by Macronomicon
“Casey,” she gasped.
“Casey, nice to meet you.” Jebediah turned to the side, where Smartass and a dozen other faeries were hovering curiously.
“You guys have been drafted.”
“Uh…what?” Smartass asked.
“Your M&M lord commands it! Fetch me water and towels!”
The faeries scattered.
He turned back to Casey. The black-haired goth teen with the running mascara was watching him with a frightened expression.
“Faeries,” Jeb said by way of explanation. “By the way, what’s your Body at? This is relevant to your pregnancy.”
“Thirteen.” She said moments before another contraction hit her, causing her to groan and clench her jaw.
Excellent. Thirteen is well into superhuman territory, so as long as she doesn’t crush her baby’s skull, she should be relatively safe, being significantly tougher than a normal mom.
Jeb had heard plenty of stories about women bleeding out, and basically all the way up until the last hundred years, birth had been a crapshoot, where mothers dropped like flies.
And even if her natural resilience failed, there was the Vivicant cane. Brett had refilled it for him, and he’d used one for the spike in her shoulder, leaving him with three uses.
If three uses of magical healing couldn’t compensate for a lack of high-tech facility, Jeb would eat his hat.
I guess now I’ve gotta…check the dilation?
Peering into a gaping, bloody pussy wasn’t Jeb’s idea of a good time, but you did what you had to do.
About three inches, Jeb thought to himself. He was pretty sure the number for a baby head that he’d heard thrown around was ten centimeters.
Friggin’ metric system.
He did some quick conversion.
About four inches. Looks like we’re most of the way there.
Crash!
Jeb’s head swiveled, and he took in a humongous scaled monster with sharp teeth and a ravenous appetite that had just landed in the clearing. Most likely attracted by the spiny bastard’s howls.
It stood fifteen feet high at the shoulder, Absolutely massive, and big enough to swallow either of them in a single bite. It had a flat head covered in thick, sturdy scales, and a dumb look in its eye.
Casey let out a frightened whimper.
“Relax,” Jeb said. “I had to fight off monsters when my wife was delivering, too. This is totally normal.”
Jeb didn’t know if she caught the joke, or if it revealed his bullshit. Too late to worry about it now.
“SMARTASS!” Jeb said, watching the newcomer scan the area and lock onto them.
“Yessir, M&M lord?”
“Watch her dilation. When you see the baby’s head, gently pull it out. If she starts bleeding out or dying out at any point, channel all your Myst through the cane.” He said, dropping the cane down beside Casey.
“Yessir, M&M Lord!” Smartass said, saluting him before flying down between Casey’s legs. A moment later, a shrill voice began screaming.
“Oh gods it’s hideous! It’s like the gates of Tartarus opening up in front of me! A body can’t hold that much blood!”
Smartass immediately panicked and hit the panic button.
Jeb felt a cool rush of healing magic wash over him.
“Did you just…”
Jeb was interrupted as the creature began charging.
Jeb siphoned out two threads. One he used to lift himself off the ground, the other he wrapped around the creature’s head, intending to snap its neck.
Jeb…failed. The monster was ridiculously strong, and its sheer mass prevented him from completely stopping its charge toward Casey.
Then, change its course.
Jeb flew to the left, and dragged the creature’s head to the left as well, causing it to miss the oak tree by a few feet, spraying dirt from it’s scrabbling claws on Casey and Smartass.
It charged another hundred feet before it seemed to realize it had missed its target, glancing over its shoulder at the offending oak tree with ire.
“No, you look at ME!” Jeb said, flying in front of it, feeling a lot like one of the faeries himself as he taunted the creature.
“Pip one.”
He shot it right in the nose. Just as Jeb had feared, the mind-bullet failed to penetrate. Matter of fact, it ricocheted off, whizzing into the distance to no effect.
This must be one of those level fifty monsters the faeries told me about.
It snorted and shook its head, dim eyes refocusing on Jeb.
He gave the gigantic monster the finger.
