Miami, Florida, New America Republic, December 2036
General Mark Johnson strode into the workshop with straight-backed purpose.
He ignored the slave assistants performing their duties as he did with any unused tool. They existed only when he needed to utilize them.
When he didn’t?
They stayed where they belonged, forgotten in the toolbox.
“Noel!” he barked.
No answer.
He continued to stride through the aisles of worktables, cabinets and machines that seemed to litter the place in a haphazard manner.
He ground his teeth at the disorder.
A magitech fabrication device sat on a stout work table next to what looked like a mundane air fryer.
Yes… he caught the sent of french fried potatoes wafting in the air created by the giant AC vents in the ceiling.
“Noel!” he snapped.
The slaves ignored him busy in their own worlds.
Tasks ordered by their master.
He passed a large cage with a dozen uncollared people seated on the concrete floor.
He paid them scant attention.
They had been broken. Useless until they were fitted with a collar. Then and only then would they bring value to the New American Republic.
He could tell by the way their heads hung low, their jaws slack, eyes staring at nothing.
More walking.
More time wasted.
He was a busy man.
His plate had already been filled to overflowing with everything he had to deal with because of the Freedom Championships. Another shit sandwich had been added to the pile with the recent attack on a supply convoy by an unknown group of assailants that left barely a thimble full of evidence for them to track.
“Noel!”
He finally found the annoying man hunched over a worktable.
“Slaver General!” Noel threw a lazy salute blinking through a goggle-like contraption with multiple lenses that glowed with different colors.
“That’s General Johnson,” he said reflexively.
The punk did it on purpose.
He knew it for a fact.
Noel knew what he liked to be called as he had made it clear on multiple occasions.
“Okay… General Johnson,” Noel shrugged.
“Did you forget something, Noel?”
Noel scratched his head. “If I forgot something… then I wouldn’t know what it was until I remembered it,” he spoke as though to a slow child.
General Johnson stifled the urge to slap the younger man. “I scheduled a meeting with you in my office,” he said through grit teeth.
“You shouldn’t do that,” Noel said lightly. “Bad for your teeth and it’s probably why you’re always getting headaches.”
“I do not— the meeting!” he snapped.
“I guess I forgot,” Noel shrugged. “Sorry about that Slaver General Mark, let’s reschedule. Just check my availability with Sheryl out front.” Noel returned to his work with a dismissive wave.
“Listen hear you little shit! I’m not done talking to you!” he grabbed Noel’s shoulder and spun the punk around.
“Hey, careful! This is sensitive stuff I’m working on,” Noel gestured to the spread on his work table.
It looked like a disassembled slave collar.
“No need to get your panties all twisted up, Slaver General Mark Johnson.”
“It’s General Johnson or sir!” he snapped.
“Don’t get the big deal. It’s your class,” Noel shrugged.
The slaver general thought back to the days before the spire.
He had been career army.
Never wanted anything else.
He had never advanced beyond lieutenant despite close to two decades of active service.
Inappropriate behavior toward the women beneath him, above him and on the same level, they said.
What was inappropriate was having women serving alongside men in the first place.
War was no place for them.
They were weaker, softer.
He was proved right when the base he was stationed in crumbled within a year after the spires had appeared.
It was luck that landed him in his current position and rank.
“Um… you were about to say something?” Noel blinked.
“Take that ridiculous shit off your face!”
“Jeez, someone’s wound up tight. I know you’ve got some lovely ladies on your essential support staff. Seems like you need to wet your dick. I do it a couple of times a day. Takes the edge off whenever I’m feeling brain-locked.”
“The collars for the monsters and animals…”
“What about them? They’re working great. Haven’t you watched the MOBA events? Too busy?” Noel shrugged. “Not one failure… that resulted from my collar malfunction. It’s not my fault if some dumbass accidentally fries it or cuts it off. Even then the monsters are supposed to fight anyways so it’s not, like, a big deal.”
“I don’t care about the little ones. I want to know how close you are to getting the bigger ones on-line.”
“No idea,” Noel shrugged. “Trialing the middleweight version in about a week or two. It’s kinda bottlenecked at that size. Not really worth moving forward with the heavyweight version until we get a breakthrough on the mid beasties. Like I told you and everyone else at the last meeting,” he rolled his eyes.
“Can you get something good enough in the next few days?”
“Why?”
“I need magic trackers I can control.”
“Huh?”
“The mana hounds. You remember? They were one of the monster species that we made a priority to get control of.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Noel waved, “they’re also the ones giving me the most problems. The mana-sensing organ in their heads interferes with the collar’s magic. So… that’s not happening, not in days or even weeks, give me a year or two,” he shrugged.
