of nets below the surface that he needed to pull out. Plus, he was certain that there were more fishmen with captives hiding underwater waiting for an opportunity to keep going.
Remy zoomed toward the river. He grit his teeth against the pressure around his head and pulled at the nets. He got them out just as the surge of water revealed an enormous, prehistoric-looking monster.
Plesiosaur? No, mosasaur? It looked pretty close to the one in that movie. Like a huge crocodile with fins. It had a big mouth filled with sword-like teeth and thick armor plate-like ridges all over its dark dorsal surface.
It crushed Remy’s wall.
He pulled the nets toward him at great speed. He saw that most of the nets contained a struggling fishman along with an unconscious person. He had no time for mercy or squeamishness. He sent jagged shards of metal into the fishmen before he gently deposited the nets near the trucks.
His sensitive hearing picked up powerful thwangs from bowstrings. He turned to the sounds and raised his arms to protect his face. He had missed the fishmen riding on the back of the giant monster. They had what resembled enormous crossbows, made out of coral or bone.
Remy didn’t care. He was preoccupied by the bone-like bolts sticking out of his arms and his stomach. He cursed. He was supposed to be mostly bulletproof. The fishmen’s crossbows had a lot power.
The fishmen reloaded their weapons, while several others carrying unconscious people on their backs swam around the giant monster toward freedom.
Remy dropped two large magnetic fields. One directly below over the group of fishmen killing the watch and one right on top of the giant monster’s back.
He sent the cloud of metal debris around him down to scour the fishmen and give the watch the opportunity to flee. While the jagged sheets of what was once the wall cut into the monster and its riders in a whirlwind.
Remy ignored the pain and flew after the fishmen and their captives. He was down to a pair of chains and his metal flying carpet.
The fishmen swam fast. Faster than a human could sprint. There were too many and Remy was flagging. He wasn’t going to be able to catch them all.
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Now, Threnosh World
Kynnro felt the hum from the anti-gravity generator of the small aerial transport. The temperature gauge showed that the temperature three hundred meters up in the night sky was cold. It was strange how her power armor allowed certain physical sensations through, while keeping harmful ones out. They felt the slight vibration along with the wind as it whistled through the open doors, but the near freezing temperature was nothing to them.
Kynnro checked the tactical map one last time. The first formation of cragant legionnaires neared a trap site.
“Take us into position,” they directed the pilot.
The transport banked as it descended.
Kynnro’s body pulled against the restraints. The only thing between them and a long fall were a handful of thin polymer straps. They weren’t concerned. They focused on their task.
Timing was crucial. The small transport lacked armor and wasn’t capable of withstanding more than a single cragant arrow or bolt. It relied on the darkness and its speed for protection.
As soon as they swooped down into range Kynnro reestablished their link to the explosive ash canisters they had placed in the area earlier.
They breathed a sigh of relief. They had done some testing, but they weren’t a hundred percent certain that it was even possible after over a week had passed.
The cragant’s formation moved into the kill zone.
None noticed the small Threnosh craft as it hovered less than a hundred meters above and slightly in front of them.
Kynnro triggered the canisters with a thought.
Ashen particles billowed out to cover a circular area roughly a hundred meters in diameter.
Kynnro waited a moment as the cloud spread out to engulf the majority of the cragant formation. The giant humanoids coughed and looked around in confusion as they inhaled the caustic and flammable particles.
A wrathful red light lanced at the cragants from above.
The explosion lit up the dark night to reveal the Threnosh transport streaking away into the night sky.
The cragants didn’t see them. Their eyes burned in the firestorm that clung to them and reached into their very lungs with flaming tendrils.
The probability of Rekkis 3671 and the other soldiers at the forward outpost surviving the upcoming battle rose with each cragant Kynnro took out of the fight. They desired to kill or incapacitate as much as possible.
“Head to site four next. Another group will reach it shortly,” Kynnro said.
They had prepared six such ambush sites. They had taken out all ten legionnaires at the first site if the overhead tactical view was accurate. A maximum of sixty cragants was the best case scenario. It was a fraction of the 2500 cragants marching to attack the fabrication facility.
Kynnro thought of the soldiers once again. They felt a strange feeling. It was a new thing one they didn’t recognize. They wordlessly recorded their sensations into their log. They would need to ask Honor for clarification in the future.