Jeb didn’t know if it was the mind-bullet or the finger, but he liked to think that flipping the giant monster off is what made it charge him, trying to bite him out of the air.
Jeb had an especially uncomfortable view of the creature’s mouth as he flitted out of the way of its savage bites. It was pink with dark blue barbs coming off of it facing backwards, designed to prevent prey from escaping once they were in its maw.
How the fuck am I supposed to kill this thing? Jeb demanded to himself, carefully going through his choices as he led it further away from the oak tree.
Until he heard a scream in the distance.
He glanced past the gnashing teeth and spotted more monsters coming out of the sky to land in the clearing, orienting on Casey and Smartass.
Damnit!
Jeb released the creature’s head and sent his Myst over to Casey, covering her in a small, powerful dome of force.
Freed from hindrance, the creature’s snapping lunges grew even more frantic.
You want a taste of me? FINE!
Jeb wrapped himself in an egg of force and shoved himself directly into the creature’s mouth.
“Room full of Charlies.”
Jeb exploded with telekinetic blades and mind-bullets, three hundred and sixty degrees of destruction, from the crown of his head to the soles of his feet.
Every direction.
Jeb had made it with being imprisoned in a camp full of hostiles and no friendlies in mind, but being swallowed whole worked too.
There was an eruption of blood around him, drenching him through his shattered telekinetic egg.
Jeb reupped his flight and dragged himself out of the creature’s ruined mouth, exiting through the mangled lower jaw rather than crossing the teeth and fighting the barbs.
He shot out into the air, leaving the collapsing titan behind him as he approached the smaller monsters clawing the shield around Casey and scaring the poor girl witless.
A white tiger, lamprey-dragon, and raptor-looking thing were taking turns trying to peel the protective barrier away from the pantless girl.
Jeb swooped in, pointing a finger at the leftmost creature.
“Mark of Cain.”
Mind-bullets started pouring out, twenty-five a second as the cascade of Mystic Triggers unraveled. Jeb drew an arc through the three creatures, carefully avoiding the girl.
Each of the monsters got six or so bullets puncturing their torso, the other eighty were lost into the environment.
There’s a reason they call it spray and pray.
The white tiger went down, a hole in its heart, but the other two looked at him and snarled. The white lamprey-dragon was bleeding a white goop from its side as it lunged up at him, its stubby claws finding purchase on the goddamn air.
Flying? Not fair, Jeb thought hypocritically as he floated backwards, leading the creature away while the raptor chased after him on the ground. Every second he let them bleed themselves out, the better his odds.
Jeb dropped his flight, ducking under the squirmy lamprey-dragon. He used the Myst thread to form a mind-bullet and shoved it through the charging raptor’s face.
That did the trick, now –
Jeb’s thoughts were cut off as a slippery tail smacked into his head, nearly crumpling his spine as it sent him hurtling to the ground.
Jeb hit earth in an explosion of dust and pain, heady groggy and seein
g stars.
Keep moving.
He shoved himself up and to the side an instant before the lamprey’s mouth gouged out a trough of dirt where he’d been lying.
Jeb quickly scanned the surroundings.
He didn’t see any more monsters.
I’m gonna risk it.
He released the dome of force around Casey and siphoned two new threads of Myst, sucking the corona of energy around his star until it was empty, jettisoning it out into the world.
Jeb’s ‘threads’ of Myst came out pretty chonkin’ as he sent both of them up to the eel-shaped dragon bearing down on him.
Your flesh looks soft, he thought, seizing the creature’s bones with one thread and everything else with the other. He could feel the creature’s internal Myst fighting against his, but it felt like a baby bird struggling in his cupped hands.
The creature’s bones began to show against its soft skin as he began to pull them apart, causing it to writhe in pain.
In a move he’d learned from Mortal Kombat, Jeb tore out the eel’s flexible spine.
Jeb tossed the two halves of the monster aside and hopped over to Casey. His pegleg had wandered off somewhere, so he finally picked himself up and glided the last dozen feet over to her side.
