by A. K. DuBoff
Kaiden thought for a moment. “Come to think of it, does anyone actually know how big the crystalline network is?”
I shrugged. “No idea. Does the Hegemony have a map?”
Maris activated a comm link to the Evangiel. “Commander Colren,” she greeted when the communication connected.
“Is everything okay?” the commander replied, sounding anxious through the static on the link.
“Ran into a bit of trouble, but we’re unharmed,” she continued. “We’ve reached the central crystal and are extracting the data logs now. Say, do you know about any sort of map of the crystalline network?”
He was silent for several seconds. “Why do you ask?”
“We need to trace a signal being transmitted via the network. Knowing how far-reaching it is might help us narrow down where it’s coming from,” Toran chimed in.
“We have a partial map, yes,” Colren replied. “It was extracted from the Master Archive using the interface system on the Evangiel. Now that the Archive is sealed, though, there’s no way to get updated records.”
“A partial map is better than nothing,” I said.
“Maybe, but I don’t know how useful this one will be. There aren’t any outer boundaries to the network—it’s as expansive as known space,” the commander clarified.
My sense of hope that had been building over the past several minutes crashed. “It really could be anywhere…”
“There might be answers buried in the signal,” Toran said, his enthusiasm returning even as mine dwindled. “We won’t know for sure until I get this data back to the Evangiel.”
“Then get back here,” the commander instructed. “I don’t want the four of you down there for a second longer than necessary.”
“Just another minute or two and this download will be complete,” Toran acknowledged.
“We’ll be waiting for you. Central Command out.” Colren ended the commlink.
“One step forward, two back,” I muttered.
“I don’t know, we may have actually had a net gain of half a step forward with this one.” Kaiden smiled.
Maris snorted. “This is really testing the definition of small victories.”
“Yeah, I guess it’s something to investigate, at least,” I realized. “Leads are better than dead ends.”
Kaiden nodded. “For sure.”
Toran checked on the transfer. “We can be on our way soon. Just another minute or so until—” He cut off. “What’s that over there?” He set down the tablet on the monument’s edge and brought up his fists in a defensive pose.
I noticed the approaching figure a moment after him. The creature slinked through the black tendrils with the grace of a cat, one moment on four legs and the next on two. Its sleek pelt and powerful jaws reminded me of the creatures we’d encountered a week earlier after I’d retrieved my Valor artifact. Given that I’d watched those other creatures birthed, I could only draw one conclusion. “Is that what those things from the Valor world grow up to be?”
Kaiden readied a fireball. “An alien hybrid.”
“This day just keeps getting better.” Maris refreshed the protective shells around us.
“We need to hold it off for another minute,” Toran said. “As soon as the transfer is complete, we can make a run for the shuttle.”
“Yeah, except the ground might eat us,” I pointed out.
The shadowcat snarled and bounded toward us, ending any hope of avoiding an engagement that might aggravate the vines.
Kaiden released a fireball as soon as the alien made its move. The blast struck the shadowcat in the center of its broad chest, but the creature barely missed a stride.
I ripped my legs free from the nest of vines as quickly as I could, not worried that I may aggravate them. I needed to move; my sword had proven to be one of the few effective weapons against similar shadowcreatures in the past.
Wading through the dark tendrils, I raised my blade, its magical blue flames rippling around the steel. After six strides, I was within striking distance. The shadowcat reared to maul me, and I ducked, thrusting my blade into the base of its ribcage and slashing downward.
The alien beast roared with pain and fury as it struggled to distance itself from my attack.
“Hit it now!” I shouted.
Fireballs launched from the end of Kaiden’s staff as I ripped my blade free and dove to the side. I rolled over my left shoulder and jumped back to my feet to face the creature, which was still standing but looked weakened.
Kaiden struck it with an electrical attack, which branched into three separate beams to simultaneously hit its head, torso, and hindquarters. Smoke rose from the charred hide at the points of impact, and the creature swayed on its feet.
