The Blessed of Eido Island mustered quickly to face the new threat. Commander Marshall wasn’t sure what to make of the five that had come in advance of them, considering the aid they had also offered, but that would be a matter for when the current crisis was over.

  While the wreck of the large metallic vessel was off limits due to fears of what corruption it may carry, that didn’t mean it went unwatched. His posted scout had seen the second strange vessel, longer and with what they suspected was a modified ballista attached to the back hull, stealthily make its way to the beach that had been created after the first had run aground. From the sound of it, the crew had made their way first to search the wreckage and fortify the area.

  Fortunately, there was no sign that these invaders had a trace of magic on them. They did carry items that had been identified as variants of the strange weapons this region used, and to resolve that unknown he had someone here who’d recently witnessed their effectiveness to brief him.

  “It is, I admit, difficult for me to speak with certainty on this matter,” the Hero Gadriel whispered from where he was sheltering in cover. Despite these invaders not having detected the Ranger who’d first raised the alarm, Marshall didn’t want to take any chances and lose the element of surprise. “From my limited experience, I would say the force behind each projectile is reasonably threatening, perhaps to the degree of a level 1 arrow. At least in terms of what is needed to deflect them.”

  “Hmm. Show me.” Marshall gestured to the hand-sized, black weapon the Hero had recently acquired, but Gadriel shook his head.

  “They are noticeable when discharged. Not at the level of a ballista, but the sound is sharp. We would surely alert these people.” He seemed to want to add something but frowned, Marshall nodding to urge him to continue. “Should we not attempt to converse with them first? Lograve, at the least, has shown an astonishing affinity for their language, to say nothing of what your attributes allow.”

  “No.” There was absolute surety in Marshall’s voice. “They have come here at night, making no efforts to announce themselves but rather move immediately on that corrupted vessel. Knowing from your report that there are mortals moving against the Octyrrum, it is plain to me they are agents of the Crest. I had my suspicions initially when such a large construction could been made with no trace of magic, those on it ignorant of our people and the symbols of the Octyrrum. Whether the ones you know are affiliated is a matter to be settled once this threat is handled.”

  His eyes easily crossed the distance between himself and the corrupted ship, a meager feat as it was only just over a kilometer. He was a level 5 Pugilist, and despite his roots being in Martialist, there were certain benefits everyone received from passing attribute thresholds.

  There had to be a hundred of the invaders, judging by the size of the ship and those they sent out. Marshall could also see that the weapons most carried were larger than Gadriel’s, with two of the invaders attempting to conceal themselves at the top of the black ship placed behind those almost as long as a man. It took no large stretch of the imagination to conclude that these larger weapons would be more powerful, though they would need to be mindful of additional effects these variant fell ‘guns’ would have. Elemental damage, perhaps?

  The only armament of these cursed invaders that gave him major concern was the protrusion from the back of the black ship, which he suspected was some form of siege weaponry. Not that it was his safety he was concerned for, no unenchanted weapon could hope to damage the body of a level 5 Blessed, but if they had enough range those could launch reprisal attacks on Eido. He needed to personally address those first, and without his powers, with having spent so long stagnating in a leadership position with only a rare few monsters appearing that could challenge him, Marshall worried he might have grown rusty.

  It was time to find out, either way. “Send the signals. We charge on my mark.”

  “Commander, I do think we-“

  Marshall looked at the Hero with such intensity that some fear struck him, if only for a moment. “I will not give those heretics any more time to prepare. They cannot hope to match us. We will turn back these, and any other force they hope to send.” He planted one leg firmly on the ground, setting himself to run forward. The earth shook slightly from the impact of his enhanced strength, the Commander’s eyes set for the back of the black ship. As soon as his foot lifted off the ground to propel him forward, illumination flared from the black ship, and the Blessed met with the might of Earth.

  …

  Several minutes earlier.