“You don’t have a year or two. Or were you not paying attention in the meeting. The king wants us to find our property and find who took it.”
“That sounds like a you problem,” Noel shot finger guns.
“I’m making it your problem.”
“Pfftt… whatever, bro… oh, sorry, Slaver General Johnson. I’ll give it a shot. An impossible challenge is just what I need to get my brain flowing. Haven’t had that in awhile. Or course, I’m going to have to ease back on my other projects… which I’m doing on your authority, right?”
“Just get it done.”
----------------------------------------
All across the Miami area in scattered stadiums and arenas the Freedom Championships continued into its third week.
“Master! Watch out!” Mena cried.
Adal turned to a rogue dropping out of concealment lunging with a sword aimed at his chest.
“Protect My Master!” Talia appeared out of nowhere to take the thrust for him. She cried out in pain as it plunged through her chain and padded clothing into her shoulder.
“Reflective Shield!” Adal held a hand up while he supported Talia.
The rogue sneered and took a deep breath before vanishing from Adal’s notice.
“Mena! Wind! Around us!” Adal ordered.
The rogue’s two teammates, a hammer and shield wielding fighter and a basic mage, advanced. They stayed their hands for the moment having already once felt the sting from Adal’s shield.
“Wind Wall!” Mena thrust her staff into the air.
A small, weak tornado encircled the trio.
It wouldn’t keep the other team from attacking, but that wasn’t why Adal had ordered Mena to cast it.
“Keep an eye out for the rogue, Mena, while I help Talia,” Adal said. “Here,” he poured a healing potion over the wound.
He had gotten disgruntled looks from the team they had defeated in the previous round.
Potions were costly.
One didn’t see them often in Bronze Division matches and events.
Being the son of noble lord had its perks and the other teams were just jealous and sore losers anyways.
“Thank you, Master,” Talia winced as the potion went to work sealing the bloody wound. “I’m sorry for failing you.”
“No, you didn’t. You saved me,” Adal said. “Now, are you ready?”
She nodded earnestly.
“Taunt when I say.”
Adal watched the swirling winds as Talia and Mena stood in front of him barring the path of the fighter and mage. He didn’t care about them at the moment. He wanted the rogue.
And he found the young man’s form revealed by the cloud of dirt whipped into the air by Mena’s spell.
“Got you, asshole,” he muttered. “Master’s Mark!” he pointed at the rogue. “There, Talia, taunt him! Take him out, Mena, wind whip!” He stepped forward as his girls dealt with the rogue to face the fighter and the mage as they abandoned caution and charged through the swirling dust. “Force Shield!” he knocked them off their feet.
In a larger stadium, a team waited in the tunnel for their match to start.
It shook with the stomping of thousands of pairs of feet.
The cheering forced them to raise their voices.
“Cara, remember to keep Licorice and Goldy back. Team Alpha Sigma are a bunch of sadistic bastards, they’ll target them just to get to you,” Amber said.
“It doesn’t help that the no-killing rule doesn’t apply to pets and summons,” Trevor added.
“I know,” Cara scowled.
“Those douchebros really get off on making people feel pain,” Trevor said.
“We know, Trevor, we’ve seen their previous matches,” Amber said. “Now, Cara, I’m not saying keep Licorice and Goldy out of the fight, just pick their spots and minimize their risks.”
The huge, black, mastiff-like mutt barked an affirmative before rubbing his big, blocky head against Cara’s side.
The huge golden eagle perched on the young woman’s shoulder screeched in agreement regarding Amber with disapproval. As if to say, we’re warriors too, we understand and accept the compact. Death was ever present in the fight.
“It shouldn’t be a big problem,” Trevor said.
Amber scowled at the man.
Where had that annoying perpetual grin gone?
“This is a team we don’t have to hold back against,” he continued. “You got that, Amber? Cara? Dog? Bird?”
“What’s gotten into you?” Amber said. “We’ve all seen the same report on them and how they normally act. They deserve nothing from us.”
“Good, just so we’re all on the same page.”
The gate slid open ponderously.
“They made it slow just to mess with us,” Trevor muttered.
The announcer’s voice cut through the crowd noise.
If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.
“… all the way from sunny California… The Watch! The Amberknight, Cy and Dr. Doolittle!… Versus!… Team Alpha Sigma! Brett, Chandler and Robert!”
The Watch didn’t listen to the rest of it.
They focused solely on the timer counting down.
The siren blared.
Trevor snatched a rock from one of the many pouches on his belt.
Mach Throw.
Over a hundred yards away the other team didn’t have time to react.
The projectile crossed the distance in the blink of an eye with a loud boom that silenced the crowd.
