by Zack Finley
I just agreed to stay in Jaloa. I was still reeling internally from all that led up to that. If this was real, if I wasn't unconscious in a military hospital, this was another decision I could not walk back.
I didn’t need to rush into this decision, today. Argon considered a mating bond to be a lifetime commitment, and I owed it to both of us to take our time. To be sure.
Not an easy thing to communicate when you are extremely aroused, quite naked and lying in bed with a naked, beautiful and very willing woman. Part of me wanted to just go along with my fantasy, but most of me considered Argon a real flesh and blood woman. She deserved my respect and for me to enter into this relationship fully committed.
I shared my misgivings, not about whether we were compatible, but that I wanted no regrets on either side. This logical assessment conflicted substantially with my hot attraction to her. Argon was disappointed, but she understood my dilemma.
There were too many changes and too much to take in for me to make more than one lifetime commitment today. I was also exhausted. Argon kissed me, nipping my lip before slipping out of bed. Her departure left my side cold and lonely. She smiled at my thoughts but reached for the blankets we had tossed aside to cover me.
"We will talk and do more training in the morning," Argon said, adding a light buffer to our mind sharing. "Sleep now."
Surprisingly I was out like a light and slept soundly for hours until I awakened with an urgent need to pee. I groped mentally at the lights and was surprised when they brightened using only my mind. I practiced dimming then brightening them for a moment until my hydraulic needs sent me scurrying to find the facilities, with Allo hot on my heels.
◆◆◆
Chapter 4
After doing the necessary, Allo led me into the lit kitchen. I was dressed in my only clothing. The bloodstains were still visible, and the poultice showed through the ripped pant leg. My leg hurt but not enough to limit my activities.
I knew Argon was not in the suite. I sent her a mental query.
"I'm picking up your new clothes, I'll be back in a few minutes," she sent.
I poured the hot breakfast beverage into a cup she had left on the kitchen table and sipped. It seared my tongue. Jaloans had no problem keeping hot stuff hot. After a few minutes, I noticed my beverage had not cooled at all. I absentmindedly began eating the food she left while I used magic to access the cup.
I tentatively touched the cup with my mind the way I changed the lights and directed it turn down the heat. It responded instantly. That had me touching things randomly in the kitchen to find any magical controls. After several examples, I learned I could check what they did without adjusting the controls. I found most objects had a default setting and I returned everything I fiddled with to their defaults.
I was about to return to the bathroom to experiment more with its controls when Argon returned.
"Good morning Steve," she said. "I guessed the size but erred on the large side."
She put the bundle of clothes on the table and hugged me. That felt so good I hugged her back.
She pulled my head down to hers and kissed me, tentatively at first, but it expanded as our preliminary tie opened up. I couldn't help myself; I kissed her back just as enthusiastically. I pulled her into my pelvis and Happy and the two Boys were jumping out of their lair.
Argon danced out of my grasp and said, "We have lots of things to do today. Have you eaten sufficiently?" We both looked at my empty food plate. "Is there more?" I asked.
"I suspect the food is more filling than you think," Argon said. "If you are still hungry at mid-meal, we'll fill you up again."
"Why is it humans and Jaloans are so similar?" I asked.
Argon pondered the question a bit before responding, "You will get the best answer on that from Shala."
Argon knew Shala had first looked for a champion on Jaloa. After that search failed, Shala looked elsewhere. She limited her search to worlds with the most Jaloan compatible upright bipeds. Had this search failed she would likely have expanded her hunt.
When asked why Shala needed a champion, Argon shared her confusion and uncertainty. "Shala is preparing for the end of the world. This has driven the pace of my training since childhood. It sent her looking for you. I do not have a clear picture of the end, but I know Shala is very worried."
Argon returned to my question, "You are probably not the first to come from your world to Jaloa. The translation program Shala provided for you is comprehensive. I've used translators before, and they are quite primitive in comparison."
Despite lacking a clear picture of the end, Argon was committed to preparing for whatever was approaching. Today this involved raising my mage skills. "We must concentrate on your training immediately, as I fear the end-of-the-world will not wait for us," she said.
We dressed in our armor, and I received my own crossbow and bolts. I was very familiar with crossbows, and while the magical charging mechanism was different, the principles were still in line with what I knew. I asked Argon for a combat knife and a sword. She agreed to get them for me, but we would have to go out today without them.
While crossbows are nice, I was already missing my Mark 48 machine gun. Going from being a 60 gunner to crossbows and swords was going to be a big letdown.
We teleported to a desert area north of our home base.
"Can you show me how to do that?" I asked.
"Teleportation can be a tricky spell and requires control you don't have yet," Argon answered.
She showed me a safe way to monitor her magic use and encouraged me to observe future teleports and other spells to learn the proper technique.
I monitored as she set up a circle of wards around us, to contain any magical energy generated by our training. She emphasized the need to set up wards whenever practicing battle magic. The wards absorbed excess magic and kept people and animals from straying into the area.