I needed to finish it off while it was stunned. I ran forward until I was a pace away, then swung my sword downward at the base of its skull. The flaming blade sliced clean through the flesh and what must have been the equivalent of bone in the alien hybrid. Its jaws flexed wide as it sucked in a dying breath. Knees buckling, it crumpled to the ground. The moment it fell, the black tendrils blanketing the ground began to encase it; within minutes, it would be nothing more than an unrecognizable mound.
I lowered my sword and released a relieved sigh. “I really hate these things.”
6
“You okay?” Kaiden asked me, lowering his staff.
“Didn’t even touch me,” I replied, checking myself over. It was then, however, that I realized my moves during the fight had foolishly exposed most of my suit to the infected ground. I quickly checked myself to make sure that none of the tendrils had latched onto my torso, and at least I seemed to be unscathed in that respect. What might happen to my suit remained to be seen.
I flicked my blade and then wiped it off using a cleaning cloth from a pouch next to my scabbard. “Are we ready to get out of here?”
“Yes, transfer just completed,” Toran confirmed as he detached his equipment from the interface.
“Good, let’s go.” I shifted anxiously on my feet while Toran finished packing. Dark forms kept darting through the shadows around us. As much as I wanted to hope I was just on edge from the last engagement, I knew better; we were being hunted.
Once Toran had secured his equipment and the data backup in his pack, we began making our way back through the tendril-covered plaza at a steady pace. Though the way toward the monument had been easy going, I now found that the tendrils were beginning to tug more at my feet whenever I tried to take a step.
“Is anyone else feeling a little restricted here?” I asked.
“Then it’s not just me.” Kaiden frowned at his feet as he continued to plod forward. “I don’t think it wants us to go.”
“That might be the most disturbing thing I’ve heard all day—and there’ve already been some doozies.” Maris shook her foot as one of the tendrils threatened to climb up her leg. In response, the vines already around her feet and ankles cinched tighter. “Agh!”
“Don’t fight it!” I cautioned, trying to keep my own movements measured despite my pulse spiking. “Relax. See if they let go.”
Maris paled, her breath quavering over the comm. “It’s getting tighter.”
“Shit.” Kaiden glanced from Maris to the shuttle a hundred fifty meters away. The last two-thirds of that distance were relatively open ground, but we still had another fifty meters of the tendril field that now seemed intent on keeping us as part of its personal collection.
“I don’t think we can make a run for it without turning this entire field against us,” I said. “Let me see if I can cut it off. Keep moving.”
I shuffled over to Maris with far more difficulty than I would have had even a minute prior.
Kaiden and Toran continued along the path to the shuttle, watching me over their shoulders.
“Stay calm,” I told Maris when I reached her.
“Easy for you to say when a demon-plant isn’t cuttin
g off the circulation in your foot,” she replied through gritted teeth. Terror filled her eyes in the light cast from the hazsuit’s facemask.
I pointed my sword blade toward the ground and slowly pressed it through the knots of black tendrils at the side of Maris’ right foot. The steel sliced straight through the vines, but they recoiled from each severed point and snapped back in an attempt to re-snare her legs. A new tendril snaked up her thigh.
Maris conjured a fireball in her palm. “Stand back, Elle.”
“Maris, don’t! This whole field might turn on us.”
She looked me in the eyes through the facemask of her hazsuit. “It already has.”
A beam of fire streamed from her palm toward the dark tendrils closing around her. I brought up my arm to shield my eyes against the blaze, regaining my vision just in time to see a wave of the black vines rising up before me.
I took a hasty step back and sliced at them with my blade. “Run!” I shouted to Kaiden and Toran, hating that we might fail in the mission after being so close to succeeding. It might be too late for Maris and me, but maybe the two men could make it back to the shuttle before they were snared.
Only, rather than the sound of receding footsteps, my attention was drawn by a fireball thrown by someone other than Maris. The orb hurtled past Maris, who was still desperately trying to beat back the vines attempting to weave their way around her.
