Retreat, Hell - Episode 6 (Patreon)

I must be going insane.

Rinn was sprinting across an open field of scraped and packed dirt, surrounded by hundreds of non-keshmin, aliens from another world, towards a line of whirling contraptions that could fly. I must be going insane. It’s the only explanation.

The  Marines ahead of him slowed, turning towards a specific craft. This one  had two wings sticking out on either side, with great, spinning blades  whirling above the columns at the end of each wing. “First Platoon,  Second Squad! First Platoon, Second Squad!” another Marine was shouting,  waving them towards the rumbling monstrosity. The Marines piled into  the craft, ducking as they stomped up the short ramp and into the belly  of the beast. Rinn followed them. I am definitely going insane!

Inside,  the Marines were unslinging their packs and dropping into seats mounted  to the outer shell. Following suit, Rinn fumbled for the straps on his  own pack, and soon found himself being shoved into a seat and strapped  in. Snugging the straps, Dubois gave him a slap on the shoulder and  moved to a seat further in the craft.

Through  a small window in the opposite wall, Rinn could see smaller flying  vehicles. These ones had one big set of blades and a smaller set of  blades on their tail, and were already lifting off, loaded with Marines.  The rest of the squad piled in, along with Marines from another squad,  then the ramp was raised and the tones of the contraption changed.

Jostling slightly, Rinn looked out the partly-open ramp. Above and below, we’re in the air. He latched his hands onto his seat.

The  craft tilted, and the view from the ramp spun, bringing the portal into  view as it turned northwest. Already a hundred feet in the air, Rinn  was granted a birds-eye-view of the human side of the portal.

Past  the fortified defensive line, he saw the ordered rows of orchards and  farms surrounding a huge complex of bizarre structures that looked like  long rows of white half-barrels. Beyond that was a great highway,  stretching into the distance past mountains covered in green trees and  brown scrub.

He  felt a faint rumble and thunk beneath him, and a glance out the small  windows opposite him revealed the vertical columns with their spinning  blades had rotated forward. Glancing backwards again, Rinn saw the  portal receding at an increased pace, a line of other flying craft  trailing behind them as the rest of the battalion loaded and took off.

“How  you holding up?” Bradford shouted, clapping him on the back. She had  been several Marines ahead of him when they boarded. She must have  swapped seats when he wasn’t looking.

“I’m sitting in a chair, in the sky!”

“Ha! You’ll get used to it!” She waved at a Marine near the ramp. “Just look at Hicks! He’s already asleep!”

“Nah,  Hicks don’t count, Jabs,” Edison cut in from the seat to Rinn’s right.  “The man’s a freak of nature! Put him in anything that moves, and he’s  out, almost immediately!”

Rinn regripped his seat as the craft shuddered and rattled.

“Relax!” Edison said. “It’s just a bit of turbulence, probably from the portal! It’s having some weird effects on the weather!”

Bradford wrapped her knuckles on the steel helmet on his head. “Glad to see you found something to protect your grape!”

“Yeah,”  he said, latching onto the distraction, tapping the keshmin helmet  himself. “Your helmets don’t fit! Gomez found this somewhere. It’s still  not the best fit, but it works!”

“Better than nothing, at least!” Bradford grinned.

“Hot  damn, that’s a sight!” Kawalski said, pointing out the back ramp at the  line of mechanical birds falling into formation around them. “This has  gotta be one of the largest air assaults since fucking… I don’t fucking  know when!”

“Shock and awe, man!” Kimber said. “Shock and mother-fucking awe!”

“Oorah!”

“I’m  just surprised they were able to mobilize all this on such short  notice!” Sampson waved at the craft around them. “Organizing an  operation like this normally takes weeks! At least!”

“I know, right?” Bradford laughed. “The portal kicked off a mad scramble. Everyone’s been on high-alert and ready to go since it popped up!”

Rinn  looked back out of the ramp and was amazed to see the portal so far in  the distance behind them. Even more astounding was the appearance of the  Royal Host camp and FOB Williams below them. He thought the  twenty-minute ride from the front lines to the portal was amazing, a  distance it would have taken the Royal Host half a day to march. We’ve been in the air for mere minutes, and we’re already crossing the Yinkai River!

Rinn sat back and considered that fact for a moment. We haven’t taken the offensive across the Yinkai in months! And here I am, flying through the sky*, joining a band of marauding chaos demons in an assault on an elven camp, nearly into the next county!*

He adjusted the helmet on his head, not liking how it chaffed against his ears, and tried to relax. Once you get used to the noise, the droning of the blades is actually kind of soothing…

“Ready up, Marines! We’re five mikes out!”

Rinn  blinked. He hadn’t fallen asleep, but he had drifted away from the  here-and-now, and hadn’t noticed how much time had passed. Are we almost there already?

Around  him, Marines shoved each other awake and double-checked their weapons  and gear. Rinn adjusted his helmet again, and gave himself a quick  pat-down, looking for anything that seemed out of place.

