Dread filled me as a dark shadow followed him across the ground.

“Oh, fuck!” I yelled.

Giant talons swung down from the sky, latching onto Jimmy’s shoulders as the flier screeched in triumph.

Hawk moved, an arrow flying into the air as soon as he could see the thing, followed quickly by a second. I wished yet again that I had a ranged attack.

The flier screamed as the first arrow hit, and it dropped Jimmy from several feet up. The man slammed into the ground with a sickening crunch.

John tossed the ladder into its compartment and raced toward the front of the ship. Doc whimpered and huddled in a corner.

I yanked out my broken spear and peeked out from under the shuttle, spotting the flier.

[Pterosaur, Level 15]

Jimmy moaned and the shadow circled around again.

Hawk fired a few more arrows, swearing.

Without thinking too much about what I was doing, I raced out toward Jimmy. The Pterosaur screeched loudly at the sight of me, but I kept moving toward Jimmy. He crawled forward, dragging one leg behind him. I slid an arm under his and yanked him up. “We got this, Jimmy!”

“Don’t leave me. Please don’t leave me!” he mumbled. He shook with every step, but moved faster than I thought he would with a badly broken leg. Twenty feet to go.

Hawk kept up his firing, then he screamed, “Down!”

I dove to the ground, taking Jimmy with me. Dust rose up as the beast flew overhead, claws missing us by mere inches. My heart pounded. As soon as it flew past, I scrambled up, grabbing onto Jimmy and dragging him up with me again.

“We gotta keep moving!” We limped forward, then were under the shuttle and on the ramp.

Hawk grabbed Jimmy’s other arm and helped me lift him to one of the seats.

“Close the ramp!”

John did something and the ramp began to close behind us. It didn’t take long before Jimmy was seated, though he was crying and clearly in pain and shock. Doc hadn’t moved from hiding next to one of the cargo containers.

I sat in the chair on the left side of the shuttle. Hawk paced back and forth, while John peered out the front window.

“Once it’s gone for the night, we’ll head out.”

“This isn’t the same one as before, it’s only level 15,” I added. “I swear it was smaller than that other one too.”

“That’s not good,” said Hawk. “We don’t need a territorial fight on our hands.”

“Or worse, a new flock moving in,” added John. “At least we know they roost at night. We just gotta be patient.”

“Doc, get over here and check out Jimmy’s leg,” growled Hawk. “I think you need to set it.”

Doc didn’t move, just shook in the corner.

Hawk marched off toward him, mumbling under his breath before yanking the man up by his shirt. “You need to help Jimmy!” That got him moving, and I turned to my brother as Doc moved to check on Jimmy’s leg.

“Well, you might get to see if your weapons work,” I said to John.

“I’d rather not test them in combat.”

“Speaking of combat, do you think you can fix this?” I asked, holding out my spear. Well, it was really a long knife at this point, with half the shaft missing.

John took it in one hand, examining the metal. “By any chance do you have the rest of it?” I shook my head and he frowned. “I don’t even know how you did this…” he mumbled before speaking louder. “Without more metal, I can’t put it back to the way it was.”

My eyes lit up and I pulled out the metal that had melted and fallen from the sky. “I think this is the same stuff…”

John took it in his other hand, jaw-dropping. He shook his head twice and shoved the spear back at me. His focus shifted completely to the metal blob. “This is… where did you find this?” he asked in a whisper.

“Meteor crater,” I said leaning forward. “Pretty sure that storm was the spine, or part of it, crashing and burning.”

He blinked, then slowly nodded. “Well, this is the same stuff… Can I keep the extra? If you find any more of it, I call first dibs.” He yanked the spear back from me and got to work. First, he made the metal malleable just like he had with the crystal, except this was softer. He broke a piece off then started fixing the collapsable shaft. It didn’t take much time for him to fix the first section. “I need to rest for five, but I'll get it done.”

I turned away from the front of the ship and found Jimmy passed out in his seat, with his leg braced with a piece of wood. Doc and Hawk were in the cargo hold, and I joined them.

“Will his leg heal?” I asked.

“Yes,” answered Hawk. “He needs rest and food.” He pointed to the hatch on the ceiling. “I’m going to peek out the top and see if that thing’s hanging around.”

I moved over to the compartment where John had stashed his ladder and pulled it out. “Better you than me.”

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He nodded sharply then climbed the few steps before unlocking the hatch. The three of us paused at the sound, waiting to hear if something came to check it out. Then he raised the hatch only a few inches and peeked out the crack.

My heart pounded as he twisted about, looking in the three directions that he could see before he lowered it.

“Nothing so far, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t still around.”

“What about that nest?” I asked.

“That fucker is around Level 18, and I have the impression it's gonna lay eggs soon.”

Doc turned to look at Hawk. “Eggs? You didn’t mention eggs after scouting it.”

“Why else would it build a nest?”

“So, wait,” I said, holding up a hand. “Is this other one here to do its mating duty? Is that what’s happening?”

“Possible.” He frowned and climbed down the ladder after locking the hatch. “I’d hoped to take out the one with the nest, but I’ll need more fighters. Even with trapping it, I’d need 5 people.” He rubbed the back of his head. “I hope to recruit a few folks from the mines who want to level.”

John joined us. He held the spear out to me. “I can’t do anything about the tip, since it’s a weapon.”

I took the spear and glanced at the chipped head. “I’ll try and fix it. Can I snag one of those crystal shards?”

He nodded and motioned to the crate they were in.

