Now, Las Vegas
“I don’t get it,” Hayden swept a hand over the two dozen or so chained together grocery carts filled with raw meat, vegetables and other items.
“The bat people farm mushrooms, so they, presumably, are capable of digesting veggies. Although, I went heavy on the mushrooms just in case,” Cal said.
“That’s not what I meant and I’m pretty sure you know that,” her eyes narrowed.
“I’m playing diplomacy rather than murder hobo. They saw the worst of our kind with the Dread Paladin, so I’d like to provide the counter example to that. Hopefully, when they do eventually gain the ability to exit the encounter challenge they won’t be hostile to humanity in principle.”
“They’re invaders from another world. Here to take our land or something like that.”
“I’m seeing them more as refugees fleeing from even worse things that could be coming after them—”
“Well shit! All the more reason to not be friendly.”
“So, your plan is genocide?” Cal said mildly.
Hayden couldn’t keep the scowl from her face. However, she managed to stifle her instinctive answer and reflect on the many lectures from the last few months. “What you’re trying to do is to gain information about potential threats because you see the bat people as a lesser one compared to what drove them from their world. It makes sense because we gain nothing if we simply get rid of them all… at least right now.”
“And this,” Cal gestured to the carts, “costs me nothing, except for the time and effort it’ll take to fly it to the encounter challenge, which is largely negligible.”
“Not true,” Hayden turned to regard the Vegas strip a short distance away, “it’ll cut into your pool time.”
“A sacrifice I’m willing to make.”
“You sure you don’t want company?”
“Nah, go enjoy yourself. This’ll be the last guaranteed break and fun times before we head east.”
“After I take care of business stuff. I need to touch base with the Golden Eagles. See how things back in Texas have been,” Hayden walked to her motorcycle.
“Ugh,” Cal grimaced. “I’ll have to do that too, thanks for the reminder.”
“No problem,” Hayden grunted as she kicked the motorcycle to life. The engine’s high-pitched whine turned into a roar as she rocketed down the street.
The ride was over all too quickly.
She pulled up to the front of the Golden Eagle’s base in Vegas, the Mandalay Bay, and strode into the lobby.
The benefits of keeping their contract open and active meant she didn’t need specific permission.
A teenage boy she didn’t recognize waved at her from behind the front counter.
She walked over with a curt nod. “I’m—”
“You’re the MVS!” he said with wide-eyed awe.
Ledge, you bastard, she thought.
If he was around she was going to shock him until he pissed and shit himself.
“Hayden is my name and I’m meeting with Elliot.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he blanched, “I’ll let him know right away!”
The teenager disappeared into the back and Hayden sighed.
It wasn’t the poor kid’s fault.
She resolved to smile when he returned.
It didn’t work.
The kid practically shook with nerves as he gestured for her to follow him.
They walked through the maze-like warren of back offices in silence until Hayden decided to try again with the being nicer.
“So, I haven’t seen you around before. You’re new. What’s your name?”
“Yes, ma’am, I’m new, I mean, I’m Khalid, but I’m also new. I mean, I just arrive two weeks ago with the relief convoy.”
“You’re in Ledge’s group?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“That’s good. He’ll do his best to keep you alive.”
Khalid visibly swallowed a lump in his throat.
“That’s important, staying alive, you can’t level and get stronger if you’re dead.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Stop with the ma’am. I’m not that much older than you— how old are you anyway?”
“15, ma— Hayden.”
Hayden stifled a curse.
That was almost ten years younger than her.
Ma’am might be acceptable.
Was it?
The kid brought her to Elliot’s office.
“Thanks, Khalid.”
“No problem, ma— Hayden!”
She pushed through the closed door before he could knock.
“As insubordinate as always. Glad you haven’t been changed too much by your months with a supergod,” Elliot sighed.
“Nah, he’s just a guy. Why would that be enough to change me? No one’s changing me.” Hayden sat and propped her boots up on Elliot’s desk.
“Really?”
“What?” Hayden eyed him with a bland expression.
“Fine, whatever. Not like it’s my desk anyways. Been here for months and it still feels like I’m stealing a dead man’s office.”