“Keep  your ears open!” shouted an unfamiliar Marine, tethered to the deck and  manning a mounted machine gun. “The Hueys are engaging psy-ops when  we’re two mikes out!”

“Best. Day. Ever!” Kawalski shouted. “Let’s kill us some fucking keeblers!”

“Oorah!”

The  craft rolled, and Rinn found himself staring down at the Marine across  from him while his stomach tried to do its level best to crawl up his  throat. The world reeled outside the back ramp and the craft leveled  out, much closer to the ground. A swarm of whirling birds of death  jockeyed around them.

“Two mikes!” The Marines around him all grinned at each other.

At  first, Rinn couldn’t hear anything over the noise of the craft he was  in. Straining his ears, he started to make out the sound of some string  instrument, the fluttering of a flute. Then the horns began.

The  Marine on the machine gun leaned towards the ramp, gripping up on his  weapon, eager for targets. He paused, putting a hand to one of his  earmuffs. “Are you fucking shitting me?!”

“What’s the problem?” Bradford asked.

“There’s nothing there, Sergeant!” The Marine shouted, half-turning to face her. “Just a bunch of fucking trees!”

“What do you mean just a bunch of fucking trees?”

“I mean just fucking trees!” He pointed out of the ramp, at the uninterrupted forest below. “We just flew over the target!”

“Did we make a wrong turn or something?” Edison asked.

“No,  we’re right on-target!” The Marine shouted. He paused to listen again  as the horizon tilted. “We’re making another pass. Radar’s not jiving  with what we’re seeing!”

“Could it be a-“ Bradford stopped mid-sentence as Rinn unbuckled himself and lurched to the ramp.

Bracing himself with one hand on the ceiling, he felt a hand clamp down on his tail. “I got ya, brah!” Stephensen shouted.

Ignoring  him, Rinn spun a standard detection artifice. It couldn’t detect the  elves through their invisibility or illusions, but it could detect… Aha! Somebody’s leaking too much mana! Shifting his grip on his stave, he fired off a hasty disruption pulse.

It was quick, dirty, and low-powered, but it did the job.

The  flicker of mana burst into the edge of the illusion, disrupting a large  swath and revealing the elven camp below for several seconds before the  illusion re-stablized and the hole collapsed.

“Shit! It’s right there!”  the Marine on the gun shouted as several rockets flashed from one of  the Vipers. They shot right through the illusory trees to strike the  ground in a rapid series of detonations.

Completely  disrupted by the rockets, the illusion collapsed, revealing the elven  camp in its entirety. “We’re going in!” shouted the Marine, leaning out  to spit a burst of machinegun fire into the camp as the craft rolled  again.

Rinn stumbled, and Stephens yanked on his tail, hauling him back into the craft.

The  ground came rushing up as they came in to land, and several pulses of  small arms spellfire flashed by. Something tinked against the frame.

“El-Zee’s hot!” The Marine on the gun shouted as the ramp dropped and he swung his weapon clear. “Pile out!”

Rinn  surged down the ramp with the rest of the Marines as spellfire flashed  and gunfire rattled around him while an orchestral symphony blared  overhead.

Stumbling,  he struggled to hold onto the pack someone had shoved into his hands  while firing a mana pulse in the general direction of a group of elven  regulars charging towards them.

Leaf-green  tents toppled and tumbled across the ground as thundering sky carriages  landed and poured Marines into the camp. Their ride roared and lifted  into the air, swinging clear as small arms shardbursts tracked after it.  None hit.

Rinn  dropped his pack and threw up a shield where he stood. Several  shardbursts deflected off, but they were all shot wide anyway.

The squad of elves charged, swords high, but they were cut down by sustained rapid fire from Kawalski and Gomez.

“Eat shit and die, fuckers!”

“I got one! I fucking got one!”

“You fucking got five of them, Gomer!”

“Eyes  front, Marines!” Bradford shouted. “Clear the El-Zee! Kill anything  that’s hostile, but remember, we want prisoners! Two/Five!”

“RETREAT HELL!”

“At ‘em, boys!”

Contracting his shield, Rinn grabbed his pack and dragged it behind him as he sprinted after the Marines.

A hundred tails, several bursts of gunfire, and a few explosions later, and the fight was over.

“Is  that it?” Dubois asked as the gunfire tapered off around him. Only the  whirl and rumble of flying machines overhead and a few shouts from  Marines remained.

“That’s  it,” Bradford confirmed while Rinn took the opportunity to properly  shoulder his pack, nearly falling over in the process.

“Well, that was a little… anti-climactic…” Edison said.

“Fuck your big words, it was goddamn disappointing, is what it was!”

“That’s a bigger word…”

“Nobody asked you, Gomer!”

“They  must have had maybe fifty people defending this camp.” Olanrewaju said,  looking about at the torn-up tents and half-collapsed buildings. “No  more.”