The enemy mage… Brett? Chandler? Trevor couldn’t remember, took the rock to and through his knee.
“Just wanted to make a point,” Trevor shrugged.
The other two men roared with rage. One visibly swelled in size as a reddish haze wafted off his body.
“Rage Skill,” Amber said. “I’ll deal with him. Trevor, can you keep the other one busy?”
“Sure, I’ll even toss a few over to one-knee every once in a while to keep his head down.”
“Cara—”
“I know, Amber… I’ll watch for a good, safe-ish opening,” Cara sighed.
Amber strode forward then broke into a run.
Ghostly plate armor appeared over her body in her name’s color. Followed by a ghostly longsword of the same.
Unburdened by the physical weight of mundane armor she dived into a roll underneath the raging warrior’s wild stroke of his blood-stained axe.
She came up behind slashing through his thick pants severing both hamstrings.
It didn’t matter if you were temporarily immune to pain if your body was damaged enough that no amount of Skills or magic could compensate and allow you to go beyond what was biologically possible.
“Haste!”
Amber heard the pained voice.
The enemy mage.
A heavy impact to her back ragdolled Amber across the dirt.
She came out of it and blindly stop-cut her longsword in front of her.
The clang of steel and magic rang out.
The third Alpha Sigma member wielded a steel sword and shield.
The man leered as he slashed and stabbed with impossible speed.
She was pushed into survival mode. For every strike she managed to parry, three more got through to score lines on her magic armor.
A baseball streaked over her shoulder and beaned the man in the side of his helmet.
“Licorice… Iron Fur! Go get him!”
The giant, nearly 300 pound dog bounded over Amber and latched on to the man’s sword arm.
She heard the crunch of the steel gauntlet or maybe that was bone.
“Disarm!” Cara bellowed.
Hopefully, not literally or… there weren’t any rules against maiming.
A huge wave of fire suddenly erupted from the downed Alpha Sigma mage’s hands.
Amber rushed forward to block for Licorice and the chew toy he was currently shaking violently.
Her magic armor could take it.
She wasn’t as confident in the dog’s ability, despite Cara’s Skill.
The heat was unbearable sapping her will but it passed quickly.
Amber blinked.
It felt as though she had lost the will to live. That the only thing she wanted to do was lie back and give up. Let it happen.
She made a mental note to bring it up with Jake and Hillary back at the hotel.
The spell had been more than just magical fire.
The mage’s face was a mask of pain and hatred as he pointed a finger at her. He opened his mouth just as a baseball beaned him in the face.
He dropped like a sack of potatoes.
“My bad!” Trevor called out.
Amber waved him away. She approached the Alpha Sigma fighter in Licorice’s mouth and laid the edge of her magically-conjured sword on his neck. “Give up.”
“Fuck you, cunt! We’re going to f—” he yelped as Licorice shook him.
“Your team likes taking trophies. It looks like he’s found a new favorite chew toy. Isn’t that right, boy?”
Licorice nodded causing the man to whimper.
“I might want some trophies myself. What do you think? A hand and an arm, like this goodest of boys? Maybe a foot? How bout the shriveled up excuses you’ve got between your legs?”
“OkayokayokayIquit,” the man sobbed.
“The Watch wins!”
The crowd roared.
“I’m satisfied,” Trevor said as they walked back to the tunnel.
Amber didn’t think she could agree with that.
Just being in close proximity to those men had left her feeling disgusted on an impossibly deep level.
It was almost instinctual, primal.
“I need a long bath,” she said.
“Licorice needs to wash out his mouth. That man tasted wrong,” Cara said.
“Oh…” Trevor blinked. “I didn’t know that was possible. For humans to taste wrong. Clearly, I’m missing out by not trying to get the flesh eater class.”
The huge, black dog barked.
“Normally, people taste like pork,” Cara said.
“I’ll… uh… try to forget that,” Trevor said.
In yet another arena, this one with the old hardwood floor long gone in favor of a layer of blood-stained dirt, two men fought.
“This is kinda boring, sarge…”
“Tough dick, Greygrass, you volunteered,” Mouthy said around a mouthful of popcorn.
The two sat high up in the stands surrounded by empty seats.
The arena wasn’t nearly to capacity and everyone else sat as close to the action as possible.
“I was getting bored just sitting around the motel.”
“You bored? then make yourself useful and get me some fucking nachos… with cheese and those hot things.”
The young ranger blinked. “You mean jalapenos?”
“Look at you, fancy as a bunch of cats at a motherfucking tea party,” Mouthy snorted.
“A young woman like me… alone in a place like this? You’re the one that said us fragile ladies shouldn’t be going around by ourselves.”