“That’s cause that is exactly what you’re doing.”
“True, so, what do you want? I don’t have anything for you since I know you’re otherwise engaged.”
“Just looking for some news.”
“You’ll have to be more specific.”
“Did it stick?”
Hayden had been there when the mayor’s fighters tried to attack Cal when he had delivered a couple of ultimatums.
Tried, being the operative word.
Hundreds of men and women being held completely helpless in midair was quite the sight.
“I just got back a few weeks ago and you’ll be happy to hear that the mayor is sticking to the rules. A minimum, comfortable level of food, housing and other supplies that are no longer tied to the money.”
“What about the pervy bullshit?”
“You took the victims with you to California. As for it continuing, I can’t say for sure. The mayor made a decree that it’s all prohibited, but I’d suggest to Cal that he make a point to periodically check to make sure it isn’t going on. I don’t believe that rich pervs can hold themselves back forever.”
“It’s in their nature,” she agreed.
“Yeah, I don’t know why he didn’t just kill them. That’d be a good example for the rest.”
“He’s not a dictator.”
“Could’ve fooled me,” Elliot snorted.
“Is Ms. Daniels okay?”
“The girls’ orphanage mistress? Yeah, as far as I know. As part of our contract with Cal, we’ve got a few squads acting as security at both the girls’ and boys’ homes. That’s why I’m fairly sure that the grooming shit has been stopped… for now.”
“It better stay that way. Next time it might be me dealing with the pervs instead of Cal and I can promise that I won’t be merciful,” she growled
“Whoa!” Elliot held up his hands as he recoiled. “I’m with you on that. Please don’t shock me. I’ll look ridiculous with a fro.”
Hayden jolted with surprise.
A momentary lapse of control after all the practice and effort she had been doing over the past several months had her cursing herself.
“Anything else I should know about?” she spoke quickly to cover up her slip.
“Actually, I was going to discuss something with Cal, but maybe if you get a word in his ear to help me out?”
“Depends…”
“Scouts have spotted the Meat Parade moving.”
Hayden’s eyes grew flinty. “How big? Are they headed toward San Antonio?”
“That’s a bad news, good news sort of thing. For the good… they’ve been spotted skirting through the north of the state. They seem to be moving up into Oklahoma. Bad news is that there have been multiple, distinct fingers spotted in the last month. Estimated total numbers range is from 4K to 5K.”
“That is a lot,” she said flatly.
“We’re very concerned. They could swing south at any moment. You know how random the crazy cannibal bastards are… which is why Leon would be grateful if your supergod could maybe, sorta, take care of them before that happens. The last time they attacked us there was only a couple of hundred of them and you remember what happened…”
Hayden put the pieces together. “We’re headed to that area.”
“Well, that’s a fine coincidence.”
“Not my information to share. You can ask Cal.”
“I wasn’t really concerned. I don’t care too much about whatever it is y’all are doing in flyover country, but it’d be nice if you could take care of the Meat Parade. It’ll do every normal person in the area a solid.”
Hayden nodded. “Alright. That’s all I needed,” she rose. “Thanks, Elliot. Cal said he’ll be by at some point to touch base with you.”
“Right, I got the message. I’ll be here or around,” Elliot shrugged. “Take care of yourself and tell Dayana and Jayde I said ‘hi’. Not that they’d care.”
Elliot was right. They wouldn’t care, but it would be impolite to tell him that.
“I will,” she replied truthfully.
She waved bye to Khalid and stepped out into the sandy street.
She supposed it was too much to ask of the Golden Eagles to sweep the streets, at least around the claimed hotel casinos.
They had enough work to do with the monsters and mutant animals.
A load roar shook the air.
Speaking of which—
Hayden pulled the small pistol-like weapon from the holster around her left thigh while rushing to her motorcycle to grab the long, thin chain from the plastic compartment on the side.
“What was—” Khalid rushed out of the lobby.
“Get inside!” she waved him back.
“I’ll get help!” he disappeared as quickly as he had appeared.