“And how are we doing?” He asked, giving his most professional, calm tone of voice despite being covered in viscera.
“I think I can see the head!” Smartass cried, trying not to throw up. “So much blood…”
“I can feel something!” Casey groaned, unaware of the faerie keeping an eye on the situation. “I think it’s coming!”
Her eyes widened. “Above you!”
Jeb raised his left hand, fingers splayed as wide as he could get them.
The shield deployed just in time to ward off the crash of talons above him.
“Smartass, I gotta deal with this. You got this under control?”
“She pooped on me!” Smartass shouted, covered from head to toe in…stuff, wiping himself off furiously with one of the wet rags.
“Suck it up, buttercup!” Jeb said, using his Myst threads to fling the snarling creature away from them.
The other Faeries arrived while Jeb was dealing with the monster, carrying rags and several MRE containers full of water.
It became a joint effort, with Casey pushing, fairies pulling, and Jeb making sure they didn’t get killed by the unceasing onslaught of monsters.
You have gained a level!
You are now level 36!
Jeb was busily murdering the endless stream of creatures attracted to the sound of fighting when he heard the crying of an infant.
Yes! Now we can leave, Jeb thought, blasting over to the tree where dozens of faeries were proudly holding the bloody baby above their heads, Smartass standing on top of it like an exultant mountain climber.
“Look,” Smartass said, thumping his chest. “At what I have created! I am the bringer of life! I claim this human as my own and shall call her –”
Casey looked highly confused about the way her baby was seemingly floating in midair, and she scooped it up, not hearing the faerie’s indignant protests. Smartass was accidentally sandwiched between the baby and mother, his wings twitching as he struggled to escape.
“Can’t stay here,” Jeb said, landing beside her and pulling out his knife, cutting the umbilical cord with the confidence of desperation.
Jeb picked her up and wrapped a single thread of Myst around the two of them, picking them up and zooming away.
Behind him, Jeb felt the air vibrate to the powerful beat of a wing.
He glanced behind them and wished he hadn’t.
A toad-looking creature that dwarfed the other monsters swooped over them, its gullet expanding an instant before it dropped a rain of fire above their heads.
In a desperate bid to survive, Jeb made a two-layered bubble of air around the two of them, desperate to insulate them for the extra second or two it would take to get out of the clearing.
It worked.
Jeb and Casey made it out of the clearing zooming through the forest, safe inside their little bubble of protection.
The faeries on the other hand…
Jeb glanced back and his heart sank.
The entire clearing was on fire. The great oak carrying the entire Mossy-oak-in-the-clearing clan was ablaze, burning like it’d been doused with napalm.
Son of a bitch! Jeb gritted his teeth and put on more speed, aiming to lose pursuit in the woods. There was nothing he could do for them now.
He’d known it was dangerous to stay there, but he’d done it anyway. Too dangerous to move a woman in labor. Didn’t want to get ambushed searching for Jessica and co. Those thoughts had gotten people who’d helped him killed.
I should’ve just left and taken her with me.
Jeb took a deep breath, locked those thoughts away, and refocused on the now.
Now, he had to get Casey and baby to the rest of the group and get them somewhere safe. Get Amanda to look after them, make sure they didn’t die over the next couple hours…
“Ah, fuck I left my cane!”
The cane was certainly destroyed, whether it be from Faerie overuse or simply being burned to a crisp by toad/dragon fire.
You better be worth it, Jeb thought, glaring vindictively at the nursing baby.
Chapter 15: Cheese the Healer
It took Jeb a little over ten minutes to track down his team, since they’d been weaving around conflicts the entire time, they were a little off-course from where he thought they’d be.
They seemed surprised to see him. Jeb took a wild guess that it was because of the copious amounts of blood and the naked teen and her baby.
“Is she hurt!?” Amanda demanded, jumping up on the zombie-hauled palanquin as he alighted beside her.
“Probably not, I just wanted you to watch her, make sure she doesn’t have some kind of bad turn.”