“I didn’t order that cause you’re a chick. I ordered that cause these slavers had it in for us rangers. You see how they did X-Ray dirty down there,” mouthy gestured toward the arena floor.
The man in question was trying and failing to catch a mage.
The crowd was actually booing.
“The spells are doing shit to X-Ray, as expected. He’ll catch the mage once he runs out of mana for the haste spell.”
Rangers Bluesilk and Timber chose that moment to return.
The two young men were burdened with drinks and more snacks.
“No nachos,” Mouthy scowled, “no beer…”
“Um… Sarge, you’re the one that ordered no booze while outside,” Bluesilk said as he handed sodas over.
“Nachos, sarge,” Timber handed the large cartoon to Mouthy.
“What’s this green shit?”
“Jalapenos,” Timber blinked, “like you asked.”
“Just testing,” Mouthy said.
“X-Ray still trying to get his hands on that scared dude?” Bluesilk said.
“Yup, round and round they go,” Greygrass sighed.
“Go get him, X-Ray,” Mouthy cheered flatly.
“You could be more enthusiastic, sarge,” Timber said.
“Why? I hate that fucker.”
“Then why are we here?” Timber’s brow furrowed.
“Got to support our fellow rangers, even if they’re like that piece of shit that gets stuck in your asshole hairs,” Mouthy said.
“Dingleberries, sarge?” Bluesilk said.
“What have I told you about make believe words, ranger?”
“Uh… all words are make believe, sarge,” he replied.
“Good memory.”
“X-Ray needs to trap him against a corner,” Timber said.
“It’s an oval,” Greygrass sighed.
“Ovular?” Timber said.
“There you are with those made up words again,” Mouthy said.
“The mage’ll run out of mana eventually,” Bluesilk nodded.
“Throw dirt in his eyes!” Mouthy bellowed.
Down on the arena floor, Ranger X-Ray took every spell his opponent hurled on his bare chest. His ability to absorb magic attacks kept him safe and uninjured while increasing his physical attributes by a fraction of each absorbed spell.
Unfortunately, for him and the entertainment of the crowd the mage seemed to be going with the tactic of low-powered spells to make his mana supply last longer.
The booing was starting to get to the man.
“Stand and fight, puto!” he shot rude gestures at the mage as the young man ran away on haste- empowered legs while shooting small darts of magic fire that were simply absorbed. “C’mon, I won’t even hit you that hard.”
“This is getting embarrassing,” Greygrass said.
“More for the other guy, than X-Ray,” Timber said.
“I’m embarrassed for both of them,” Bluesilk said.
“For fuck’s sake,” Mouthy said. “Ranger Sergeant’s Command: Hear me. Hey, dumbass, find a rock,” she whispered.
X-Ray’s eyes darted up to the crowd finding Mouthy despite the fact that she was all the way up in the nosebleeds.
He took a barrage of magic missiles to the face for that but the purple marbles disappeared into him.
His skin glowed with a faint rainbow of colors from all the different attack spells he had absorbed.
He scanned the ground and found one as a fireball splashed into his bare chest.
He rushed over, picked it up, turned and hurled it.
It clanged off the mage’s helmet like a gong.
The young man staggered and dropped to one knee.
“Tsk… finally, asshole couldn’t do it without me,” Mouthy snorted.
X-Ray pounced on the mage battering him into the dirt with, perhaps, excessive force.
“Pendejo… make me look stupid in front of the fans…” he spat as the young mage flailed trying to block the rapid-fire punches.
“You never want to block punches with your face,” Timber said.
“It took you six months to learn that shit,” Mouthy said.
“No…”
“Why do you think I gave you that name?”
“Cause of the way I chop down monsters like trees?”
Mouth snorted.
“Sorry, dude, but you might want to review your timelines,” Bluesilk said.
“It’s useless,” Greygrass smirked. “His memory is shit with all those shots he took,” she laughed.
Far down below, X-Ray raised bloody fists to an unappreciative crowd.
“Hey, sarge?” Greygrass said. “Can I go watch Shrewed’s next fight?”
“Nope, you fucking volunteered for today, so you’re gonna have to watch that on TV,” Mouthy said. “The others are gonna get a turn.”
“The motel TV’s are shit, sarge,” Bluesilk said.
“Not my problem. you’re squid shit at thinking long-term.”
----------------------------------------
“They’re mass monsters,” Jake said.
“Yeah, they look huge.” Hillary leaned toward the TV with tablet and stylus in hand. “Seems like they’d be slow.”
“You’d think so, but they’ve advanced this far.”
“What div?” Alexa hopped over the back of the couch to plop in the middle. “Del! Grab me some pizza and a beer!”
