by Kal Aaron
The queen advanced, her tail swishing behind her and knocking rubble and dead kin out of the way. All her earlier hurry had vanished.
Was she dying? Lyssa didn’t believe it. But she also wasn’t mindlessly charging like earlier.
No. She was being careful.
The monster thought she had the advantage in her chamber. She’d felt safe and secure there, not even bothering to help the rest of the swarm during the massacre in the hatchery until Lyssa fired directly into her room.
The creature had thought she was above the fray, and Lyssa had shown her that she wasn’t. Now she needed to prove the queen should have stayed hidden.
Lyssa lowered her penetrator-loaded gun and pointed the other pistol at the queen’s mouth. “This is going to hurt you more than it hurts me.”
She pulled the trigger, and yellow-tinged purple flames lit the throat of the monster. A sickening sizzling followed.
The queen scurried back, rising on her back legs and jerking her head. Lyssa aimed for one of the previous wounds and fired another ablative round, searing the upper layer of the flesh. She fired another, but the queen crashed down and the round clipped her side, leaving a blackened, smoking mess.
Now staring down the gaping maw of the queen, Lyssa kept firing. The loud sizzle and smell of burnt flesh reminded her in a sick way of a barbecue. She emptied the magazine into the thrashing queen, who shot forward, slicing and bashing with her legs.
Lyssa shoved her empty gun into her holster before launching a penetrator through the queen and leapt into the muck to avoid the spear-like tips of the monster’s legs. The queen slammed down near her, splashing fluid all over. Lyssa kicked her legs, regretting her lack of water sorcery to keep her gun from getting jammed with gunk.
She rolled toward the queen and squeezed the trigger, moving her pistol up and down as she sought a brain, a heart, or some other vital organ.
Monsters weren’t spirits. They were living creatures. They could challenge Mother Nature, but that wasn’t the same thing as being free of her grip.
Lyssa kept firing. Round after round dug deep into the queen, leaving her mouth filled with blood. How many enchanted bullets could the damned thing take?
She stopped and concentrated, murmuring an incantation under her breath. She grew insubstantial. Her spell complete, she took slow steps, watching the queen for a reaction.
The queen writhed and splashed fluid for a long moment before calming and crawling into the deeper parts of the pool. Lyssa crept along, moving as fast as she could manage without splashing.
Holding her breath, she reloaded with ablative and penetrator rounds. She continued circling to the side of the injured queen, aiming for one of the deep burns from an earlier ablative hit. Anything that could be wounded could be killed.
Lyssa pointed both pistols and backed away, trying to put enough distance between them that the monster couldn’t nail her with an immediate reaction. She exhaled slowly and pulled both triggers, winking into existence with the loud echoing blasts from her pistols. Another puff of yellow flames ripped into the wound as the powerful second round carved through the queen.
Now visible, Lyssa ran toward the back of the monster, trying to keep her angle on the wound. Relentless trigger pulls sliced away at the queen until Lyssa had drained her magazines and left a gaping hole in the side of the huge monster. The blood leaking from the wounds mixed with the fluid in the pool.
The squirming and violent jerks intensified. Lyssa ran toward the hatchery and loaded her last set of magazines. Running might not work if the queen charged through the cavern and smashed her way through the intervening walls.
“You should consider retreat, given your ammo situation,” Jofi said.
“I made her mad,” Lyssa replied. “It’d be rude to leave now. This might be my only chance to finish her off.”
She rapid-fired into the open wound, careful to use only half her remaining ammo. The queen grew wilder, swinging her tail and striking the wall and the pool. Lyssa rushed into the hatchery, but the monster didn’t follow her.
“Come on, already!”
With one last spasm, the queen reared, holding her entire giant body on her two rear legs. Lyssa’s concerted efforts had burned a hole through the queen’s body. Heart pounding, the Sorceress took slow steps back, pointing her guns above the wound. Did she need to annihilate the entire body?