  To throw away the work of decades for two lives that may have already been extinguished seemed foolish. That wasn’t considering the value of his own life he was now risking. Yet, for all his deception and maneuvering, Chris wouldn’t leave Alex and Ami to the mercy of this unanticipated development. It wasn’t just because they were key to his plan.

  Still, those who wished to play in the game of fate had to be good improvisers. For example, he hadn’t known anyone friendly to Daniel would be on the island, retaining some of their offworld powers nonetheless. In the worst case he had been prepared to reveal himself upon their landing, confident he could guide the Commander to accept the Brant’s presence on the island. That Lograve was among them was a stroke of luck, and it only made sense something like this would happen to balance out Karma.

  Adjusting the straps on his wrists and making sure the bulges weren’t visible through the sleeves of his jacket, Chris then walked closer and into the line of sight of the two Lograve had detected at the back of the yacht, hidden in preparation for someone like him to come looking.

  Slowly raising his hands, he called out, “Don’t shoot, I’m surrendering. Please, tell me my daughters are still alive.” He flinched as flashlights mounted to the under-rail of rifles flashed and pointed at him. Man of mystery or not, he was grade A human, nothing more. If these were the shoot first, ask questions later kind of professional mercenaries then, well, that wouldn’t mean anything good for the twins. Without them, there wasn’t much point in sticking around.

  “Get on the fucking ground!” One shouted with what Chris thought was a faint French accent, though not to the degree that would suggest they were a non-native English speaker. Both were two meters above him, and the only thing he could leverage against the advantage that was the high ground was the hope that the off-brand wizard could finish his end before these two finished him off.

  As he carefully lowered himself to his knees, the beam of the second one briefly turned as she shouted, “Hey, we have someone over here!” American, that one. Not that it mattered for his immediate circumstances, but knowing who the hell had come here would help untangle this mess later. If there was a later.

  “My daughters,” Chris repeated, by all outside appearances nailing his performance as a distraught father without a very particular set of skills. “Please.”

  I’m on, give me just a minute, Lograve informed him through telepathy, one of their only real edges here. Also, gods man, even I’m starting to think you’re their father.

  He didn’t respond, focused on keeping up the deception. The mercs were sold, at least. “You want to see them again, you get on the fucking ground!” The first shouted, keeping him under his sights. Chris saw one of the two from the dock moving at a fast walk toward him, also keeping their weapon trained on him.

  Hurry up, Chris mentally urged, knowing he couldn’t let that one get to him.

  This place is a travesty. Bottles everywhere. Did you drink an entire lake on the way here?

  …that was Ami. Chris began to slowly bend forward, acting like he was lowering himself to the ground. The exaggerated motion wouldn’t be too suspicious. The character he was playing wouldn’t want a sudden movement to invite death, and as luck would have it neither did he. The living space isn’t that large, what’s taking so long?

  I had to dodge around a brute the size of a- I see them. Alive, but unconscious. Bound in what I believe is the control room. Despite the fact that the third mercenary was almost on him, Lograve paused before he relayed, One of them is watching them.

  Do what you need to. Make it loud. Chris tensed, mentally preparing for the specific actions he’d need to take. The margin of error was razor slim.

  Just as the third mercenary was getting out what looked like zip cuffs, a pistol trained on him in the other hand, automatic weapons fire shot off in the yacht. Chris could have worried about who was shooting at who, but instead he crossed his arms as he fully planted himself on the ground. The noise and his passive move gave him a second to do what was needed.

  “Oh fu-“ the third mercenary tried to say before Chris shot him in the head. They had on some kind of body armor that covered the legs but had forgone full helmets. That left at least two more for him to deal with, who naturally opened fire themselves.

  Two bursts of automatic fire shot toward him, his chest and arms stinging from the repeated impacts. When it was over, the still form of Chris suddenly whipped out from behind what was attached to his other arm, managing to hit another of the mercenaries but failing to tag the other one before they got into cover to reload.