A massive mutated white lion padded toward her from the south side of the street.
It might have looked regal, but for the mouth grotesquely twisted by the irregular dagger-like teeth that crowded for space and the oozing wounds from split skin due to the over-sized, bulging muscles.
She pulsed the electricity within her to the surface.
The air around her crackled with static as arcs ran up and down her metal armor and weapons.
She had to be careful.
The lion was a huge mound of muscle and it could crush and maul her before her power could do its work.
Her first instinct was to charge it and hit it with her new weapon and chain.
Catch it by surprise.
Instead, she did the smart thing and slowly backed toward the hotel’s doors.
There was no need for her to take the mutated lion on solo. It’d be safer to work with the Golden Eagles that were no doubt on their way.
Her best intentions were for naught when she felt a tingle run along the right side of her body.
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
She remembered her recent training in that split-second.
Living things had electrical fields and she had been working hard on learning how to detect them or rather pay attention to what she had been thinking was instinct.
She half turned and lashed out with her electrified chain catching the mutated lioness in the face.
The massive beast was mid leap as her body shuddered and locked up from thousands of volts of electricity flowing into it.
Hayden had to throw herself backward and to the ground to avoid the hundreds of pounds of muscle flying in her direction.
A roar and the scrabble of paws on the ground was her only warning of the male charging her.
She didn’t have time to aim her pistol-like weapon so she pointed at the car-sized beast bearing down on her and squeezed the trigger.
The cartridge released the gas and pressure which shot the barbed spike out almost as fast a bullet.
An impossible stroke of luck had the spike pierce the lion’s eye.
Hayden sent the remainder of her electric power into her left hand. Through the metal frame of the pistol-like weapon. Transmitted through the thin wire connected to the spike. Into the lion’s eye.
The world’s most powerful taser was what they had taken to calling it.
The lion seized up and began to convulse just like his mate.
Hayden poured everything she had into the pair.
Their bodies began to smoke.
Gunshots rang and red bloomed from the lions’ bodies.
Throughout it all Hayden kept her power flowing.
“Hayden! That’s enough!”
Elliot’s voice.
She shut it off and rose to her feet.
Steady and not empty.
“Sorry about that. I promise we don’t usually get random attacks, at least on this stretch of street,” Elliot said.
The gathered Golden Eagles eyed her with undisguised awe.
“No problem. It was a good chance to see how far I’ve come with the training and practice.”
“I’d say you’ve come pretty far,” Elliot regarded the smoking lion corpses, “jeez, like a terrible BBQ.”
“Maybe we can gain power by eating them?” one of the Golden Eagles said.
“Shut up, moron!” another snapped. “That’s the kind of thinking that led to the Meat Parade.”
“We don’t eat mutated animals. That’s a good way to get sick and maybe die, as we are all aware of,” Elliot shook his head.
“You can keep the bodies,” she ejected the spent cartridge from her pistol-like weapon and replaced it with a new one.
“Thanks, I guess, we can make weapons out of their bones, claws and teeth. Speaking of… that’s new?” Elliot said.
“Cal got it for me. More range, more accurate and much faster than the chains,” she thrust the weapon back into its holster. “Alright… I’m out of here,” she mounted her motorcycle and sped away lest more lions appear.
“I call dibs on one of the thigh bones and some teeth and claws,” a Golden Eagle said. “Might make for a wicked club.”
“Whatever, just get a forklift out here and get those inside before something else shows up,” Elliot sighed.
----------------------------------------
Now, Missouri
Michael had keen Archer eyes, so he noticed something off with the derelict car parked at the corner of the intersection ahead.
He rode in a truck toward the rear of the convoy and had no chance at passing a warning to the lead truck before it drew close.
A massive explosion shattered the remaining windows of the buildings on each side of the narrow street.
The lead truck was thrown into a donut store, while the two trucks following it were sent spinning onto their roofs.
Bodies went flying as the rest of the convoy screeched to a halt.
Thick, dark smoke shrouded the way forward.
“… and there goes any hope of a proper tactical battle,” Fred sighed.