The queen swayed, then collapsed on her side. The body smacked hard into the fluid, launching a huge wave of muck that splashed Lyssa.
She shook her arms, trying to get some of the mess off. “I’m going to have to shower for a week to get this smell off.”
Chapter Twelve
Taking slow, deep breaths, Lyssa stared at the body of the queen for a good minute to ensure she was dead before ejecting her magazines and inspecting them. She had eight bullets left in each of her guns, more than enough to stop any leftover small monsters that decided to take a chance on killing her, but she’d have trouble against any other huge ones.
Part of her wanted to believe she wouldn’t run into any other large monsters on the way out, but the difference between a dead Torch and a live Torch was proper preparation, not luck. The quick recon sweep had turned up a large and self-perpetuating horde rather than the handful of leftover stray monsters she’d expected. It’d been a long time since she’d used up almost every bullet in a single day.
“We should retreat while you have the opportunity,” Jofi said. “The monsters are dead. You’re no longer being rude, as odd as that statement was.”
Lyssa shook her head and went back into the hatchery. “We’re still not done.”
“The contract specified elimination of the monsters,” Jofi replied. “I fail to see how you’ve not accomplished that. Even if you aren’t finished, it would be wise to return to your home and rearm.”
“We need to verify we’ve done enough that nothing’s going to come barreling out later.” Lyssa nodded toward the queen. “I didn’t know she was in here at first. If I’d just killed the guys at the front and turned away, I could have left a big problem. Those deputies don’t deserve to be eaten.”
“I understand, but I suggest you expedite the rest of this verification process if you’re not going to rearm.”
“If it comes down to it, I can use the showstoppers to cover my retreat,” Lyssa replied. “I need to inspect this place as well as possible to make sure the immediate threat is gone. It’s not like I want to be in a rank cave filled with dead monsters.”
She wrinkled her nose as the unpleasant smell of the room reasserted itself. That was what she got for thinking about it. She kept getting used to it and being able to ignore it, but then her mind drifted, and it came back in all its torturous glory. Killing the queen hadn’t helped.
She did her best to breathe through her mouth. Her entire regalia was coated with polluted monster blood. The only way things could have been worse was if she didn’t have a mask. Somewhere out there, a Sorceress with a cleanness essence was laughing to herself.
Lyssa wasn’t surprised Jofi wanted to make a quick exit. Everything she knew about his true nature pointed toward him wanting to fight intelligent creatures, or at least something with souls, not mindless monsters. This outing was only a little more diverting for him than a trip to the range.
“We’ll be smart about this since they can’t see through my sorcery, but I need to make sure there’s no hidden sorcery or shards left around,” Lyssa said. “I don’t want to find out at the end of this that the whole point was to distract us while a freaking sorcery bomb goes off and blows up everything for three miles.”
“That seems like an outlandish and unlikely scenario,” Jofi replied. “From what I’ve observed, no individual Sorcerer is capable of such a feat.”
“Why assume a single rogue is involved?” Lyssa pulled out and expanded a baton.
“You suspect more?”
“I don’t know,” Lyssa replied. “But ignore things, and t
he next thing you know, boom!” She traced an explosion in the air with her hands. “I’m doubting these monsters ended up here by accident, but I don’t see the plan.”
“Would the destruction of an abandoned mine be a particular concern?”
Lyssa shook her head. “Terrorism isn’t always about killing people. It’s right there in the name. The point is to terrorize people. Monsters can do that by looking weird and poisoning people.”
“You think someone is attempting to scare the Shadows with these monsters?” Jofi asked.
“It’s occurred to me. Abandoned mines in the desert aren’t exactly the places to begin a great world-conquering plan.” Lyssa poked open the mouth of a large snake-roach with her baton. “I only had to crack out the good stuff because there were so many of these things. Adams and Ortiz could have taken out a small pack without too much trouble. Get the National Guard and some rocket launchers, and they’d have a good chance of taking down the queen if they could keep calm.”
