The first signs that the enemy is approaching was the smoke that filled the horizon like a dark haze, a wall of black and grey that slowly crawled its way south toward the outermost walls like some lumbering titan dragging itself forward on its belly, the lights of artillery fire, exploding in the distance, shots guided by drones that hang in the sky as nearly imperceptible dots against the dark background of an angry sky that flashes with the light of barely contained lightning. Distant thunder glows with the promise of a slowly encroaching tide of death. The sounds of artillery batteries firing fills the air with a constant rhythm of boom, boom, boom, that can be heard from almost every corner of the base and even from its expanded borders. Nearly half a million civilians, from women and children to the men and sick and injured, all crammed in and gathered from all around to desperately take refuge in one of the last of America’s strongholds. From every survivor living in the refuge zones, those living in reclaimed residential areas, large apartment complexes and shipping container shanty homes, to those living on freshly claimed farmland with their families. Everyone could hear the explosive rumble of American fire power as it rained down on an approaching enemy.
Normally, such heavy displays of firepower are held back in reserve for only the largest of threats, as such open use of heavy weaponry has a tendency to draw in the worst of the monsters that now call our world home. Hordes of the things being drawn from every direction to silence those massive weapons. Those in charge had quickly learned to limit their use of certain weaponry, to hold back as much as possible on the heavy ordnance so as to keep the constant onslaught of monsters attacking their walls to just those that can be taken down with rifles and the occasional mortar round or grenade lobbed over the walls. Anything to keep their necessary buildings like the hospital and the research facility still running while also being able to keep the monsters away.
It is because they had learned this early on that Fort Knox is still standing as one of the last few bastions of the US Military, or of any military for that matter…
With the rain of heavy artillery constantly being sent out, it was only a matter of time until more monsters would be drawn to attack the walls, drawn out from their hibernations where they would have been patiently waiting out the winter. Before the Goblins can even arrive, the walls are placed under siege by the monsters. It starts with the smaller, more speedy creatures arriving first. They come screaming out of the woods to throw themselves at the human defenses with reckless abandon only to be gunned down by waiting guards.
Despite the coming hordes of Goblins, the defenders have not been so foolish as to move all their forces to the north wall. While the majority of them have certainly been moved there, there is still a sizable force left to defend the other walls from rampaging monsters. Though, the question is how long they can keep the monsters back until they can repel the Goblins. Before any of the truly dangerous monsters can be drawn to attack the base.
Within, soldiers drive about and call out through loudspeakers, calling for people to either stay indoors and arm themselves or to head towards the bunkers and emergency shelters where they will be safe. Locations like the hospital, schools, and churches, are quickly filled with civilians as they seek safety in the case of a breach.
Within the western-most expansion, Sky is waiting patiently within the living room of her and Lain’s home, in deep meditation as she focuses inward, pushing her mind to look towards her core, just like Lain had taught her whenever she would join Lain in her own meditation sessions.
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Rookie
Breathe in, breathe out…
Sky continues to sit there, has been sitting there, for hours with her legs crossed on the floor and her tail wrapped around her waist, her posture looking relaxed but focused with her eyes closed and her back held straight.
Breathe in, breathe out…
Outside of her and Lain’s home, the sound of artillery continues to sound out in the distance, our forces already having long since started bombarding the Goblins since the morning. The sounds of artillery fire have been sounding out all day for hours now, and yet they don’t cease for even a moment. Even with all the noise, Sky doesn’t stop her meditations, her focus unwavering despite the fact that she has apparently been at this for days now, only getting the bare minimum of rest before delving back into her meditation. And her work is starting to show. Bit by bit, I am slowly starting to feel a presence about her, much like that Field thing that Lain occasionally lets leak out whenever she uses her powers around people. Standing in the same room as Sky now, it almost feels like her hand is gently pushing down on my shoulders. I can’t help but watch her as she continues to breath in and out, maintaining a steady rhythm where her every exhalation seems to push something out into the world.
Breathe in, breathe out…
The front door opens, someone being allowed inside by the Kobold guards without a fuss. There is only a couple of people that that can be, and it doesn’t seem to distract Sky, even as a girl’s voice starts to call out from the entrance.
“Sky, are you in here!?” She calls out as she moves through the mansion. It doesn’t take her long to find us, which isn’t too surprising considering that this room is currently under heavy guard. All she has to do is follow where to where the soldiers and Kobolds are.