Michael thought that his section leader sounded much too calm after witnessing their leader get blown up. He was about to voice a question when loud roars shook the air.
The shattered truck was pushed free from the crater it had made in the front of the store. It scraped against the asphalt with the unpleasant sound of rending metal.
“You didn’t hear it from me, but why would you put a berserker-type in charge?” Fred said.
The vanguard leader and his 4 bodyguards emerged from behind the crumpled truck that they had just pushed out of the way like a shopping cart.
It was the first time Michael had seen the transformation of those deep within the sacrament.
They had swelled to great size. Muscles bulged and threatened to split their skin. Clothes had been shredded and they were left clad in nothing but their underwear.
“Props to the guy that suggested they wear stretchy and over-sized briefs. Let me tell you what, looking at their pork and beans flapping in the wind isn’t a fun sight,” Fred said.
Michael was struck by how their skin had taken on a chalky, almost white appearance.
Their leader turned to face the rest of the convoy. “Charge!” he bellowed in an inhuman sounding voice due to how grotesquely large his mouth and jaw had grown filled with sharp, shark-like teeth.
The five transformed men covered ground with frightening quickness that belied their huge bulk.
Spells, gun and arrow fire erupted from the ten-foot-tall wooden fence that the settlement had erected around the town center as their last-line of defense fortress.
The vanguard leader and his bodyguard took dozens of hits, but refused to fall as they reached the wall and clambered over in a single leap.
Fred pounded the roof of their truck. “Let’s go, driver. Might as well take us in close. Those poor bastards in there have more important things to worry about than us.”
Michael heard the screams, smelled the metallic tang of freshly-spilled blood in the air.
His Skills kept his arms steady despite the rocking of the speeding truck. He nocked an arrow and drew back in one smooth motion before letting fly. He watched it take a rifle-wielding woman in the eye.
She fell forward over the wall and down to the street.
“Nice shot!” Fred crowed. “That one’s Michael’s! His kill, he gets to each as much as he wants before the rest of you can jump in. You hear me? Blond woman with an arrow in her eye,” he slapped Michael on the back.
The truck skidded to a halt next to the dead woman’s body in the shadow of the wall.
“Go on!” Fred practically shoved him out of the truck bed.
Michael almost fumbled the knife as he drew it from the belt sheath. He was torn between excitement and nausea.
“Hurry it up!”
He didn’t know where to cut. All that he had been taught fled from his thoughts. So he went for the closest thing.
The woman’s arm was covered by a leather bracer, so he had to cut it loose, as he did with the sleeve beneath.
The first bite was wet and slimy, acrid with the iron-taste of blood.
He struggled to chew it properly, so he ended up swallowing too-big chunks.
The second was only marginally better tasting.
The third and the fourth were palatable.
The fifth… was good.
“You done?”
He blinked at the looming Fred.
“Just saying, you should hurry it up. We might miss out on the fight in there,” Fred gestured to the top of the wall.
“No— I mean, I’m good.”
Was he?
Michael felt good.
The nausea was gone, as if it had been a memory misremembered.
His stomach felt warm.
He felt energized.
Stronger.
Senses sharper.
He smelled prey on the wind. Heard them bleating in fear.
“Feels good, right? Nothing like the first time you receive the sacrament in the wild, so to speak,” Fred said. “You’re looking pretty fierce,” he gave a sharp-toothed grin.
Michael blinked.
He felt at his face and flinched at an accidental cut.
He stared at his fingers.
His nails had thickened and sharpened to a point.
His fingers had lengthened and had taken on a chalky white color towards the tips.
He felt at his face again, carefully this time.
His mouth and jaw felt bigger.
He gingerly ran his tongue over his teeth.
Sharp.
“Good change, man!” Fred gestured to the rest. “Everyone else grab a bite! Then I’m cutting you loose. Remember what I said, best you form up into teams, but I’m not holding you to it.” He continued to speak as the rest of Michael’s section gathered around the woman’s corpse and shared. “Your only order is to take captives if people surrender. Anything else is at your discretion. Follow your instincts. Partake of the sacrament. Grow stronger.”