“What kind?” Del called back from the kitchen.
“One of each and something light!” she replied.
“Silver Division three on three,” Jake said.
“So, what’s so special about these meatheads?” Alexa said.
“One, they’re from the old government, at least that’s what they claim.”
“Like the Stars and Stripes team and the blind-folded woman,” Hillary added.
“Yeah,” Jake continued, “and two, they should be physically impossible from the few highlights I’ve caught. I’m pretty sure they don’t have magic or Skills from what I’ve seen.”
“So, they lift weights and take steroids, I remember that being a thing,” Alexa said.
“That gets you huge, not necessarily athletic. Bodybuilders don’t usually focus on things like cardio and flexibility. Normally, and I use the term in a pre-spires sense, guys that huge and bulky would be sucking wind after thirty seconds throwing punches. They definitely weren’t as quick and agile as these guys. You’ll see.”
The match began.
The three hulking men in a mix of plate armor and combat fatigues sprinted across the arena floor. Two ran side by side behind huge, heavy shields. The third was close on their heels.
Their opponents fired spells and sprayed bullets that the thick, metal shields blocked.
“See, no Skills, just really, really strong and fast.”
They closed the distance in seconds.
The opposing team’s mage cast a magic shield at the last moment.
The two shield-bearing behemoths slammed into it creating cracks that spider-webbed across the glowing surface.
The third behemoth leapt high into the air. An impossible leap for a human without magical or Skill enhancements. He slammed a gauntleted fist the size of a ham into the cracked magic shield shattering it.
The mage cried out from the feedback and was silenced a moment later as the behemoth landed on him.
“Ouch,” Alexa winced, “still don’t see why you’re so interested in this. No class just means they’re probably like Nila, physically superhuman.”
“Yeah, but she looks normal, not like these freaks,” Hillary said. “Based on size, my calculations are saying that they’re around 500lbs. Normal human hearts can’t handle that size. Think of all the blood and oxygen that needs to be pumped to those muscles. They should be dying of heart attacks right now, not beating up those poor bastards.”
“Jeez, they’re moving really fast,” Alexa said.
“According to the slavers’ assessment there is nothing magical or class-ish in them,” Jake said. “Hillary, how’d you explain it?”
“Simplest conjecture is that they are superhuman, like Nila, except visibly bigger,” she shrugged. “Or, alterations. Magic and/or Skill-based chemistry. Alchemy, like Santi does. Healing and mana potions effect changes on the physical body without leaving long term traces of magic. Enhancement spells and Skills can and do demonstrate temporary physical changes. So, something along those lines, but permanent. Strengthening bones, muscles, organs everything really, otherwise the body couldn’t handle the weight and power it generates.”
“Silver Div, huh? So, these gorillas are Level 30 to 39 equivalent,” Alexa mused. “When does our team fight them?”
“Different bracket. Semi-finals if they both make it that far,” Jake said.
“I mean, it’d be a tough fight, but these guys don’t look unbeatable,” Alexa said.
“I’m more interested in the whole mechanics of it,” Jake said.
“Are you jealous?” Alexa grinned. “Feeling a little small?”
“Nah.”
“Thinking there’s a super soldier serum out there somewhere?”
“I wouldn’t want to get that bulky and huge anyways. Probably a pain to wipe your own ass.”
“I don’t know, Jake, they seem pretty flexible. That one guy did a splits-kick to avoid a fire spear.”
“When you’re a quarter ton you’ve got to be careful where you walk, sit… even your bed needs to be reinforced. Their gear and clothing have to be custom.”
“I think it wouldn’t work for you anyways,” Hillary said. “You have a class and that takes precedence. Any changes would be temporary. Although, it would be useful to turn into that if you needed to by drinking a potion or taking a pill. But then, what are the possible negative side effects on the body of rapid, violent change,” she muttered, “Skills and spells alleviate problematic issues automatically…”
Del finally emerged from the kitchen with a plate piled with pizza slices and several beers. “Is it over already?”
“Team USA stomped,” Alexa said as she grabbed the plate out of his hand. “What’s the next match?”
“A slaver team against a slaver team,” Jake said.
“Ugh… change the channel,” Alexa said. “It’s bad enough that I see enslaved people everywhere when I go outside…”
“Go to the one versus one Silver Division tournament,” Hillary said.
Jake complied.
“Oh… hey,” Del thrust a finger at the familiar young man on the screen, “it’s that kid Cal brought up to train with the Furies awhile back. What was his name?”
Alexa raised a brow at Hillary.
“Sticksies… er… Drake…” Hillary said nonchalantly.
Jake frowned.