by Cheek, Jason
“One … two … three … four,” Forrest counted each unseated Hobgoblin, as he carefully targeted over Connor’s head. It wasn’t going to be anywhere close enough to save his friend, but it was all he could do. Anxiously watching while he continued laying down the withering fire, Forrest saw Conner slide to a stop ten yards before the charging Worg Riders. Kneeling down, he quickly rolled out the spear bundle and hopped behind it. As the Worg Riders bore down on him, he braced the butt of the middle spear and pulled back on the four ropes.
Instantly, a fence-like spear wall rose up off the ground at a sixty degree angle. The entire device was twenty feet long with a spear spaced out every foot with heavy twine tied to the shafts at the top, middle, and bottom. While it wouldn’t have done anything against a line of charging demi-humans, it was perfect for stopping a charging line of mounts. The Worgs had no time to dodge out of the way and the shafts were too tall to easily jump as they plowed headlong onto the wide iron spearheads.
The effect was instantaneous. As the heavy wooden shafts dug deep into the frozen ground, the first ten Worgs were propelled into the air as they slammed to a stop impaled through the chest or neck. The abrupt stop sent Hobgoblins flying as the remaining Worgs slammed into the pile-up of their injured packmates in total confusion as chaos reigned. The heavy twine that held the spears together caused each pierced Worg to worsen the wounds as the spears were sharply jerked with each individual Worg’s movement. Rage fueled agony had the injured Worgs snapping at everything and anything as the pack devolved into vicious clawing and biting while the Hobgoblins scrambled to safety.
Unslinging his shield from his back and yanking the over-sized hand axe from his belt, Connor’s wordless howl rang out across the slope as he threw himself at the enemy. Within seconds, he was hacking and slashing at the downed Hobgoblins like a crazed berserker. Conner didn’t focus long on any one enemy, but spaced his attacks out as much as possible while Forrest’s bolts slammed into the Stunned enemy. Every two seconds, six iron quarrels would pincushion a downed Hobgoblin doing massive damage, while Bishop leaped atop one unfortunate demi-human to rip its throat out.
Altogether, they were able to severely damage twelve Hobgoblins, before the ten second Stun wore off. This was where the rubber met the road as Conner was swarmed under by a wave of pumpkin-colored bodies. The Warrior didn’t meet any one Hobgoblin head-on, but constantly fell back as he weathered a storm of blades hammering at his defenses. While Connor blocked, parried, and weaved from the blows, Forrest rained down death on the group as Bishop focused on any downed enemies.
It was almost comical. One second, a Hobgoblin would be slashing like a maniac trying to get through Conner’s defenses and the next the pumpkin-skinned bastard would take a full shot from the BAMF. The force of the six heavy iron bolts was enough to pick the demi-human up and smash them into the ground. These nearly dead enemies were Bishop’s job to take out. Leaping on the pumpkin-headed demi-humans, he’d rip the last of their remaining hit points away, before going after the next downed enemy.
Things got dicey when Forrest pulled back on the charging handle and there was a hollow click. Cursing angrily, Forrest ripped the empty cartridge out of the BAMF and tossed it to the side. Grabbing a new cartridge, he hurriedly slid it in place until it clicked. Taking up his firing position again, Forrest yanked the charging handle back as two heavy iron bolts slid into the dual slots. Taking aim, he began laying down covering fire again as his buddy and combat pet fought for their lives.
The situation got real once the handful of surviving Worgs still able to fight managed to get untangled from the spear-fence mess and charge the duo. Bishop was suddenly pounced upon by three Worgs in a bestial flurry of fur and fangs, while the remaining four joined the three Hobgoblins whaling on Conner. The bumrush knocked him flat on his back as Forrest was suddenly faced with the decision on who he should support first. With tears in his eyes while Bishop fought for his life, Forrest sent bolt after bolt into the pack of enemies that was tearing Conner a new asshole.
No matter how hard he tried, Forrest couldn’t fire any faster than a Multi-Shot every two seconds. As he did his best to whittle the mass of mobs down on top of Conner, he kept a close eye on Bishop’s deadly fight. While the Worgs were larger and higher level, neither they nor Bishop were Elite Monsters. Meaning, the Plains Wolf was barely holding its own. Forrest knew that as long as they didn’t grab the Plains Wolf by the throat, he could survive the battle long enough for him to save his buddy from an ugly death.