“You’re saying you’re roughly equivalent to a military unit with heavy weapons?” Jofi asked.
Lyssa snickered. “Yeah, actually, I am. Just call me the Lyssa Squad.” She moved on from the body. “I’m not saying they shouldn’t have brought me in. If these things left the mine and got near a town, they could hurt a lot of people. I had the advantage of them being all clustered together in close quarters.”
“Do you think the goal was breeding a large army?” Jofi asked.
“It’s possible,” Lyssa said. “The thing is, I’ve fought tougher monsters, and the ones I usually hear about are created to be more dangerous than normal animals. Otherwise, there’s no point in wasting time and energy on sorcery versus grabbing a bunch of javelinas and jamming them in the back of a truck, where you torture them with T-Pain songs on a constant loop before releasing them in the middle of a city to bite people.”
“I don’t know who T-Pain is,” Jofi replied. “But I would suggest your alternative plot appears overly elaborate and questionable. I don’t know if javelinas would be effective terror weapons.”
“The point is any monster that doesn’t have a good chance of killing an armed Shadow isn’t worth the trouble,” Lyssa said. “It’s not the tenth century. Sorcerers have to up their game.” She looked around. “There’s a good chance I’ve cleared everything out, but nothing says we can’t check things out with me hiding. No shame in surprise attacks against monsters.”
“You’re sure about this?”
“Hell, no, but I’m sure I want to minimize the chance of loose ends.” Lyssa leaned over one of the corpses. “I have a bad feeling I’m going to be back here anyway.”
“Next time, I’d suggest you bring more ammunition,” Jofi said.
“That’s probably a good idea.”
Lyssa allowed the shadows to swallow her. Her heart had long since stopped pounding from the fierce series of fights, and she’d not used much sorcery, meaning she’d be able to maintain her cloak while inspecting the rest of the mine without it being a struggle.
That was one advantage of merging technology with sorcery, despite what some Illuminated thought. Aisha could pull off flashier stunts, but Lyssa could deal death for a longer period.
“You know, I just thought of something,” Lyssa said, heading toward the queen’s chamber. “I’ve never actually been in a mine before.”
“Does it impress you?” Jofi asked.
“The monsters kind of ruined the whole atmosphere.”
She walked along the edge of the pool before wading in again. The queen’s body took up most of the space, and Lyssa risked hopping up and walking down the length of the huge corpse for more clues. It wasn’t like she expected a QR code, but anything could help.
“All that fighting, and I didn’t feel any sorcery,” Lyssa said. “I’m even more convinced our guy’s a wimp. I don’t think it’s crazy to assume a potential rogue at the other end of this might not be much of a combat Sorcerer, hence the big army of monsters.”
“Terror requiring regalia would ensure Eclipses are sent,” Jofi replied.
“That’s a strong point.” Lyssa nodded. “And you’re right. It could be a ridiculously dangerous Sorcerer and a huge horde of monsters. I’ll sleep well tonight.”
Lyssa crouched near the hole and peered inside the body. She wasn’t a biologist when it came to normal animals, and she was all but clueless as to what she was looking for in a sorcery-enhanced creature. Dissection via thorough application of bullets was her scientific exploration strategy, but her analysis needed work.
At least she could verify she didn’t feel anything resembling active sorcery. The lack of a Sorcerer at the end of the incident would be helpful, but she needed to be sure. Unfortunately, not feeling it didn’t prove anything.
“I don’t get it.” Lyssa jumped off the body. “Was the plan to just breed an army of monsters and wait until they killed someone? That seems sloppy. They got their one kill, and now I’ve cleared out this whole horde. If a Torch got killed, the Society would send in a big group to guarantee this nest got wiped out.”
“You previously suggested this might be terrorism,” Jofi said. “Doesn’t that suggest the requirements are different?”
Lyssa nodded. “Yes, but terrorism works best when it’s planned and pointed at a high-profile target. When things go off at random, you mess everything up, and it isn’t scary. Nobody’s going to be that afraid of monsters that were discovered in an old hole and promptly cleaned up. Right now, the EAA could bury this incident with almost nobody hearing about it.”