“Sky, they are calling for people to evacuate to the shelters, we need to get go-”
She gets interrupted by the Kobold guards getting her way, responding to her in their best attempts at English.
“No, interrupt.” “Empress busy, no… Distract? Yes, no, distract!” The two Kobold declare as they cross their spears to block access into the room, their little bodies dressed from head to literal tail in plate and scale armor that seems to have been carved from the bodies of different monsters, capes of fur hanging from their shoulders and bearing iron crafted sigils hanging from chains. Honestly, the craftsmanship of their armor is superb, decorated with little decals and ornaments, and makes them look like little knights in stylized armor with animal shaped full helms. These two guards in particular have their helmets looking like that of a bull and a stag, with matching horns on top. Really, it looks sort of like some of the armor sets from that game Lain made me to play with her, where you hunt monsters and make stuff out of their parts to be able to hunt bigger monsters… only in real life. Point is, they look pretty cool, and if it weren’t for the fact that they are half my size, and I am already pretty short myself, then they would be pretty intimidating. Right now, though, they just look like kids in cosplay.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
If it wasn’t for the fact that I have seen how viscously these little fluffy people can fight, then I wouldn’t have been able to take them very seriously, but I know how dangerous their spears and knives can be, so I make sure to treat them with due respect. Especially when it comes to protecting their beloved Empress.
The person they are blocking is Lain’s sister, Anna, a girl that I have had the opportunity to interact with a couple of times now. She is a very nice girl, and I doubt that the Kobold would ever hurt the person who is basically their Empress’s sister-in-law, but they are justifiably jumpy right now with everything that is going on.
So, to keep things from getting bad, I quickly move over and let myself out of the room, ushering Anna off the side of the hallway before she can anger the little guards into giving her a poke. On my way out, I have to carefully navigate around the other meditating Kobolds in the room, a bunch of old looking ones in robes that Sky called shamans.
“Sky, we need to get going, please let me in… Oh, Rookie, hey. What are you doing here?”
“Shhh, don’t distract her and keep your voice down, she is busy.”
“Busy? We need to get going. They are calling for an evacuation to the emergency shelters. We need to leave and meet up with mom and dad.”
“Right, I know, but she has decided not to move until she is finished. Sky won’t be going to the shelters and is planning to stay with her people and fight. Also, I’m here because my team got assigned to guard her. We are under orders to keep her safe and do as she tells us.” I say as I gesture over at Thomas who has claimed an armchair to sit in by the fireplace, his LMG resting on a table next to him.
Anna throws another look towards Sky, before giving up with a little sigh. “Is she still trying to get her magic to work? She’s been at this ever since she started zapping herself… Does she actually have magic, like Lain?”
“I think so? Whatever is going on in there certainly feel magical. It’s like the air feels all staticky.”
Anna returns her gaze back to the room and I turn to look as well, still finding the sight to be a bit fascinating. Sky is sitting cross-legged in the center of the living room on a large cushion, with all the furniture pushed away to the walls. Surrounding Sky is a bunch of batteries, laptops, electric lanterns, and anything else that can hold electricity that she was able to scrounge up and find. She even had her people tear old cars apart to steal their batteries to add to the rings that surround her. Even now, her people are still bringing in more electronics and batteries, offering them up to her so they can help however they can. TV remotes and game controllers, RC cars, game consoles, and anything else that they can find. Her people bring them in and hand them to the guards so they can be added to the piles that surround her.
Thankfully, her people aren’t going around and stealing from around base or anything like that, at least not yet… No, instead, they are simply clearing out the town they have taken over as their new refugee city in the western expansion. The town hadn’t been cleared out before the Kobolds took it over, so all of the old junk is still there for them to claim and use as they see fit.
Surrounding those rings of piles of electronics and batteries, is their Shamans, the old and greying Kobolds joining Sky in her meditations as they sit in a circle around her, their breathing all somehow perfectly synced as they sit in complete silence.
“How long do you think she will be?” Anna eventually asks, but all I can do is shrug.
“I have no idea. How long does Lain normally do her… magic meditations, or whatever it is she does to practice?”
“… I honestly have no idea. Lain doesn’t like to talk about stuff like this around us, and we rarely see her using her magic. Unless she gets lazy and has her shadows grab stuff for her, but I mean, yeah, I would do that to if I could… I’m pretty sure that she does it because she doesn’t want to feel too different from the rest of us, like she is still her old self. We’ve tried to make it a point to not ask her about it and just treat her like normal.” Anna says sadly.