“Fifty  fucking people?” Kawalski laughed. “We just dropped half a goddamn  battalion with heavy air support on fifty fucking people?”

“Looks that way,” Bradford said, shaking her head.

“Shiit. There’s shock and awe, but that’s just fucking overkill,” Sampson said.

“Overkill is just more kill,” Kawalski declared. “No such thing as too much kill.”

“Right,”  Bradford laughed. “Alright, stick together. We’ve still got mop-up to  do, and a whole camp to search for anything we can haul off. Let’s go  find the LT and see what he’s got for us.”

Rinn  picked his way through the rows of scattered and still-standing tents.  They were made of a strange, leaf-like fabric he had never seen before. I wonder if they’re grown… He paused, looking about.

“Something wrong, Shields?” Edison asked.

“I’ve  never been in an elven camp before.” He looked at the Marines. “Seven  years of war, and I’ve never set foot in an elven camp.” He gestured at  the rows of elegant, green tents surrounding them. “We’ve beaten them,  driven them back, forced them to withdraw, even overrun them a time or  two, but we never managed to push them back so hard that they couldn’t  decamp.”

“They really had you by the shorthairs, didn’t they?” Dubois asked.

“I don’t…” He snorted, staring out across the field of tents. “Yeah. Yeah, they did.”

“Well, you’ve got us here, now,” Kawalski said, throwing an arm over his shoulder. “We can all kick their asses together.”

“Let’s  keep moving,” Bradford said. “The birds only have so much flight time  before they gotta go back to refuel, and I don’t want to get stuck out  here overnight. The pens are just up ahead.”

The pens. The thought sent a shiver down his spine, hope and fear warring in his gut at what they might find.

Clearing the last row of tents, a large corral came into view, constructed with the typical elven style.

“That looks… delicately brutal,” Dubois said, looking up at the inward-curving spines and spires at the top of the high fence.

“Those two words don’t go together,” Edison objected. “How can… Ah, fuck it, you’re right.”

“There’s a gate over here,” Bradford said, leading the way. “It’s open.”

“It  looks empty,” Sampson chimed in as they approached. Bradford pushed the  gate fully open and they walked inside. Rinn slowly walked to the  center, and stopped, staring at an object on the ground as the Marines  fanned out to investigate.

“There’s  not much here at all,” Kimber said, gesturing about. “Couple lean-tos  for shelter, a pit over here for shitting in, looks hand-dug.”

“How can you tell it was hand-dug?” Gomez asked.

“You can see the finger tracks in the walls.”

“Look  at how the ground’s all tore up,” Miller said, pointing at the bare  dirt and mud. “There must have been hundreds of people here.”

“None of them are here anymore,” Kawalski said.

“Where did they all go?” Gomez asked.

“With the army to the other side of the river,” Bradford frowned at the obvious.

“Yeah… Fuck.”

“Ah, Jesus…” Edison said, walking up to Rinn.

“What?” Bradford asked.

“There  were kids here.” He bent over to pick up the crude doll that Rinn had  been staring at, and held it up for everyone to view.

“Fuck…”

“Echo-One,  this is Echo-One-Two, standing by to make report,” Bradford said into a  “radio headset.” It was in one of the boxes she had smuggled out of the  supply tent with Rinn.

She  listened to a response that Rinn couldn’t hear, then continued.  “Echo-One Actual, this is Echo-One-Two. We’re at the corral, but the  gate was open, it’s been cleared out. Ground sign indicates several  hundred people were held here, including children.” Another pause as she  listened to the response. “Echo-One-Two Wilco. Out.”

Bradford  frowned at the corral around her. “Alright, make sure we get plenty of  pictures. Intel wants them, and I’m sure the brass will want to feed  some to the press. After that, we’re headed back to the El-Zee. There’s a  lot of gear we’ll have to sort through.”

Rinn  gently took the doll from Edison, and examined it. It was mostly rags  tied together, with a bit of stuffing in the head. Crudely shaped like a  keshmin, it had mismatched buttons sewn on for eyes, and was missing an  ear.

He felt a hand on his shoulder. “You going to be okay, Shields?” Bradford asked.

“Yeah,”  he said, showing her the doll. “Maya had a doll like this. She called  it Binkles. She carried him everywhere.” Gripping the doll tight, he  twisted to try and stuff it into his pack. After he struggled a moment,  Bradford helped him stow it away.

“I’m ready to go,” he said, looking across the corral.

“Yeah, let’s get out of here,” Bradford agreed. “Dubois, Stephens, you guys get enough pictures?”

“Yeah, Sergeant,” Stephens said, his irrepressibly chill attitude subdued.

“About as much as we can get,” Dubois confirmed, stowing his camera away.

“Let’s get back to the El-Zee.”

“Aye, Sergeant.”