“But a man has died.”
“Sure, but I know how people think. They’ll tell themselves Jake could have avoided trouble by not poking around an abandoned mine. They’ll say that if he stayed in LA, he wouldn’t have ended up dead.”
“That’s true,” Jofi said. “Both those actions led directly to his encounter with the creatures.”
“I know all that, but that’s my point,” Lyssa said. “He probably shouldn’t have been poking around in an old mine, but that’s why this doesn’t work as terrorism. Most people aren’t going to be poking around in old mines. Effective terrorism relies on everyone believing it might and could happen to them no matter what they’re doing. Anything that smacks of bringing it on yourself doesn’t work.”
Lyssa craned her neck up to look into the higher tunnels. The roofs of the hatchery and the queen’s room chamber were both smooth.
She frowned. Those roofs were also much higher than the queen’s maximum height. The smaller monsters could climb the side walls. That might explain how they’d carved out the space, but the more she considered that, the more unlikely it seemed.
Creature hives, regardless of species, tended to be functional. Extra space meant wasted energy, but two chambers had been blessed with huge voids overhead. The monsters might have gotten lucky, but a Sorcerer also might have carved out the space for them.
“My time with you suggests the average criminal lacks foresight,” Jofi said. “Even in situations involving more serious intentions than petty crime, foresight is a key problem. The criminal shard users you killed recently were a good demonstration of that. They should have anticipated that the heavy use of shards would lead to their deaths.”
“The average criminal isn’t so bright, sure, but the average rogue Sorcerer?” Lyssa replied. “And someone who could pull this off is far from the average rogue. I’m ninety to ninety-five percent sure a rogue’s involved. They might be long gone, though.”
She moved back to the wall and ran her hands over it, feeling for anything odd. There was no way she was going to take her gloves off. It was bad enough she could feel all the water and grime that’d made it in from the bottom and pooled in her gloves.
Something caught her eye, and she knelt. It was half a driver’s license covered in filth and grime. The picture was gone, but the name Jake Colmes was legible.
Lyssa pulled it out of the mud near the edge of the pool. It’
d been bitten in half. She shook her head and tucked it into a pocket.
“This isn’t a small operation.” Lyssa stopped at what looked like a handle protruding from the wall. She squatted and realized it was nothing more than a rock that’d cracked and been chipped away. “Even if that queen was plopping those things out, somebody had to get her in here to begin with. And that had to happen without anyone noticing.”
“Could a smaller creature have been grown inside here?” Jofi asked.
“Possibly.” Lyssa blew out a breath. “I don’t know the reproduction cycle. There are too many unknowns in this whole thing.”
“Illuminated population density is low enough that it wouldn’t be likely for another Sorcerer to stumble upon an operation away from a population center,” Jofi replied. “This is a remote location, from what you’ve said.”
“Sure. I’m not saying I’d expected Samuel or me to come strolling along and sense a bunch of sorcery.” Lyssa chuckled at the image of the white-suited Elder wandering the Arizona desert, hunting slimy monsters. “But using sorcery to do something big might be detected by Shadow tech. They’ve got all sorts of sensors and gizmos looking around, and not always for what you think. Seismographs, cameras, drones. It’s hard to hide, even for Sorcerers. That’s allegedly one of the reasons the Tribunal had us come out of the top hat after M-Day.”
“The EAA didn’t have more information than they provided,” Jofi said. “That implies there was nothing unusual to detect, or whatever was done was done in a way that it put it beyond their means of detection.”
“That’s a good point.” Lyssa nodded. “But you know what Damien is always saying, they are underfunded and understaffed. It’s a theory anyway, and it’s heavily dependent on what kind of sorcery they used. It doesn’t do me any good to run around shaking down every scientist or government employee in Arizona, asking them questions if I don’t even know if I’m asking them the right ones.”