Michael collected his bow from the truck bed and regarded the wooden wall.
“Hey, man… wanna team up?” Donald approached him.
The fat young man had undergone a muted version of the change Michael had. The same chalky white tinge to his lower face and fingers, but less pronounced sharpness to teeth and nails. He did add a fearsome looking hand print of blood on his face.
“Sure, we should probably find a few others. Get a well-rounded team going,” he said.
“Totally! I’ll ask around.”
Donald came back with four other people.
Three young women and one young man.
Michael vaguely recognized them, but didn’t remember their names.
The prettiest one gave him a bright, blood-stained smile. “Hi, Michael. I’m Britt. Is anyone else here on the leadership track?” she regarded the others with confidence. When the rest answered in the negative she smiled. “Then I should take charge.”
“That sounds fine for now… unless you screw it up,” the slightly less pretty one said.
“Whatever. Let’s hurry before they eat everyone,” the cute one twitched.
“Yeah, I’m with her,” the young man said.
“Awesome! Let’s do this!” Donald punched his fists together.
“Introductions first and tell me what you can do,” Britt eyed Michael, “I know you’re ranged, but the rest of you…”
It turned out that everyone had a level in Flesh Eater, which was obvious based on their physical appearance. Though Michael had the most noticeable changes. They were all also under 20 when it came to their best class.
Britt was a Mage. Her normally dark skin tone provided a stark contrast to her partial transformation.
The slightly less pretty girl, Charlie, had an athlete’s build, which was fitting for a Fighter.
Michael didn’t think the undercut was flattering for her straight black hair.
Sunny was the shortest and smallest of the bunch. She was also a Mage. She gave off a vibe that echoed something like a particularly vicious squirrel with the way her eyes darted from person to person and her forward lean. Almost as if she was on the verge of launching herself at them.
Lincoln was a big-bodied young man, which fit his class, unfortunate as it was.
Michael wondered what the story behind a Heavy Laborer was.
Donald turned out to be a Soldier, which he seemed to be ashamed off by the way his shoulders slumped slightly and his eyes darted to the ground when it was his turn to share.
“Great! Um… Lincoln,” Britt pointed, “I don’t want to assume, but tell me if I’m wrong… you’ve got Skills that make you strong and tough, I mean, more so now that you have the blessing of the sacrament?”
Lincoln gave her a silent nod.
“And you,” she turned to Donald, “same?”
“Uh… no, sorry. Most of what I can do is with this,” he held up his M-4 carbine.
“Well… the blessing should help you. So, I’m thinking Lincoln for primary tank. Charlie will be secondary tank. Donald, you’ll be emergency tank. The rest of us will shoot from the back.”
“Plans won’t matter too much. We’ve got the blessing on our side. We get hurt, we just need the flesh,” Sunny grinned viciously.
“Yeah, I guess, but it’s a good idea to practice what we’ve learned in tactics class for the real fight,” Britt said.
“Alright, kids! This is your first real battle! Don’t fuck it up!” Fred cackled as he removed his boots. He transformed. His light brown skin turned a chalky white as his limbs lengthened. Fingers and toes grew longer as did his nails, which thickened and sharpened into deadly claws. His face changed the most. Mouth and jaw grew grotesquely larger as sharp, triangular teeth pushed the normal human teeth out to clatter on the ground. A long tongue licked his lip-less mouth as he gave them a ghastly smile. “Good hunting!” he said in a guttural tone before he leapt up to grab the top lip of the ten-foot-wall before vaulting over and disappearing into the fortified compound.
Michael watched as the other veterans changed to join Fred in the hunt.
The noobs were left to stare in awe for a silent moment.
Britt cursed. “We better hurry before they take everything.”
Despite being slightly better in a physical sense they couldn’t quite vault the wall the same way the others had. It took teamwork to boost and then lift each other up.
“Wow…” Donald stared down at the fierce battle.
The veterans had already carved a hundred yards into the enemy, but they weren’t sticking in one place long enough to wipe them out completely.
Were they leaving the rest for the new recruits?