Rinn stood up and stretched, feeling a satisfying pop and crackle run up his spine. Above and below, this stuff weighs on you…  He rubbed a hand across his face, and scratched behind an ear. He had  been sorting through gear for the last hour, inspecting captured  equipment and doing his best to tell the Marines what it all was, and if  it was worth hauling back or not. At  least the “helos” and “ospreys” have flown up into a higher, wider  pattern. I could barely hear myself think over their racket.

“So you’re sure you can’t make use of one of these things?” Edison asked, picking up the gemstaff of an elven mage.

“No,  I can’t,” he said, pointing at the mana gem bound into the staff, near  the top. “See this? That’s a mana gem. Only the elves can make them. We  haven’t figured out how.”

“What is it? This one looks kinda like an emerald, or something.”

“It’s…  It’s like a mana crystal, but with a much more complex structure. It’s  very stable, so it can’t be converted into somatic mana and used up like  a mana crystal, but it can store  somatic mana, and it makes it easier for the elf wielding it to channel  mana, both in using stored somatic mana to cast spells, and drawing in  ethereal mana.”

“Kinda like your articulation stave?”

“Yeah, same basic concept.”

“So why can’t you use it?”

Rinn  sighed. “Because when an elf makes a mana gem, it gets personally tuned  to them. Only that elf can use it.” He shrugged. “From what we  understand about them, creating one is a difficult and arduous process  for an elf, and entails some risk for them. Many elves never create a  mana gem in the first place.”

Edison  set the staff down and picked up a gemblade, examining the ruby-like  gem set into the pommel. “Do they all get worked into stuff?”

“I believe so, yes,” Rinn said, picking up a water bottle and examining the material for a moment before taking a drink. This plastic stuff is fascinating…  “We’ve only ever seen them set into specialized articulations, like a  mage staff, or a gemblade, matching the elf’s profession or  specialization. No two are alike.” He twisted the cap back on. “There  are rumors that some mana gems are imbued with such a complex structure,  or with so much of the essence of the elf that made them, that they are  almost alive, with a personality all their own.”

“Really?” Edison swung the blade around a few times. “Like a living, talking sword?”

“So  the rumors go,” Rinn said, setting the bottle down. “But I don’t think  it’s more than just fantastical speculation and rumor.”

“You find yourself a souvenir?” Kawalski asked, wandering over with Bradford and Miller.

“Nah,  it’s gotta go back with the rest of the haul for the egg-heads to  study. We didn’t get enough of these things that weren’t tore up or  blown to shit by artillery.”

“Don’t we have enough here? Just sneak it in your pack or something.”

“I  wish! My pack’s not that big!” He shook his head, setting the sword  back in the “important or useful” pile of captured gear. “Besides,  that’s one of them lightstaber shit-asses, and there were only a handful  of those fucks and their magey-types here. Most of them were just  regulars.”

“They  all died fast enough,” Kawalski shook his head. “Too bad. I wanted to  get my hands on a live Keebler so I could beat him to death.”

“That kinda defeats the point of taking prisoners, Kawalski,” Bradford laughed.

“It’d still be worth the satisfaction.”

“Coupla  boys in Second Platoon nearly caught themselves one of the wizard  types,” Kimber grunted as he and another Marine hauled a heavy chest  over to the inspection pile. The rest of Second Squad and a few other  Marines from Third Squad were following him with a half-dozen more  chests. “But the bastard made his hands all glowy, put a knifehand to  his chin, and blew his own brains out.” He mimicked the motion.

“Kimber, aren’t you supposed to be taking it easy with that arm?”

“Nah,  it’s fine, Sergeant,” he waved her concern away. “Maybe only popped a  couple stitches.” Bradford rolled her eyes. “Anyway, Shields! El-Tee!”  he said, tapping the chest as the others were stacked up next to him. “I  think you guys are gonna get a kick out of what we just found in one of  the big tents.”

Meyers broke away from his conversation and walked over with Staff Sergeant Rickles. “What have you got, Corporal?”

“A  whole fuck-whack of mana crystals,” Kimber said, popping the latch on  his chest and flipping the lid open. “There’s another ten chests back  there, just like these, all chock full of ‘em.”

“Gods  above and below,” Rinn said, his ears standing straight up. “That’s  enough to supply…” He flicked an ear. “Well, a whole army!”

“Good  find, Corporal!” Rickles said, clapping him on the shoulder. Kimber  only winced a little. “Take a breather and hydrate. First Squad’s been  hanging out here with their dicks in their hands for the last ten  minutes. They can haul the rest over.”

Kimber  nodded, taking a water bottle and sitting down on one of the chests.  “It’s that big tent over there, three tents down from the half-blowed-up  hut. We stacked ‘em all out front before we hauled these over.”

“You copy that, Sergeant Tanner?”

“Yes, Staff Sergeant.”

“Right then, get to it!”

“Aye, Staff Sergeant!”