Still, it took two solid shots of the BAMF to take a Worg down. In the six seconds that they were beating on Connor, he managed to slaughter all three and blast two of the three Hobgoblins off their feet. While they weren’t dead, they were temporarily out of the fight. Sending a final shot into the back of the Hobgoblin on top of Conner, he began firing at the Worgs on top of Bishop.
Though it was hard to line up the shot with the fast moving battle, Forrest managed to take one Worg down and then another. As a bloody and beaten Connor rolled to his feet to face the severely injured Hobgoblins, Forrest managed to get a solid shot in on the last Worg in this group just as it pounced on top of his Plains Wolf. The nasty beast cried out in agony as the Multi-Shot pierced its back, which allowed Bishop to lock his jaws around the larger Worg’s jugular and roll on top of the creature as Forrest went back to supporting his buddy.
Though, the Hobgoblins knew by now where Forrest was sniping them from, they were too far away to escape the inevitable. Like clockwork, he and Connor knocked the last of this group down. While Forrest turned his focus next to the severely injured Hobgoblins on the ground, Conner made his way over to finish off the Worg that Bishop was choking out for his dear life. As soon as the bloody Plains Wolf climbed to its feet, both went after the remaining Hobgoblins and Forrest cursed for all he was worth.
“Could you fucking finish off the wounded first?” Forrest shouted after them, as they both ignored him completely and took off down the hill.
With no other option, Forrest began sending bolts after the remaining group of Worg Riders. There were only a handful of Wild Hounds left as his Multi-Shots began blasting Hobgoblins off their Worgs. By the fifth target, they started to get visibly upset. Looking around in confusion, they saw Conner and Bishop were already halfway down the hill as another Multi-Shot slammed into a Hobgoblin’s chest. By the time they figured out where Forrest was, he’d taken another of the fuckers down as the Commander ordered three of his Scouts to take off back towards the main force.
“Fffuuccckkk!” Forrest screamed, as he targeted the farthest runner and sent six bolts into its vulnerable back, killing it instantly. At least, that’s how he read the situation. Another shot two seconds later and the Worg went down as he swiveled the BAMF around to target the next farthest Scout. If Forrest had been the commander, he’d want to know what was wiping out his foraging teams. By now, the constant groups of missing foragers must have been starting to register with the powers that be that something was hunting them down. For Conner, Forrest, and Bishop, it would be best if the Hobgoblin Commander never figured it out.
The next Scout took three shots to take out due to the angle. While that wasn’t bad, it still left the last Scout in question if he could get the kill shot in. Besides, you know, meaning that he couldn’t help Conner and Bishop with their battle. Forrest got a solid shot on both the Hobgoblin and its Worg, but due to the perpendicular line they were traveling in, neither shot was enough to take either enemy down. Forrest got another shot off, taking the Hobgoblin before the Worg managed to disappear down into a shallow area that blocked his angle on the Worg.
While Forrest didn’t know if the Scout was carrying a message or not, he didn’t dare let even the Worg get away. Partly, that was due to the tactic they were using of hiding the Hobgoblin’s corpses so the enemy didn’t know what was happening to their soldiers. Connor explained it as foraging groups go out but they never return.
Forrest h
ad thought the strategy was brilliant, but Conner admitted that he hadn’t come up with it on his own. He’d said that it was some old Mongols or Vietcong trick that he’d read about either in a Fantasy or Sci-Fi novel. Not that it mattered where it came from. As far as either one of them was concerned, it seemed to be working to breed fear in the enemy and that was all that mattered. Not that Forrest was too concerned about strategy one way or another. That was Conner’s job. Forrest’s job was constructing new weapon systems to kill monsters faster and better like the BAMF and the Spear Fence.
About two hundred yards out, Forrest saw the Worg running up a small rise in the distance as he immediately let fly with a Multi-Shot. Due to the distance and the dead Hobgoblin on the mounts back, the Worg didn’t go down as he hurriedly sent Multi-Shot after Multi-Shot after the fleeing monster. Finally, the fourth one brought the fucker down.