  Are you still with me? Chris asked Lograve as he checked the shield on his arm. It was a good thing he’d spent a few years in Aughal, albeit in disguise, otherwise he might not have known about a particular trick of the Octyrrum’s enchanted items. Between the level 2 shield and armor he’d worn under his jacket, both from some kind of primarily red leather, he’d been able to weather the shots that had come back at him. It’d been tricky to fit the two bags of holding in either sleeve, but he couldn’t just walk up with a gun and shield in the open, could he?

  Two down, was all Lograve said in reply, before both overheard one of the surviving mercenaries gurgle into their comm.

  Must have tagged the other one after all. Lograve, warn the others on the island, we just poked the bear, Chris advised while seeking more solid cover. His legs were still vulnerable and there was at least one gunman unaccounted for. Before he heard anything else from Lograve, however, the sound of faint explosions carried to his ears.

  …

  Mercenary Captain was not her title. This outfit didn’t do titles, or anything that would be inconvenient to put down on paper. Numbers were safe. No one could prosecute employee #3654 because she only existed on paper. Neither was this position particularly rewarding as it paid nothing.

  Unauthorized reproduction: this story has been taken without approval. Report sightings.

  Employee #3654 only existed because, at the end of the day, you had to have some form of reference in an organization like this. Something to put on an after action report so the higher ups could keep track of who was and wasn’t still alive. Also, to stop the salary of the cover job belonging to the real person that number was tied to. It wasn’t a measure she considered extreme, not when you could be working against governments that gave no thought toward the wellbeing of captured enemy combatants.

  But since humans couldn’t live and work together and just go by numbers, she did have a name used here. Eagle. Still no title, anyone who couldn’t recognize her or her voice risked being shot as an infiltrator if she didn’t know them in turn.

  So far, the mission had been going well. The possible lead had paid out, though it had led her company to one of the strangest places she’d even been. Technology existed to hide something like an air base from both radar and satellite, but to conceal an island almost ten kilometers across from the human eye? Every moment they spent here made her skin itch, and it was almost unfortunate that they’d found their primary objective after committing to a landing as they couldn’t leave without it.

  “Eagle, still nothing from the radios we recovered after that first transmission.” Marmot, her direct subordinate, reported as she looked out from the armored bridge of the Menagerie. The ship had gotten its name after the trend of callsigns stuck in the company. “Think they were bluffing?”

  “It was for our benefit, that much I know.” That was another thing that bothered her as much as the gold having been left in the Rigel. She would have expected some kind of attempt at negotiation after they’d taken over the smaller craft with two civilians on it, but instead the one radio they’d recovered had gone dead. Then there were the buildings faintly visible in the distance through night vision that looked… wrong, but the definition in the images wasn’t good enough to tell why. “Status report, how much longer?” she asked, tapping into the company’s secure channel.

  A response came quickly from the one overseeing the Rigel. “We’ll have it all on board in ten minutes, Eagle. Gold’s heavy. Could cut it in half if everyone helps. Be nice if we could get out of here, it’s too quiet.”

  “Shut it, Badger. Everyone stay where you are, eyes open.” She followed her own advice, looking out into the darkness ahead of her. In theory, there was only an open approach to the Menagerie and the wrecked Rigel, but the cargo ship had come in at an angle. As she was only concerned with fulfilling their contract to the letter, time was a factor, and they’d set their vessel to the side of the larger ship. The bow cut off line of sight on one side and most of the center ahead, though by now they’d posted sentries on the railing of the cargo ship to cover that blind spot.

  They’d been undisturbed so far, but Eagle wasn’t about to leave one flank undefended to buy five minutes. If-

  A ragged voice suddenly came through the comm, with a wet quality that suggested either lungs or a throat beginning to fill with blood. “T-they got… shot,” a deep voice Eagle could only recognize as belonging to Ox reported.

  It was plain he was on his way out, but she put aside whatever emotions she might have felt for her subordinate to quickly ask, “Who? How many?”