With  a satisfied nod, Rickles turned back to his conversation with Meyer as  they stepped away. “You sure we’re gonna have enough room for all this  shit, sir?”

“Captain  Spader just got off the horn with the CO. They’re sending a couple  flights of Super Stallions for cargo lift, so it shouldn’t be a  problem…”

“Lieutenant, sir,” Rinn spoke up, shifting from foot to foot as he eyed the open arsenal before him.

“Yes, Ahyat?”

“May I stock up, sir?” he asked, waving a hand at the chest. “I’ve only got a crystal and a half left.”

“Help yourself, Second Artificer. We’ve got plenty, and I’d hate for any of us to run out of ammo.”

“Thank you, sir,” Rinn said, barely stopping himself from giving the Lieutenant a crisp bow. No saluting in combat zones…

Meyers  nodded and resumed walking away. Rinn jumped on the chest, greedily  pulling out crystal after crystal and stuffing every single pouch he had  with them.

“Jesus, you’re like a kid in a candy store!” Kimber laughed.

“You’ve never run out of ammo, before,” Kawalski said, snagging a couple fist-sized crystals and tucking them into a pouch.

His pouches topped off, including a few crystals large enough to properly feed an artillery piece, Rinn sat back, satisfied. I think I’m carrying more mana crystals right now than I’ve personally handled in the last three years…

“I  think we made a good haul,” Bradford said with an approving nod. “They  managed to burn a lot of their documents and gear, but we got a lot of  it, too. Captured a bunch of tech, including some comms gadgets, and  their goddamn magazine.”

“I just wish we had more of a fight,” Kawalski said, shaking his head. “I wanted to fuck up some more keeblers.”

Rinn  rolled an ear at Kawalski. “I like your Marine way of fighting a lot  better than what I’m used to, but I’ve had enough fights. I don’t need  more.”

Kawalski shrugged, giving Rinn an understanding nod.

“Meh,  it was good enough,” Kimber said, taking another swing of water. “But,  hey, real talk, important question. What would you do for a billion  dollars?”

“I’d do a lot for a billion dollars,” Kawalski said.

“There isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for a billion dollars,” said one of the Marines from Third Squad. Rinn didn’t know his name.

“Would you suck a billion dicks for a billion dollars?”

“Dude, I’ve already said, there isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for a billion dollars.”

“I dunno, man,” Stephens said. “That’s a lot of dicks.”

“Dude, there isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for a billion dollars.”

“But that’s a billion dicks!”

“Just line them up, man, that’s a billion dollars!”

“You’d never finish…”

“But it’s a billion dollars!”

“Dude, that’s a dollar a dick.”

Rinn stared in a confused mix of fascination and horror at the conversation. Are they really discussing this?!?  He glanced at Bradford. She was merely rolling her eyes and laughing at  the conversation, though he didn’t miss that she was firmly not  participating.

“Dude, five dollars a dick is a rip-off! You’re talking a dollar a dick!”

“Yeah,  but-“ the Marine from Third Platoon stopped mid-sentence and turned,  pushing Stephens out of his way. “This conversation’s over. I just shit  myself.”

“What?!” Kimber laughed.

“I  just shit myself. Move!” He shoved past Dubois and ran off as the rest  of the Marines burst out laughing. Rinn saw an “Osprey” setting down in a  cleared area a couple hundred yards past him.

“Did he just shit himself to get out of a conversation he was losing?” Bradford chuckled, pointing after him.

“I think he did,” Edison said, struggling for breath.

“What  about you, Miller?” Kimber asked. “You’ve been silently staring at the  trees this whole time. What would you do for a billion dollars?”

“Shut up,” Miller said, not shifting his gaze.

“What?” Kimber asked, coughing out another laugh.

“I said shut the fuck up,” Miller snapped.

“What  do you see, Miller?” Bradford asked, stepping to his side, levity  instantly forgotten. Rinn jumped to his feet, joining them.

“I don’t know. Something doesn’t feel right.” He nodded at the treeline. “There’s no birds singing over there.”

“I don’t see anything,” Kawalski said, peering through a pair of binoculars.

“Wrap it up, Sergeant,” Meyers said, walking over. “We’re pulling out.” He paused. “Something up?”

“Dunno, sir,” Bradford said, pulling a telescope-like device out of a pouch. “Maybe.”

Rinn squinted, running his detection artifice again. I’m not detecting anything, but it’s a good distance to the tree line…

Bradford fiddled with her device a moment before putting it up to her eye. “Shit! Contact!  Hostiles in the trees! Visible on thermals!” She stuffed the device  back in its pouch and brought her rifle up as Miller started snapping  off shots into the trees.

The thwump of her grenade launcher joined the rapid staccato of Kawalski’s SAW, and suddenly the treeline was filled with elves.

“HOSTILES  IN THE TREE LINE!” Meyers shouted as he grabbed his radio hand device.  “All units, this is Echo-One Actual! Multiple hostiles in the eastern  treeline, visible on thermals!”