“I can do that,” Amanda said, jumping off the palanquin and running over to the luggage, grabbing a cloak and sprinting back, wrapping it around the sleepy looking Casey in a professional manner.
She was shifting the baby a bit to tuck the cloak around the two of them when Smartass squirmed out, heaving a huge gasp of air.
“I LIIIIVE!” he shouted, unfurling his wings in a power-pose.
“Eep!” Amanda squeaked before hauling back to smack the little guy.
Jeb caught it a moment before she made contact, stopping her hand with a gentle cloud of Myst.
“He’s a friend,” Jeb said, picking up Smartass and putting the faerie on his shoulder. Ron watched the exchange with a chuckle. The three Myst users in the party could all see the faerie perfectly well, but Brett and Jess were unaware of what was going on.
“What happened?” Brett asked.
“Got bogged down,” Jeb said, relaxing. “Casey was ready to pop, so we had to stop and deliver the baby…except the monsters caught wind of it.”
He glanced at Brett. “You can’t afford to stop for anything. They don’t stop coming. Not anymore.”
“First thing we gotta do is find somewhere they won’t go, or else they’re gonna wear us down to nothing.” Jeb said, pointing to the west.
“Let’s start with the fire-mountain. Worst case scenario we can seal ourselves in a cave to sleep.”
“Aren’t those caves filled with fire?” Ron asked.
Jeb shrugged. “Not all of ‘em.”
“Well, I wish you fellas luck with that,” Smartass said, standing on Jeb’s shoulder and flexing his wings, drawing the attention of the spellcasters to himself. “I’ve got to get back to my acorn commodities business. Hopefully that ruckus scared away the devil squirrels.”
Jeb winced. Smartass had been buried between baby and boob when his entire tribe had been toasted. He still didn’t know.
“Now,” Smartass put his hand under Jeb’s nose, wigging his fingers greedily. “Payment for helping deliver that baby. I take payment in rare metals, candy
, acorns or lenses.”
“Unless you want the girl to settle her debt herself, with her…” Smartass adopted a spooky, melodramatic voice. “Firstbooorn!”
Jeb reached into his vest and pulled out a snickers and passed it to the faerie. It was his last one.
“Muahahaha! Seed money!” Smartass said, petting the candy bar with a malicious grin that split his face.
“It’s been nice knowing you chumps! Next time we see each other, I’ll be head of a multinational syndicate!”
Smartass made to fly away, but Jeb gently stopped him with a cloud of Myst.
“What?” Smartass demanded, turning to face him and clutching the candy bar possessively. “You already gave it to me. No take-backsies. Wait. Do corporations have take-backsies?”
“I just wanted to tell you something.” Jeb said. “No matter what happens with your corporate empire, you’ll always have a place with me. If things don’t work out, I’ll help you get back on your feet. I owe you that much.”
Smartass peered at him suspiciously for a moment, his face dark.
A moment later, he grinned. “’Kay!”
Smartass zoomed up into the sky, lugging the heavy snickers bar beneath him.
“What the hell was that?” Brett asked, mouth slack.
“Faeries.” Ron said, shaking his head. “I wish I’d thought of the candy angle. I just ate most of it.”
They kept on heading westward, avoiding combat as much as possible, streaming along at a human sprinting speed, carried by the zombies. There was something to be said about the fact that they didn’t get tired or slow down, no matter how long they went.
While they moved, they talked strategy.
Jeb opened the floor to discussion, when Ron spoke.
“Have any of you guys ever played Fire Emblem or Final Fantasy Tactics? Or any tactics game?”
Jeb shrugged.
“I played a bit on my brother’s Nintendo, but I didn’t get very far.” Brett said.
“Okay, there’s this tactic that always works,” Ron said, glancing at Amanda. “I call it Cheesing the Healer.”
“So we...use her as bait?” Jeb asked, unable to understand why they would cover her in cheese.
“What? No!” Ron stared at him agog. “Alright, so here’s how it goes. The healer is the anchor of any team. As soon as they go down, you’re basically fucked, so people tend to keep them in the back and only use them when necessary.”