“You missed!” she yelled at Kaiden.
“I wasn’t aiming for you.”
Then, behind Maris, I saw his intended target—a pride of six shadowcats slinking from the shadows of the city ruins. Their expressionless black eyes were impossible to read, but their inky lips were curled back to reveal three rows of needlelike teeth.
“Great, that’s all we need.” I sliced the black vines at my feet and bolted back toward Maris.
She was still rooted to the ground, casting weak fireballs in an attempt to get free. “We’re not going to make it.” Her tone had gone from frightened to defeated, not a good sign.
“Don’t even start.” I glared at her. “Buck up and fight back. We’re the heroes, remember?”
Maris worked her mouth while she no doubt searched for the right objection, but instead she nodded. “You’re right. Screw this planet.”
Our eyes met and I suddenly knew what we had to do; I couldn’t explain where the feeling had come from, but Maris’ eyes lit up. She cracked a smile. “Ready?” I asked on instinct.
“Do it.”
I slashed my sword around her and she spun, simultaneously casting a continuous beam of fire from her hands. As the movements unfolded, I couldn’t shake the feeling that we’d done it before, even though it hadn’t occurred to me until a moment earlier. Wherever the idea came from, the move worked. My sword severed the bonds holding Maris in place, and the vines recoiled from the heat radiating from the flames. As Maris spun, she picked up her feet and jumped to a new patch where the vines appeared to be dormant; they certainly wouldn’t stay that way for long, but a half-second delay was everything with the tools at our disposal.
My world tinted orange as Maris cast haste magic on our party. My own movements appeared in real-time to me, but everything except for my companions in the outside world now looked like it was moving in slow motion. The vines unfurled from the groundcover like a time-lapse video, and I carefully stepped around the tendrils slowly extending toward my feet.
“Stars, this would have been really handy earlier!” Kaiden exclaimed.
“Sorry, I was distracted,” Maris replied, flushed. “Stop complaining and fight!”
Our banter ceased and two of the shadowcats parted from the others to circle around behind us. Their movements were swift, even with our altered perception from the haste magic. We wouldn’t have any advantage, but this at least gave us a fighting chance.
I got into battle position. Just one of the shadowcats had proven to be a reasonable foe for our group, but I had my doubts about half a dozen. While physically I knew we could take them on, the real challenge came from six individual targets. We needed a way to keep them working together as a unit so we didn’t have too many separate fronts to track.
“Maris and Kaiden, keep those four distracted,” I ordered. “Toran, those two will be coming up behind us. We can’t let them catch us by surprise.”
“Okay, we’ll try,” Kaiden acknowledged.
I wanted to correct him that ‘try’ wasn’t an option, but I decided that went without saying. We were about to fight for our lives, and we all knew it.
With our backs to Kaiden and Maris, Toran and I arranged ourselves so we’d have full visibility of the area around us; there was no way the two shadowcats could sneak up behind us without us knowing. One of them was bound to make a move at any moment, we just had to wait.
Except, nothing happened.
“Where are they?” I asked in a low voice when thirty seconds had passed with no sighting.
“I don’t know,” Toran replied.
“How long are we supposed to distract these things?” Kaiden called out.
I kept my feet moving to avoid being snared. “Until these two aren’t behind us.”
He grunted “Well, these four are getting impatient.”
It didn’t make any sense. The other shadowcat had pounced on us the moment we saw it. Why had these two disappeared?
The orange tint faded from my vision, the haste spell having expired. “Maris, time to—”
My vision spun and a sharp pain radiated from my right shoulder. I struck the ground, my vision black as tendrils washed over me in one horrifying wave. My arms were bound by the vines in an instant. I was trapped.
Heat radiated above me. I couldn’t see it, but I could feel two taloned paws pinning my shoulders to the ground. The shadowcat’s jaws must have been centimeters from my face. “It’s got me!” I shouted into my comm, not sure that anyone would hear me or know where I’d fallen. I needed to free myself.