Spellfire  flashed by, and Rinn threw up a shield, deflecting the blasts overhead,  then his blood ran cold. The trees seemed to sway out of the way as  mage tower strode into the camp.

“Jesus  it’s a fucking… WALKER!” Kawalski shouted, turning his SAW to hose down  the spindly, three-story tower. The rounds flared harmlessly against  the personal shields projected by its mage crew.

The  tower swiftly cleared the trees, its six legs letting it scramble over  the uneven terrain with ease. It slammed to a halt, barely swaying, and a  heavy shardblast burst from the spindles at the top. It crackled  overhead and slammed into the Osprey as it desperately tried to lift  off, the violent explosion sending debris and shrapnel flying across the  field.

“Fuck!” shouted Kimber.

“We’ve got a bird down!” Rinn heard another Marine shout.

Dozens of shardbursts snapped and crackled towards them. He angled his shields to deflect all that he could.

Another  flash came from the spindles at the top of the tower, but instead of a  shardblast, a pillar of energy shot up and arched over the tower and the  hundreds of elves pouring out of the trees, doming them over with an  area shield.

It  stabilized just in time, as several streaks slammed into it in rapid  succession, bombarding Rinn and the Marines with the concussion of heavy  explosions. The shield rippled briefly, but was otherwise unperturbed.

“Shit!  It took heavy artillery and carpet bombing to take down eight of those  things! How much can one hold up to?!” Bradford asked.

The  spindles flashed again, and a heavy shardblast thumped into the ground  half-way across the camp. One of its legs swung up, over, and down. The  tower started to move forward, one leg at a time.

“I  don’t know!” Rinn said. “It takes us an hour of bombardment with  several artillery pieces to bring down one! We’ve never brought down  more than three!”

“Danger  close! Danger Close!” the shout came barely seconds before the  crackling thunder of a “warthog” spattering against the tower’s shields,  followed a second later by a short BRRRRRRRRRT! The shields held.

A  flash pulsed out from the spindles, and Rinn watched as a heavy  shardblast flew towards the warthog as it banked away from its attack. It’s out of range, and it’s going to miss-  Rinn’s thoughts were interrupted when the shardblast reached its  maximum range and detonated, bursting into a cone of mana shards that  extended several hundred meters more.

The  shards riddled the warthog, shredding one of the bulbs at the back and  ripping off one of its tail fins, a third of one wing, and half the  other. Rinn watched the warthog shudder across the sky, waiting for it  to fall. He kept waiting as, to his utter amazement, it managed to  recover. It flew off, trailing smoke, but still flying.

Almost  as if in rage at its lack of a kill, another shardblast flew from the  tower and thumped into the ground far too close for comfort. Dirt and  debris rained down, scattered by his shield.

“El-Tee!” Bradford shouted.

“I  saw it!” he responded, then continued shouting into his radio. Another  explosion thumped into the far side of the elven shield, and the tower  continued to advance.

Marines  on the eastern side of the camp were streaming back to their position,  or past them, pressed back by several hundred elves advancing with the  walker, spitting lesser shardbursts.

“Fuck!”  Meyers shouted. “Pull back, Sergeant! The El-Zee’s too hot, we’re  out-numbered, and we don’t know what it’ll take to bring that shield  down! We gotta get away from that thing and find a new extraction  point!” The shield crept towards them.

“Tahsh!”  Rinn cursed, crunching his shield and throwing an angled wall up  directly between them and the tower. A heavy shardblast flashed out and  skipped off his shield to detonate harmlessly in the air above them.  “The elves will overtake you in the trees,” Rinn said. “They can draw  mana from them, somehow!”

“Fuck!” Meyers cursed. “Well, we can’t stay here, they’ll overrun us!”

A  streak of smoke and fire shot up from behind them to slam into the  shield, again with no effect. Rinn reconfigured his shield to deflect  the renewed volley of shardbursts coming from the elven mages. They’re all bunching under my shield… I can’t hold off a mage tower by myself!

“Sir, I have an idea,” Bradford said. “I need a javelin team.”

“Sergeant, I know what you’re thinking, and you’re fucking crazy.”

“Sir,” Bradford stared him down. “We’ve got Ahyat. Get me a javelin team, we can do it.”

Another  shardblast thumped into the ground ahead of them. Rinn couldn’t deflect  that one. A salvo of smoke and fire from a Viper splashed against the  shield and it continued to edge closer. Rinn heard someone shouting for a  corpsman.

“Damnit!”  Meyers cursed. “Whiskey-Two, this is Echo-One Actual, I need a javelin  team on my position, ASAP.” He paused to listen. “Whiskey-Two Actual,  Echo-One Actual. We’re at the loot dump under the friendly shield. I’ve  got a squad going under the enemy shield with our embedded keshmin to  put fire directly on the tower. Echo-One Actual copies. Out.”