Swiveling the BAMF back around, Forrest focused on the fight going on down below only to find a shit show going on. Bishop was snarling and snapping at a large group of riderless Worgs that were trying to drag him out of the shallow den of the Wild Hounds, while Connor was doing his best to kite the seventeen Hobgoblins that were trying to surround him. Even so, his buddy leaked like a sieve as he bleed everywhere.
Hurriedly, Forrest began raining death on the Hobgoblins. His first shot blasted his target off his clawed feet to slam it into a group of his buddies as all five Hobgoblins went down. His next shot took the group down that rushed into the gap. At two-hundred yards, he must have been out of the Hobgoblins’ aggro range, because they couldn’t seem to understand what was taking them out. Conner did his best to help out, as he worked to turn the Hobgoblins so that their backs were towards Forrest. His next four Multi-shots dropped a Hobgoblin with each shot as the demi-humans began to freak the fuck out.
Several took off running for the hills trying to get away from the terrible bolts slaughtering them from afar. Not that it helped any. Like a machine, Forrest hammered each one of them down before they could find any cover in the shallow bowl that the Wild Hounds had used for their den. Pulling back the charging handle, Forrest cursed to the high heavens when the next hollow click sounded.
Once again, Forrest scrambled to remove the old cartridge and slam the next one home. This was the first time they’d been faced with forty Elite Hobgoblin Worg Riders and it was taking a lot of ammunition to take them all down. Taking up position again behind the BMF, Forrest pulled the charging bar back, once again, and began sending Multi-Shots down into the survivors as Connor ran while chugging a Health Potion, when Forrest’s next shot flew just over his buddy’s head to blast the five Hobgoblins that were chasing him off their clawed feet.
Whirling back around, Conner got in several good licks and then jumped out of the way as Forrest’s next shot hammered into the angry and injured Hobgoblins. From there, it was a pretty straight forward fight to take the remaining mobs out as Conner ran in the opposite direction so that Forrest could hammer his Multi-Shots into their vulnerable backsides. As the last Hobgoblin fell, he turned his fury against the Worgs that had nearly managed to yank Bishop out of his hole.
Once again, Forrest was forced to change out cartridges. Charging back the arm, he began to knock down the Worgs around the den. In less than thirty seconds, the Worgs finally broke and ran for the hills. Not that they got very far as Forrest finished them off one by one. As the last mob fell, Forrest turned his sights on the downed Worgs and Hobgoblins from the first group.
While he was pretty sure that they were all dead, he wasn’t about to take the chance that he was wrong and get caught by surprise while they were collecting the quarrels and hiding the dead. It took another forty seconds to tag every last corpse, which also happened to finish the last cartridge off. Shooting the last Worg corpse, Forrest finally leaned back with a sigh of relief and nearly collapsed due to the light headed feeling that had come over him due to his low mana.
Waving away the system message about reaching level 40, Forrest quickly put all of his extra Attribute points into Intelligence to increase his mana. If he hadn’t gained a level during the middle of the battle, he’d have run out of mana for his Multi-Shot, which was currently the bread and butter of their Worg Rider hunts. As soon as he approved the changes, he let out a sigh of relief as his mana jumped up seventy points, pushing it up over a hundred once again. Taking a deep breath, Forrest left the BAMF where it was and headed down the hill to help his buddy and Bishop out.
It took a couple minutes for him to get around the corpses littering the field. Mostly because the Spear-Fence had kept the dying Worgs linked together in a gruesome heap. Approaching the bloodbath outside of the small den, Forrest’s temper reared up inside of him as he noticed that Bishop was still all banged up and sitting to the side, while Conner fumbled with something deeper inside the den on his hands and knees.
“What the fuck is going on, Conner?” He growled, seeing the Plains Wolf’s snow-white fur still matted with blood from the oozing gashes in his flanks. “Why didn’t you heal Bishop up after the fight?”
“Why the fuck isn’t this working?” Conner angrily swore out loud, completely oblivious to Forrest as he urgently fumbled with something on the ground in front of him. “My spell should’ve worked!”
Calming down somewhat, Forrest glanced over at Bishop who’s look seemed to say that everything was alright and to let Conner work. Grumbling unhappily at seeing his boy hurt, he got down on his hands and knees to crawl in beside his buddy. As he reached Conner’s shoulder, he immediately understood what was going on as he saw the healing potions scattered in-between five unmoving grayish-black lumps.