She turns to me and asks, “How about you guys, her friends, does she talk about any of this stuff?”
I just shake my head as I keep watching Sky meditate. “No, she doesn’t talk about any of that with us either. If we ask her stuff, like about her Demons or whatever, she will answer, but then always quickly change the subject to something else. I think you’re right, it’s like she wants to pretend that she is still just a normal girl and not, well, Queen of the Demons, Wifey of the Kobold Empress, creator of a whole new race of people, and basically the leader of a squad of Special Forces Super Soldiers… and I can’t blame her really. Being normal is nice... Jokes on her though, normal girls don’t hang out with soldiers and have fun by learning to drive tanks and use hand grenades to demolish condemned buildings.”
“When was that!?”
“A couple weeks ago when we all together and had some time off. We might have had a bit too much to drink that night, one thing led to another, and we somehow ended up with a tank and a crate of hand grenades. And well, since Lain was the only sober one at the time, that made her the DD for the night, naturally, -”
“Naturally…”
“- and so, Sergeant thought it would be fun to teach her how to drive a tank… Ended up driving it to one of the condemned areas, where the buildings need to go down so we could make way for new homes and stuff to be built, you know? Yeah, well, we had a lot of fun that night. MPs were PISSED afterwards, and we all got chewed out, but it was fun.”
“So that’s why she came home late and wouldn’t tell us why…” Anna says as she is looking up and to the right, probably recalling a memory.
I can’t help but to giggle a bit. “Yes, don’t tell her that I told you though, ok?”
“Mhm, I won’t.” Anna says with a nod. “But back to what I was originally here for, the evacuation call is going out right now. Is Sky really not going to come with us?”
“You could wait until she is finished and ask her yourself, but as far as I know, no. She is planning on staying with her people to try and help however she can. At least that’s what she told me.”
“Oh…” Anna looks sad to hear that, and while it seems like she wants to argue, she eventually relents and nods her head. “Ok then. When you can, can you please tell her that we are going to be holding up in the hospital? Mom refuses to leave for the bunkers. There are too many patients that can’t be moved, but there will be plenty of soldiers and guards there to keep it safe. They even have a tank protecting the entrance in case any big monsters get that far.”
“Will your dad be there? I know he is working as a guard now. Or did he get assigned to one of the walls?”
“He’ll be at the hospital with us.” Anna tells me, relief clearly in her voice.
“Ah, good, and that is probably intentionally too. I doubt that Command wants to risk losing any of you. It could affect their relationship with Lain.” I tell her thoughtfully, mulling over how much of my superiors’ thoughts and plans probably now resolve around this crazy Imp now. But honestly, if you had someone that can make super soldiers on demand, then you would be making concessions too.
“Yeah… One of the many benefits of being her family. I just wish it didn’t come with the cost of having her have to fight all the time…”
“Well, if it is any consolation, she is doing a lot to help. Our casualty rates have gone down quite a lot since she joined us. She’s crazy and weird, but she does good work.”
Anna just gives a sad smile, so it probably didn’t help much…
I quickly decide that we should hurry this along, so I more forward and gently take her by the shoulder, walking her towards the door. “Anyways, you should hurry up and return to your family. They are probably worried about you and waiting. And you don’t need to worry about Sky, me and my team will keep her safe no matter what. We wouldn’t want the Demon Queen to rampage and destroy the world because of her wife getting hurt.”
“Hahaha… Don’t let Lain hear you call her that, she hates it, hehe. Also, they aren’t married yet, not even engaged.” Anna laughs as we walk toward the entrance.
“Yeah, but everyone knows that is just a matter of time until they tie the knot. Heck, they are already living together.”
Anna laughs again, “Yeah, they’re a couple of U-Haul lesbians, hahaha.”
Finding Sanders near the entrance as he is on his patrol around the manor, I stop him and let him know that I’ll be out for a bit and to let him know that Thomas is still watching over Sky. Heading outside with Anna, I tell her, “I’ll drive you to the Hospital and then come back. Sky will be able to focus better if she knows that you guys are safe.”
“Alright, thank you, Rookie.”
Getting into a Jeep, we drive away from the snowy fields of the mansion, the sounds of artillery still blasting away in the distance as a constant reminder of the approaching threats. Even from the nearest walls to the west, the sounds of gunfire can be heard as the first of the monsters attracted by the noise are being fended off.