My arms felt impossibly heavy with the vines wrapped around them, but I yanked my sword hand with all my might. The vines had just enough give to free it a little, and then I used the slack to see the movement through the rest of the way. I pivoted my wrist as much as I could to stab the end of my blade upward into where the shadowcat’s abdomen should be based on it pinning me with its front legs. Unable to raise my shoulder, I knew the attack would be weak, but the flaming blade of the sword would do the work for me.
Just as the blade met resistance, the world tinted orange around me again. The weight released from my shoulders and I sat upright. As I rose, some of the tendrils that had covered my facemask fell away, and I saw the shadowcat stumbling backward, viscous black blood spurting from a wound in its side. Amazingly, I’d hit it right where I’d intended.
A smile played on my lips. “You messed with the wrong group.” I leaped to my feet, slicing back the vines around me to keep them at bay.
The shadowcat I’d wounded snarled, but when it tried to lunge toward me once more, it stumbled. I took the opportunity to deal it a lethal blow, severing its head at the base of the skull like I’d done with the first. Its lifeless body collapsed, the pool of blood invisible amid the bed of vines.
“Well, that wasn’t so bad.” No one replied to my quip. I pivoted to face my friends and was horrified to see that four shadowcats were racing toward Maris and Kaiden while Toran was gripped in the talons of the fifth.
My heart dropped. I couldn’t aid in both defenses at the same time. Toran was closer to me, but I also had more faith that he’d be able to beat the solitary shadowcat into submission. A fight of four against two—especially given Maris’ weak offensive capabilities—was where I was needed the most.
I bounded across the intervening terrain, still under the influence of the haste magic. Kaiden’s and Maris’ fireballs appeared to have almost no effect on the attacking shadowcats. The creatures’ movements were almost as quick as ours, but I could still
close the distance in time.
“Jump clear!” I shouted when I was right behind Kaiden and Maris.
They looked over their shoulders, then quickly took a step to the side as I charged past them.
“What are you—” Kaiden started to ask.
In response, I jumped over the head of the middle shadowcat and flipped midair. When I was directly above it, I plunged my sword into its back and used it as a pivot point to kick the shadowcat on its left, and then swung back around to the right. As I completed the rotation, I removed the sword, bringing it around at an angle to decapitate the other middle shadowcat as I flew horizontally through the air. I didn’t have enough momentum to repeat the move on the fourth, but I was able to embed the tip of my blade as I passed over its back, opening up a gash that stretched from its shoulder to the center of its ribcage on the other side.
I landed on my side and then rolled up to my feet in one motion. By the time I was upright, the first shadowcat I’d stabbed had fallen to the ground and was disintegrating, and the decapitated creature was already halfway turned to soot. The remaining two shadowcats looked worse for wear but were still standing.
“Holy shit…” Kaiden whispered in stunned disbelief.
“Don’t just stand there!” I lunged back for the shadowcat nearest me, which I’d slashed across its back. Just as I made my move, the orange tint faded from the world around me, along with the protective purple shell.
The shadowcat seemed to sense the change, and it rose on its two rear legs, bearing its teeth and flashing the dark talons on its front paws. I thought it was just a display at first, but then it compressed its hindquarters and sprung toward me. I tried to dodge it, but the talons had latched onto me before I fully registered the movement. The hazsuit’s fabric ripped. I sensed pressure on my back, but there wasn’t the searing pain of the nails in my flesh that I expected to follow; my coat beneath the hazsuit had done its job once again. The shadowcat, however, wasn’t deterred by the thin fabric.
It snapped at my facemask, wrapping its jaws around the transparent plastic. The faceplate fogged from its warm breath and smeared with slobber. Rancid air leaked in through the tear in my hazsuit’s shoulder. There was no telling it if would hasten the corruptive properties of the world on my equipment, but at least there was still oxygen I could breathe.