“You’re here!” Conner anxiously said, as he pushed two grayish-black puppies over to him. “Try palpitating their hearts, man!”
“Palpitating their hearts?” Forrest asked in confusion. “You want me to give them CPR?” Seeing the crazed look on Conner’s face, he held up his hands to stop any arguing as he got to work.
“It’s a hundred and twenty compressions every minute,” Conner said, as Forrest gave him a “what the fuck” look. Seeing the look, Conner rolled his head and tried again. “Think of the beat from Stayin Alive by the Beegees and try to match that.”
“Really,” Forrest said with a contemptuous snort, “Stayin Alive? Are you going to ask me to craft you a pair of bell bottom pants or-”
“Just fucking do it,” Conner exasperatedly said, as he focused back on trying to save the pups.
“Meh meh mehmeh meh,” Forrest mockingly said under his breath, while doing his best to follow Conner’s example. Pulling two of the small bodies over to him, he carefully began squeezing the puppies’ small little chests to work their tiny hearts. It was definitively a lot harder to do then Conner made it look as he accidently cracked a few ribs until he figured out how hard and where to exactly push on the little bodies. While he knew you could give CPR to an animal, it was something he’d never done before in his life. Besides, he wasn’t about to give mouth-to-mouth to some rando Wild Dogs regardless if they were puppies or not.
“Gah!” Conner wordlessly screamed, while still compressing the little puppies’ chests. “What am I missing … what am I missing?” He muttered under his breath as he urgently searched through the healing paraphernalia scattered across the floor, when a gleam came to his eyes. Pulling the little body close to him, Conner bent over the tiny body as Forrest gagged in the back of his throat.
“Ugh, you’re not going to do what I think you’re going to do?” Forrest started to say, when Conner pressed the puppy’s muzzle together and cupped his hands around its nose to breath oxygen into the lungs. Forrest was about to say, “He’s dead, Jim!” when the small puppy began to cough and hack up gunk. Catching a mouthful of whatever the little guy had spit up, Conner spit it out urgently looked over at Forrest who began shaking his head. “Oh hell no, man! That’s all you.”
“God, you’re such a fucking baby,” Conner snarled in annoyance, as he pulled
the other puppy to him and breathed into its lungs. Again, the small creature spat up a mouthful of crud as it came back to life. With shaking hands, Conner did the same with the two puppies that Forrest was working on with the same result, before scooping up the last one.
This time when Conner breathed into the little creature’s lungs nothing happened. Urgently, the Warrior began trying to start the heart with his fingers gently palpitating the heart. Giving fifteen compressions, he tried breathing into the tiny muzzle once again without any results. As Conner frantically wracked his brains trying to think of what he’d missed, the four Wild Hound puppies that he saved eerily began to gather around him in an arc.
The little monsters moved with a preternatural grace as their red glowing eyes watched Connor’s efforts intently. Forrest looked at the odd scene a little freaked out from it all as Bishop limped up behind him and let out a warning growl. His eyes never leaving the small creatures as Connor became more and more distraught, when an idea came to him.
“Conner … Conner Mac!” Forrest said, loud enough to catch his buddy’s attention. As Conner’s distraught eyes looked up at him, the hair rose on the back of Forrest’s neck as the four puppies followed suit moving as one. He swore it was like a Village of the Damned moment as he calmly said. “Did you use a health potion on the other … puppies?”
“Aha!” Conner happily exclaimed, as he snatched up a half-full Health potion and sucked it into his mouth. Leaning over the puppy, he pried the little jaws open and forced the liquid into the puppy’s mouth while using his fingers to massage the liquid down its little throat. Once he felt like enough was in, Conner once again breathed a breath of air into the creature’s muzzle.
The hacking fit the puppy had this time around as its glowing red eyes snapped open freaked both Bishop and Forrest out as they both hurriedly backed up out of the den. By the time they made it out of the space, the Plains Wolf’s lips were pulled back from his fangs in warning and he was growling like he was going to rip the little puppies apart. Forrest wasn’t sure if the nervous vibe he was getting from the little monsters was due to how odd Bishop was acting or because his primitive brain was picking up on something unnatural. Either way, it was freaking him the fuck out. So much so, that he gripped the hilt of his long sword as he seriously debated pulling it out, while he watched the five Wild Hound puppies eerily gather in front of Conner.