When she began setting the wards, I had no idea what she was doing. By the time, she set the last one I heard the spell in her mind and felt her connect to her magic to form it. I asked if I could try to set one and she invited me to try, but within the original circle of wards.
Argon was a warm copilot in my mind, encouraging me while diligently monitoring my actions. With her guidance, I reached out with my magic and twisted a ward into place. It was different from hers but seemed to do the same thing.
"Very good Steve," she said. "Complete your circle. This is the simplest type of ward, and we can move onto more complicated ones after these are set up."
So, I practiced wards. I began to sense an easier way to set them up but used the technique she demonstrated until I finished surrounding the practice field. She examined each one and gave me the green light to make a ward within the practice field using my own spell. She assumed her copilot persona, and I twisted magic. The new ward set up with a snap.
Argon studied it for a moment. "This is even stronger and more efficient than mine," she said. "From now on you can set our practice wards using this as a model."
Argon had some magical battle dummies tucked into her backpack. She set them up inside our wards, before moving to the opposite end of the protected area.
"I want you to access your fire magic as soon as possible," Argon said, establishing the top goal for the session. "But first, I want to review some magical fundamentals."
"Where does the magic come from and how do I know how much I have," I asked.
She flowed back into my mind and began sorting out my magical assets.
"Your body produces only a small amount of new magic over time," she began. "How much you produce is determined by genetics and increases some with age. Imagine it as a trickle of water."
"I can't see any trickle when I look at my magic containers," I said.
"Most spells take significantly more power to execute than that trickle can provide in an instant. We get around this limitation because our bodies can store some of the magic for use later. You see t
hat storage as a container. The new magic drips into this container until it is used or it overflows. If it is overflowing, any new magic you produce is wasted. If your spell needs more magic than you have stored in your container, you can't cast it. You can only cast spells that require less magic than you have stored."
I looked at my containers, and they all seemed filled to the brim. "Does that mean I'm wasting all my new magic?"
"Yes, except for your force magic. Look at it," she said.
After my work with the wards, my force magic container was glowing. I could also tell it wasn't quite full.
"Setting the wards drained some of your force magic, and your container is refilling. Every mage needs to monitor not only how filled their containers are but how fast they refill with new magic. If you cast a huge force spell that empties your container, you won't have enough magic to cast a teleport spell. So, you are stuck where you are until it builds back up."
Against the banders, I mostly used force magic, but I had not monitored how much each blast used. I remembered Argon switched to her air and water magic to kill the banders, citing a desire to conserve her force magic.
Argon invited me to look at both of our magical assets. I saw immediately where I had three containers, she had four. But, none of hers was glowing.
"When you first begin using magic, you can store only a limited amount. Practicing magic makes your container grow and glow as you can see in your force magic. You know a container is growing because of that glow. The more you practice a particular magic, the larger that container will grow. Up to a point," she explained. "Our bodies have hard limits set by genetics on how much magic of each type we can store internally, no matter how much we practice. Then they stop glowing. Your containers will continue to grow with use until you reach your personal maximum. When you reach that point, you are capped. I’m already capped until I undergo a mind meld.
She refocused on my magic assets.
"But other than your force magic, your mind and earth magic containers are full, so all the new magic you are producing is being lost. My containers are also overflowing. I have a few active spells, but they use less than I produce," said Argon. "It is natural for our magic containers to fill overnight when we aren't using magic."
My mind and force magic containers were about the same size, but my earth magic dwarfed them. Argon's mind and force containers were small compared with her water and air magics.
Argon explained comparing powers between mages could be misleading. One mage's power container could empty with a simple spell, while another mage could cast the same spell 100 times and not deplete hers.
"Enough of this, I want to see you throw some earth balls until you make that container glow."
Argon settled in as my copilot as I began tossing a steady stream of rocks down range using both hands. After several serious flurries, Argon called a halt. A glowing container of earth magic was my reward. It was nearly full, and now I knew I could probably toss rocks for hours without draining my container.
"Enough dawdling, I need you to ignite some of that lava magic Shala says you have," Argon said.
I then imagined forming a ball of flame in my hand. Argon had assured me my own magical flames would not burn my flesh until I released them.
The size of the eruption surprised us both, with Argon reacting quickly to douse the flames with a cascade of water. The blast had singed our armor but did no lasting harm.
When we looked at my magical power center, a huge glowing container of fire magic had appeared beside the earth magic.
"I expected you were endowed, but wow," Argon said. "That is tremendous, especially for an untrained mage. No wonder you have no air or water magic."
Argon urged me to try again. I summoned a flame and with a few key nudges from Argon formed it into a ball of destruction. Treating it like a force ball the fire sped down range to impact the battle dummy. It was the same, yet different from throwing the balls of force or earth.
Within a short while, I was peppering the training dummies with balls of fire, some small and some quite large.
"Are we limited to the speed and distance I can throw?" I asked considering the best way to weaponize it, thinking fondly of my Mark 48.