I headed in that direction while Hawk paced back and forth. Doc shook his head and checked on Denver.

It didn’t take long before I sat down on the shuttle floor with the knife in one hand and a crystal shard in the other. Now, I needed to figure out how the skill worked. I focused on the energy that I used to make the tip glow, and instead I tried to connect the two crystals together. Melt them into one. Of course, it was harder than that, since the spear tip was still attached and I didn’t want to mess with that.

I don’t know how long I sat there until I felt it. The two become one crystal. A smile crossed my face and I lifted it up, using the handle. The second tip had merged with the first, overlaying on it.

“That looks unusable,” said Doc.

I glared at him. “I just need to shape it back into a speartip,” I muttered. Anger at his doubt rushed through me, giving me the boost I needed. A giant part of the attached shard came free and I set it on the floor. Now I had to focus on repeating that until it was back to its normal shape. I got to work.

#

“Hawk, can you scout things out?” asked John.

The words snapped me out of my focus and I realized the cargo hold had darkened. My spear tip looked good, or at least good enough. The weight had increased a little, but I didn’t dare chip anything else off of it. Once we arrived at the mines, I’d search out Sang and see what she could do. It didn’t take long to clean up the crystal bits.

“Yeah.” Hawk climbed up the ladder and peeked out. Very quickly he shut it. “Shit!”

John froze. “What?”

“It's still there, sitting on the dropship. I think it–”

Something heavy landed on the top of the shuttle. "Saw me..." Hawk quickly twisted the hatch shut and climbed down the ladder.

Everyone stared at the ceiling.

“We can’t just sit here,” whispered Doc.

“Its claws might mess up the shuttle.” John's face twisted to one of concern. “It has to know we’re still in here.”

Hawk let out a sigh. “It’s only level 15, we should be able to take it out. It’s getting dark.”

Something poked at the hatch, denting the very center.

“Alright, we need to get rid of this flier,” growled John. “I just fixed this damn ship.” He rushed to the pilot’s chair.

“Hawk, what if you race to the dropship, get it off us, then once we power up you snipe it from there? You already hit it twice,” I added.

“We can try that.”

“I could run back and distract it,” said Doc. Everyone turned to look at him in surprise. “Hawk can fire from the hatch.”

“Doc.”

“And you can give me one of those bottles of booze I spotted in the crate.” Doc’s fingers twisted back and forth. “I have my explosive. Once it's dead, you pick me back up.” Doc stared at Hawk. “Promise me you won’t leave me behind.”

“Never.” He gave the man a nod. “John, does that work for you?”

“Yeah, I might be able to do some damage of my own,” he said from the front. “And a bottle of booze is a fair trade.”

I looked at the ladder and the hatch. “Maybe we can tie a harness so you don’t fall off the ladder.” It didn’t take long for John and I to rig up a harness attached to the ceiling for Hawk. He’d need to be careful to duck if he closed the hatch, but it was better than crashing to the floor.

Doc stood by the ramp, shaking. He had something clasped in his hand, but I wasn’t going to ask about it. Last time he’d mentioned explosives, Hawk had gotten mad.

I stared at Hawk for a moment to see what information I got.

[Hawk, Level 17, Archer, Predator]

Holy smokes, I got his class, and how my class thought of him.

I turned to study Doc.

[Doc, Level 10, Explosives Expert, Prey]

The few times I’d used Insight before, it hadn’t given me that information. The last tag on Doc worried me, but it made sense. He was so much lower level than me, and he acted like prey, always hiding. Heck, Hawk was only one level higher than I was, though he had ranged attacks while I didn’t. This whole fight wasn’t going to play into my strengths, and I kind of wished I’d mentioned running for the dropship.

I stepped up next to Doc. “Do you want me to go with you?” I asked. “We can go in different directions.”

He turned to look at me, eyes wide. “You’d do that, for me?”

“Of course.” I nodded slowly. “I’m not a ranged fighter, and we need to have each other's backs out here.”

I felt Hawk watching me and he gave me a sharp nod. “Two targets will make this harder for the flier.”

“Everyone ready back there?” called John.

The beast on the roof of the shuttle shifted, moving toward the front.

The ramp started lowering, making a whining noise. The beast headed toward the back, following the noise, and its beak came into view. The pointed tip dipped down, but it couldn't see us.

I swallowed hard.

Hawk flung the hatch open and fired.

The flier screeched and took to the air, wings flapping.

Then I ran.

The crystal next to the door glowed in the twilight. That was our target.

I thought I was fast before, but now I almost flew across the dirt. Doc lagged behind me and I curved off to the left, widening the gap so it couldn’t try and attack both of us at once.

“There's two!” Hawk’s voice echoed across the darkened clearing.

I twisted, looking to the sky to find the fliers. One dove at Doc, claws outstretched. The other circled the shuttle, which made more noise than before as it quickly powered up. Hawk launched arrow after arrow at it. At least one hit.

[Pterosaur, Level 15]

Both flyers were the same level, though one had green coloring while the other was a deep gray.

Crystals tied to the fencing let off a soft glow, making the entire area easier to see. I stopped running and instead watched the flier behind Doc.

“Doc, drop!”

He didn’t listen and instead twisted about. The pterosaur caught him by the shoulders and lifted him.

This wasn’t good.

Hawk’s focus stayed on the one diving at him in the shuttle, and I couldn’t blame him.

Doc twisting in the air, trying to break free, and I stood there helpless.