***
“Dammit! That was a crappy shot. My fault on that one!”
“No worries, sir Steve! Behold! They are all retreating to the tunnel Breslin wants us to take. He must be right. Come! Do not lose sight o’ them!”
Dwarf and human surged ahead, with the weary fire thrower bringing up the rear. Every so often a guur would poke its head out of an overhead tunnel, and a searing blast of fire had it retreating back into the rock.
The guur they had been chasing paused suddenly, checking behind it to see if it had eluded the flames yet. It hadn’t! The fire pursues! The urge to flee spurred the guur on once more. Up ahead was a known junction of at least ten subterranean tunnels. Chances of one or more of its hive mates being in the area was strong. With their help, it could rid itself of these aggressors once and for all.
Emerging into a small cavern, the guur bristled with excitement. One of its brethren was lying in ambush just inside the closest tunnel, waiting for the opportune time to attack. The smallest biped passed by first, followed by the much larger one. There, the final biped approached. Now was its chance! The guur clicked its pincers, signaling for the trap to be sprung.
Without warning, a guur’s head appeared at eye level directly in front of Steve. Its jaws opened, pincers preparing to strike. He didn’t even blink. Three years of taekwando kicked in even before he could even think about igniting his hands. His right fist lashed out as he twisted his body to the left, channeling all his strength into the blow. His fist, protected by the enchanted gauntlet, knocked the guur’s head clean off. It rolled sickeningly down the tunnel before bumping into the captain’s right boot. Rhenyon glanced down to see lifeless insectoid eyes staring up at him. Nodding with approval, he kicked the head away and watched as the rest of the guur twitched a few more times before dropping lifelessly to the ground.
“Ewww. Damn bugs.”
“Excellent strike, sir Steve.”
“Thanks.”
Its chances of salvation dashed, the lone guur darted away as fast as it could.
The trio pursued the large insect through countless tunnels, passing by amazing rock formations, and numerous small caverns. What was that noise? Were they approaching the river? Something could now be heard besides the sounds of their own footfalls and the constant chittering of the guur. Yes, Steve decided, once he was able to hear it clearly past the sounds of his own labored breathing, they had to be getting close. Fumbling on his harness for yet another charged mimet, Steve restored his jhorun back to full strength and then slipped another crystal into his trouser pocket.
WHAM!
He had run full-tilt into the back of Rhenyon. Blinking his eyes profusely to clear the swirling stars from his vision, Steve gazed up at the captain. When had he stopped, anyway?
Rhenyon leaned over and offered an arm to help him up. The battle-hardened soldier hadn’t even been thrown off balance by the impact. Impressive!
“Are ye uninjured, sir Steve?”
“Yeah, I’m okay. What’s up? Why’d we stop?”
“Behold, lads,” Breslin whispered, gesturing in front of them. “The source of the Duvvin. We must be careful. The female guur is here.”
“How can you tell?”
Breslin gestured at the floor, where his axe was embedded. Steve squinted. He ignited his hands so that he could see better. There, on the floor, was a small guur. Half was on one side of the axe, and the rest hidden from view, presumably on the other side. Once again, the axe had buried itself deep in the rock. How strong was this dwarf, anyway?
“You got one, is that it? So there’s more around?”
Breslin nudged one half of the guur. “This is a young guur. Note the size. The female is close, I tell ye. Be careful.”
“Do ye think she’s in one of those caves?” Rhenyon pointed at one of the shadowy openings down below.
“Aye, I do, lad.”
“How do we find out which one she is in?”
“Let’s introduce ourselves, shall we?” Steve ignited a chaser and threw it at the closest cave. It spiraled in and slammed against the cave wall. Three other chasers went rocketing into the other three caves, each exploding magnificently as they smashed into solid stone. Nothing.
“Two left,” Rhenyon observed. “Which one do ye think it is?”
“Shhhh!” Breslin shushed them both, silently pointing at the third alcove to get hit with a chaser. “Observe!”
Something was moving about inside. A long, segmented leg extricated itself from the smoky ruins of the cave and dug into the rock, anchoring itself in place. Three more legs materialized out of the smoke to take their place on either side of the opening as the female guur emerged reluctantly from what was left of her lair.
The creature that appeared was unlike anything Steve had ever clapped eyes on. Whereas he could see the similarities to the ‘drone’ guur, the female was much larger, with what appeared to be two extra abdomens, and four extra legs to support the extended body. Numerous spiky protuberances were situated all along the carapace, with her head having an extra two sets of antennae that were constantly twitching about, testing the air. The female stopped to face the outcropping of rock that the three attackers were hiding behind. A loud, chittering careened off the walls as the female shrieked with anger.
“What’s she doing?” Steve whispered. “Think she knows we’re here?”
“Ye did just destroy her lair, lad,” Breslin whispered back. “She knows we are here, that’s for certain.”
A swarm of about fifty guur materialized next to their queen, instinctively surrounding her to protect her from the unseen threat they knew was nearby. Several guur began herding the queen into one of the two remaining caves, intent on shielding her from harm as quickly as possible.
“Now is the time to act!” Rhenyon whispered, watching as the female was guided into one of the last two caves. “We must get to her before she retreats into another cave!”
The captain started to rise when both Steve and Breslin laid a hand on his arm.
“Wait. Let her go into the cave. Easier to hit her from here.”
“Willing to wager that she is angling for a cave and not an escape tunnel?”
That silenced both Steve and the dwarf, who stared at the dark opening.
“All right, we attack on three. Ready? One… Two… Three!!”
The Prophecy Page 42