Argon began a rapid-fire water assault on the target. As she fired, I watched her water magic reservoir drop.
I began to experiment with my fire magic and by the end of the session; I could release an assault weapon barrage of fireballs at will.
"Let's try combining it with your earth magic," Argon said, "then we'll go have lunch."
I was famished, manipulating magic was hungry work, but I agreed.
"This time I want you to picture conjuring molten lava instead of rock. Your strong fire magic should give you a boost for this. As you've seen once you get it started, the magic nearly forms itself," Argon said.
I concentrated on the task, setting aside hunger and other distractions. You never made it to the teams if you allowed such factors to interfere with the mission. I pictured a baseball-sized ball of lava and twisted my magic to make it happen.
The ball of lava appeared immediately. The impact when I sent it flying at the training dummy was unbelievable. Fortunately, Argon was all over it with a water spray. The mass of the ball crushed the dummy, and the lava spray that erupted from the target burned a 20-foot radius around it.
An assault weapon barrage of lava, had some real stopping power. I wanted to continue blasting away, but Argon overruled the extended practice. She was worried about me getting run down. She had never worked with a SEAL.
The commingling of earth and fire caused both containers to glow.
I monitored the teleport spell and was sure I could execute the spell the next time. Now all I needed to do was convince Argon.
The rest of the day was a whirlwind of discovery and practice. I became proficient at teleporting, and my magical lava assault gun was awesome. Argon was thrilled with the combat potential my lava provided.
Mages seldom had two very strong elemental powers. While most mages could stop an assault by one type of magic, Argon believed few could resist the lava gun for more than a few rounds. I found I could fire the lava gun several hundred times before my earth and fire containers dropped noticeably.
I mostly stuck to the baseball-sized rounds and smaller; they were easy for me to picture and easy to fire. I expected to occasionally need something larger, so I visualized a football size and added a mild spin to keep it on target. While I couldn't fire those as fast, they were individually more devastating.
My direction bump helped me with the teleporting magic, but I learned I couldn't teleport to a location based on map coordinates. Unfortunately, Argon wasn't sure what map coordinates were. To teleport the way she was trained, some mage had to have visited the location and noted it magically. When possible, you used your own noted location. When that wasn't available, you used a teleport site supplied by another mage. If that wasn’t available, you walked or rode to the new location.
I asked whether anyone had collected transport spots around the globe and learned teleport locations were another closely guarded secret in Jaloa.
Argon had a few maps of Jaloa, but they weren't to scale. Some even expressed distances in days. I wished we had a replica of Shala's globe.
A dinner, shower, and a short round of mental training were all I could manage before pleading exhaustion and heading off to bed. Allo followed me to the room and lay in the doorway, still in protect mode. I wistfully thought of sharing the night with Argon but set those feelings aside and let sleep take me.
◆◆◆
Chapter 5
“Wake up Steve,” Argon said with urgency in her voice.
It was still night. I had only slept a few hours, and my mind was full of fluff.
“There has been an attack on the gatehouse. Captain Jamal has called for help,” she said, dumping my armor and weapons on my chest. “He has already lost two men and is barely holding on
.”
While I didn’t know what she was talking about the urgency came through. Within a few minutes, I was dressed and ready to go.
“Jamal says there has been a demon incursion through one of the gates. I don’t know what we will see when we get there.”
We ‘ported to the gate guardhouse. My directional sense pegged it as close to our desert training area.
The guardhouse was deserted. We ran toward the sounds of battle.
The guardians were defending the gatehouse. They had managed to bar the entrance, but it had become a costly defensive struggle. Several guardians were being treated in the hallways for critical injuries. At least four were covered with a blanket having succumbed to their injuries.
Capt. Jamal had one arm out of commission but was still directing waves of enchanted crossbow bolts into the demon army attempting to break down the barred doorway.
Some of the demons had so many bolts sticking out of them they resembled porcupines. Saying they had little effect was an understatement.
“I don’t know how they can keep attacking,” Jamal said to Argon. “Our goddess’ wards should be wearing them down by now.” A rumbling splash of fire magic snaked through openings in the doorway, scorching the hall. Signs of charring indicated this was not the first time.
“Where do you want us,” Argon asked.
“Our best enchanted bolts seem to be doing nothing, if you can hurt them they may back off,” shouted Jamal.
A demonic blast blew several guardians from their place on the battlement. We didn’t pause to see whether they were dead or just badly injured as we raced to take their place. We had to trust the medics would tend them. Argon was already pulling me into our battle state of mind just as I got my first look at our opponents. Nothing meant for banders was going to stop these bad guys.
The demons stood at least 8 feet tall, although if they straightened their hunched bodies, they probably topped 12 feet. Their feet and hands had serious claws. They looked a lot like gargoyles. Their large leathery wings were apparently not meant for flying because they weren’t already on the battlements. Flying demons could easily have bypassed the gate. Looking at their muscular legs, I suspected even if they couldn't fly, they could jump and glide long distances.