  “Couldn’t see,” Ox choked out, voice failing before he could finish, though he tried again. “Two, but I couldn’t see-“

  Rather than trail off, the connection died. By the sound of it, they had just lost the six that had been sent to secure the yacht and any hostages they could find on it. She’d told them to get out as soon as possible and secure leverage to keep their exit clean, but they hadn’t been fast enough. The enemy was coordinated, and skilled enough to contest her people at three to one odds. As soon as they heard the hostages had been rescued-

  “Full alert!” She shouted through the comm. “Lights on, weapons free! The moment a shot is fired I want everyone on guns.” There were unfortunately no half-measures, not when they’d found the full cargo. Her employers weren’t idiots, and they also knew exactly who they’d sent. If they came back with only some of the gold, or none of it at all, her life span would be shorter than Ox’s, especially as any number of people in her company would readily verify that they’d found the full shipment if pressured. She wanted to put everyone on defense, or better yet pull out and come back. Wrong line of work if I wanted to make the safe choice.

  Marmot was reaching for his rifle, preparing to step out onto the gantry connected to the bridge when he swore lightly. “What the fuck is that?”

  It wasn’t as if she could miss it either. Eagle’s hand found her sidearm as, from one of the small forests on the island, the floodlights revealed a dark-skinned man without any sign of modern armor or weapons moving toward them. Flying toward them, at a speed that would allow him to reach their position in under a minute after starting over a kilometer away.

  She couldn’t explain what was happening, even as the strange man began to descend to show he was less flying and more getting launched. At the speed he was going the impact should kill him, but then again so should whatever had sent him into the air.

  It wasn’t anything her company could explain either, but it was something they could aim at. Already dozens more were pouring toward them at various, yet Olympic speeds, but this one was the fastest. “Take him down!” Eagle shouted, more to Marmot than anyone else, shelving her disbelief until after the danger had passed.

  Most opened fire, but not all of them. The Menagerie had equipment to counter light vehicles, some aircraft, and even tanks or other similarly-sized ships if the cannon on the back of the ship got involved, though that had limited ammunition for that. Not that these options were needed for an insane man… dodging bullets midair.

  That familiar snap of adrenaline hit her, the state of focus that came when an enemy sniper opened fire or IEDs went off. Eagle’s ability to become deadlier when others panicked had made for a promising career, both during and after her service period. She could see the man almost blur as he dodged, no, not only dodged, but blocked the automatic fire. It was unmistakable how his forearms moved to cover his face and neck as if he were in a boxing ring and not a shootout.

  Whoever, whatever this was... He had to be stronger than the rest of his forces, for if they were all like him, they’d need an entire army to fight off this terrifying advance.

  “I want grenades where he lands next, stagger fire!” She ordered quickly, noting that he would need at least two more of those jumps to close the distance, assuming he was still capable of them. “Snipers, headshots. Mortars, dial in on the ones behind. Everyone else on guns. Drop the fucking gold and get my cannon crewed!”

  Throwing out orders rapid-fire wasn’t ideal, but the man was already hitting the ground toward the end. Everyone else in the company was throwing lead, but she had both of her hands firmly planted on the console in front of her, eyes locked onto the enemy. Find out what works. Find out what works. She was in command. Her mind was her greatest weapon. Bulletproof skin? Try to collapse the lungs and burst interior blood vessels with the pressure let off from chained explosions.

  Nothing stopped his second jump either. She refused to let the utter confidence, no, the arrogance this man was displaying in front of her trained forces humble her. He either hadn’t seen everything they had to throw at him or didn’t understand their firepower.

  The two mounted weapons at the bow of the Menagerie were already unloading, one starting about halfway into the burst from the other. At 300 meters, the automatic grenade launchers lost some of their accuracy, but the gunners had correctly assumed that they shouldn’t reserve ammunition and made up for it in volume of fire.