He  threw down his handset. “The rest of the Company and Weapons Company  are pulling back to here and are going to withdraw to the treeline.  Second Artificer!”

“Sir!” Rinn kept his attention focused on the tower and encroaching elves, ready to try and deflect another shardblast.

“How many people can you effectively cover in there?”

“Much more than Second Squad will be tight at that range, sir!”

Meyers grimaced.

Two teams of Marines lugging fat tubes jogged up. “Javelins as ordered, sir!”

“Sergeant Bradford!”

“Sir!”

Another shardblast thumped down behind them. Rinn heard screams.

“Take  your squad and these two Javeline teams under that shield and take that  fucking thing out!” He stabbed a finger at the tower. “The rest of  First Platoon will fan out and draw fire to try and give you some kind  of cover!”

“Aye  sir!” Bradford shouted. “Second Squad on me!” She loaded a fresh round  into her grenade launcher and fired it at the base of the shield. It  struck and started pouring white smoke. “Move up!”

“Fuckin Ay!” Kawalski shouted. “Let’s go fuck up some keeblers!”

Rinn  narrowed his shield and sprinted forward, surrounded by Marines. They  passed several others, some laying down fire, some falling back, and  some huddled under whatever cover they could find as shardbursts flashed  around them. Some were dead.

Several  thumps landed ahead and to either side, and a heavy smoke screen began  to billow around them. Moving through the smoke, Rinn’s nostrils burned,  but the spellfire around them thinned and became more erratic. Another  shardblast flared overhead, and Rinn heard something explode behind  them.

This is crazy! This is the most insane thing I have ever done in my entire life! He thought as they ran up to the shield and passed through. It had never been meant to stop infantry. But I think it can work! Which is more insane?!

Clearing  the smoke, they became visible once more and shardbursts flared all  around them. Rinn flattened his shield, deflecting the shardbursts  barely over their heads, as human gunfire hammered around him. Elves  started dropping.

“Contact left!”

“Squad right! Squad right!”

“Frag  out!” Sampson shouted, ripping a pin out of a green ball. He chucked it  ahead of them and to the left. It tumbled through the air, skipped off  the ground once, and exploded amidst a cluster of elves, sending them  all to the ground. Half started screaming. The other half didn’t.

Kawalski’s SAW chattered to the right, mowing down a line of mages.

Several shouts came from ahead of them, and a formation of gemblades charged them.

“Contact front!” Bradford shouted, bringing her rifle up, but Rinn beat her.

Two  rapid mana blasts punched into the leading gemblades, toppling them to  the ground with gaping holes in their chests. He quickly switched to a  fireburst, dumping more mana into the artifice than he had been able to  spare in a long time. The spell  pulsed from his stave and burst into a cone directly in front of the  gemblades, engulfing their entire formation in fire.

They screamed.

“Jesus, Shields!” Kawalski shouted. “Fuckin’ get some!”

Bradford’s  rifle barked several times, and Rinn flicked his shield to the left,  deflecting a salvo of shardbursts covering a line of elven regulars as  they charged. Rinn was about to fire on them when he felt the mana  surge.

Instinctively  knowing the angle was too steep to deflect the shardblast high enough,  he flipped his shield forward. The blast from the tower flashed out,  striking his shield, and deflecting down, right into the charging column of regulars. With a heavy thump, dirt and pieces of elves went flying high.

Well, that wasn’t intentional… he thought as he flicked his shield back in place. But nobody needs to know that…

“Defilade!” Bradford shouted, pointing at the newly-formed crater. The squad surged forward.

Rinn  hopped over elven body parts and jumped into the crater as other  Marines dove in around him. Kawalski and one of the “javelin” teams slid  into cover behind a toppled cart that had been full of crates and  barrels.

“Get those Javelins on target!” Bradford shouted as the Marines ripped the flared end off the front of their fat tubes.

Rinn  sent another fireburst into a mixed cluster of elves, then desperately  fumbled for a fresh mana crystal as his stave ran dry. The flames  engulfed all but the two mages, but several shots from Bradford’s rifle  took them down.

“Reloading!” she shouted, dropping the empty magazine out of her rifle and grabbing a fresh one to slam home.

“Reloading!” Rinn belatedly added as he shoved a fresh crystal into his stave and restored his shield.

“Holy fuck, there’s people strapped to that thing!” Dubois shouted.

“What?!”

“There’s fucking people strapped to that thing! Eight, ten foxes!”

“Shit, you’re right!” shouted one of the Javelin Marines.

“They’re fucking cats!” Kawalski shouted.

“Jesus, some of them are fucking kids!” Kimber said. “They’ve got fucking kids strapped to that thing!”

“They’re  dead!” Rinn shouted, sending several mana pulses into a group of elves  advancing on their position. Something heavy thumped against the shield  from the outside.

“What!?” Bradford asked.