“Why are you surprised? You should’ve been able to smell and hear it this whole time,” Michael said.
“I— I was kinda distracted,” Donald frowned.
“Mage Shield,” Britt conjured a blood red magic shield to block the incoming fireball before it splashed all over them. “Pay attention! That’s like the first thing they taught us.”
Chagrined, Michael loosed an arrow at the old man that shot the spell at them, but was blocked by a similar magic shield.
Donald’s carbine barked a three round burst and the old man fell with a bloody stain in his chainmail shirt.
“Teamwork,” Donald nodded.
“Let’s get down there!” Britt said.
“On it!” Lincoln jumped down. His boots hit the ground with a thud.
Michael and hundreds of his brothers and sisters followed, swarming down the wall like an avalanche.
The landing was surprisingly easy.
“Hey! That’s ours!” Donald pointed.
Michael loosed an arrow into a thick-necked man in even thicker armor, which was a waste as the arrow bounced off before he turned his attention to the source of Donald’s ire.
A small group of their brothers and sisters had rushed toward the old man Donald had killed. In their haste to consume the sacrament they had forgotten about the enemy.
“Fucking Meat Parade!” a young woman swept her arms wide, “Force Wave!”
The air between her and the cluster of Michael’s brothers and sisters distorted as pure force washed over them.
Their broken bodies landed a dozen feet back.
“Light Arrow!” Britt thrust her hand toward the young mage.
A sickly yellow arrow of light sped across the dozen yards and plunged into the young Mage’s shoulder.
She spun and fell with a cry.
A group of men and women rushed forward with shields raised to pull the young Mage back.
Michael’s senses were much sharper than they ever had been, but it was difficult to adjust. The arrows he loosed were off by inches.
Screams of rage and fear freely mingled.
He was surprised to note that he could tell the difference.
Flesh Eaters surged forward, many forgetting their weapons, Skills and spells in favor of tooth, claw and physical might.
The problem was that they were newly-minted in the sacrament.
Unlike the veterans, they couldn’t shrug off damage long enough to feed and heal, nor were their claws and strength enough to rend armor to get to the protected flesh.
The mad rush pushed against a hastily formed shield wall.
They fell in the dozens from the bullets and spells shoot into the tightly packed mass.
“Grab her!” Britt called out.
Charlie’s strong hand shot out as quick as a snake to the back of Sunny’s collar.
The small girl was snarling, her clawed hands grasping toward the melee.
“You’ve got spells! At least use them up before you throw yourself into it!” Britt spat.
“Uh, why are we holding back?” Lincoln grunted.
Michael could see the tension in the big man’s posture. Lincoln’s arms practically vibrated as he held tightly to his round shield and long-handled axe.
“Because this is Main Street and it’s a kill zone. We go in there and we’ll take a fireball to the head,” Britt gestured toward the bloody battle. “They’ve got the better idea,” she pointed to several other groups as they skirted the main press and melted into side streets and alleyways, using the buildings as cover.
“Better hunting,” Michael agreed. “Maybe we should start up there,” he pointed to the rooftops overlooking the wide street.
There was enemy up there, shooting down.
“Yes! We can get kills and achieve a tactical objective!” Britt beamed. “We’ll use the alleys. Find the back doors.”
Donald snickered, but was properly ignored.
“We can take them by surprise, Lincoln in front. Followed by Donald.” She eyed Sunny, who had calmed down, “are you good or should we just let you waste your life in that mess?”
“Fine,” Sunny growled.
“Listen, I get it, I feel the hunger, but look at the rooftops. We can have them all to ourselves without getting blown up, shot or trampled,” Britt said.
“I think we should move now,” Michael said.
Tactically, it’d be good to take away some of the pressure the rooftop enemy was placing on their brothers and sisters.
“Just one more thing,” Michael whistled to catch the attention of another group like his huddled behind the corner of a building across the street from them. With vigorous gestures he conveyed the idea that they too should take to the rooftops. “They’ll take the other side,” he explained.
“Good, good,” Britt nodded.
They slipped into the alley like the predators they were.