“They’re dead!!”  Rinn screamed back. “Once you’re linked to a tower, there’s no undoing  it! They’re dead already!” With a wordless scream he threw an  overcharged fireburst at the elves, ending them.

The tower slowly trod forward.

“Fucking kill that thing!” Bradford shouted at the javelin teams.

“Seekers good!” shouted one of the Marines. “It’s lit up like a goddamn Christmas tree!”

“Have lock?” asked his partner.

“Have lock!”

“Missile!”

Bradford grabbed Rinn and pulled him out from behind the tube. 

“Firing!”  shouted the Marine with the tube. With a thump and a roar a fat object  spat out of the tube then took off on a jet of flame.

It  raced toward the tower and second later slammed into its personal  shields with a thundering report and a ball of fire. The tower  staggered, but continued forward.

“Hit!”

“Shit, it’s still up!”

“Missile! Firing!”

As  the missile thumped and roared away, Rinn felt another mana surge. He  tipped his shield up and curved it, just slightly. The shardblast passed  the missile in flight, curving along his shield and thumping into the  ground behind them.

The second missile detonated against tower, rocking it back. It stumbled two steps, then steadied itself, continuing forward.

“It’s still up!” Sampson shouted as dirt rained down around them.

“Reloading!” Rinn shouted.

Kawalski’s SAW chattered away. “Gomer! Where’s that fucking ammo!”

“Its shields are down!” Bradford shouted. “It’s taken damage! Hit it again!”

“Missile! Firing!”

A thump and roar. The missile streaked towards the tower, and detonated inside the twisted spire, just below the cupola at its peak.

The  tower shattered. The cupola was thrown high, broken in three. Fragments  of gold and platinum spindles and support columns were blasted across  the field and the remains of the tower collapsed in the arcing discharge  of a partially-charged spell as the shield bubble above them collapsed.

“Fuck yeah! Eat shit, fucking cockbags! Fuckin’ come and get some!”

“All  units, Echo-One-Two! Splash one! Target down!” Bradford ducked as more  shardbursts flew overhead and Rinn hastily shoved a new mana crystal  into his stave and threw his shield back up. “Request close air  support!”

“Frag out!” Gomez shouted, lobbing a “frag” out of their defilade at an advancing group of elves.

It  exploded as Rinn threw a mana pulse followed by a fireburst at a mage  leading a team of regulars, and then there was a helo overhead.

Cannons on either side of it hummed, spraying streams of fire, and showering them in brass casings.

Rinn  flicked his shield over to protect them from the metal rain, and sat  down, panting. Explosions and gunfire crackled around them as the elves  were pushed back into the trees. Kawalski crowed victory as Marines  surged around them.

The  crackle of explosions continued into the trees, until they were  silenced by a thunderous boom that threw up a towering column of smoke.

“Woohoo! Fuck yeah! That was a fucking jay-dam! Two thousand pounds of American FUCK YOU!”

“We  did it,” Rinn panted. “We did it. That was the most insane thing I have  ever done in my entire life.” He laughed. “And we did it!”

“Thanks  to you, man,” Bradford said, clapping him on the shoulder and giving it  a good shake. “We’d have been fucked a dozen times over without you.”

“You’re a natural-born killer, brah!” Stephens grinned at him.

“I  am not going to lie,” Olanrewaju said, sitting down on the edge of  their crater. “I did not think that we were going to survive that one.”

“Then why the fuck did you come with us, Doc?” Kawalski asked.

“Because somebody had to hold you while you cried like a little beetch,” he replied.

“Hahaha, fuck you, Doc.”

“Hey,” said one of the Javelin Marines, patting Rinn on the shoulder. “You can cover us any time, Shields.”

Rinn nodded.

“Everyone good?” Bradford asked. “Nobody got any extra holes they didn’t have before?”

“Just the holes you and Sampson keep leaving in my heart, Jabs.”

“You don’t have a heart, Kawalski, the Marine Corps never issued you one.”

“Oh, that’s why that hole’s there, then. Makes sense now.”

Rinn laughed. I think I’m starting to understand their insanity now…

“Alright, let’s get out of this hole, and see what we have to do to extract from this fuck show.”

“Oorah,” replied several Marines.

***********

Tyriel woke up.

It was dark, but not as dark as it should be.

The sky above was black, lit only by a scattering of stars, but harsh, unnatural light flooded the area nearby.

He slowly picked himself up. I must get away from here. I’m too close to the humans’ defenses.

He placed a hand against the rough bark of the tree had had passed out beneath. The trees aren’t talking to me. They don’t even acknowledge my presence.

He  considered for a moment. His mana reserves had replenished somewhat.  Ethereal magic was just as abundant here as it was on his world.

Or is it just because I am so close to the portal?

Something to investigate.

But first, I’m too close to the humans and their defenses.

With  his mana reserves as low as they were, he forewent the heavy mana draw  of true invisibility, and instead blended himself into his surroundings.

Picking a direction away from the portal, he began to walk.