  She could see the slight frown on the man’s face as he landed, surprised but otherwise unbothered by the bullets swarming him. So much ammunition was going into killing this one man that she’d have to have someone running from the armory to the Rigel to restock them, and yet there wasn’t a scratch on him. That changed as a cluster of explosions went off before he could move from the targeted area.

  “Fucking hell, Eagle,” Marmot murmured, letting his rifle drop as they both saw that the man was still on the ground now mottled with small craters. It was like air striking a neighborhood to kill a spider, the spread of explosions didn’t all hit the target, but the analogy would indicate that the spider should still have died.

  Instead, he remained standing. Bloodied, at least, with areas of skin that had been slightly torn, but for the most part it looked like he had just taken a bad fall down half of a hill.

  Eagle’s heart froze for a moment as she saw the man’s head turn and find her, which should have been impossible against the glare of the floodlights mounted directly above the window. He knelt, picked up a loose piece of stone that the grenades had broken, and-

  “Eagle!” Marmot tackled her to the side just as it came crashing through glass that had a fair chance of surviving an indirect rocket strike. As it was she was cut along the face and neck by shards. There was a rending sound behind her as the steel bulkhead failed to stop the rock, though she heard something else as she fell too.

  “Scorpion. Adder. We’re taking the shot.” Two nearby cracks went off as the snipers above her fired. Eagle forced herself off the ground, ignoring the new holes in her bridge, as she fought to observe what effect, if any, they would have on the target. You could give marksmen like them two kinds of weapons, generally speaking. One for soft targets, one for hard.

  The two antimaterial rifles had been chosen on the assumption that bigger was always better. What’s more, the range her mounted weapons struggled with were a joke to those. The man, still on the ground after throwing the stone as only a few seconds had passed, was bending down to calmly pick up another, eyeing the two mounted weapons that had rained explosions toward him. The two on each one were scrambling to reload, but they wouldn’t be fast enough.

  He saw the threat, but too late. He was distracted, no doubt by the rain of fire that continued as the majority of the Menagerie kept their calm and stayed on the indicated target. The two rounds had been fired simultaneously, giving no chance of one spoiling the other’s fire. A still target would have been better, but the movement the man was making was predictable.

  Eagle saw the blur, but it stopped halfway as the head jerked back, an arm throwing itself to the ground to prevent a fall. And yet, blood. If it bleeds, shoot again.

  “Eagle, cover!” Marmot yelled from the floor, concerned about more ballistic rocks.

  She ignored him. “Again! How long on the artillery?”

  Plumes of fire erupted in the distance. The mortars. She’d almost forgotten about that order. Time moved fast and slow at the same time.

  “Loading and vector calcs churning,” someone reported. They had to be in the back of the ship based on the fact that rampant gunfire wasn’t making the transmission hell to pick apart. “10 seconds. Can’t give you more than 50/50 against a man sized, less if he moves.” Behind her, the barrel of one of the ship’s cannons was rotating down, not needing to angle. Too much closer and the ship would be in the way, and if the enemy had approached from the direction of the Rigel the shot would’ve been impossible.

  There was ice and fire and Eagle’s veins as she watched the target grasp the round that had gone almost its full depth into his skull before stopping. That, and the one that had been slightly too low and pierced through the side of the neck, would have fully taken the head off of a human. She was having a hard time thinking of him as one anymore, but out of everything, this had finally slowed him down. What’s more, it had staggered him enough for further sniper fire to land, each hit buying time instead of blowing him apart as they should have. The magazines of Scorpion and Adder would run out very quickly, but the fast response by the gunnery crew saved them from needing more than what they could provide.

  A minute after the floodlights had been activated. An eternity. “Shots out.” Eagle heard the man on the artillery, Mole, in the background as he called out the salvo. The loudest eruption of sound blasted through the air as three projectiles that weighed half as much as she did were sent in rapid succession.

  It took seconds for the dust to clear. Eagle should have been giving more orders, routing her attention to the trailing majority of hellspawn, but if that man had survived those shots, she was pulling out and damning the gold and everyone still on the Rigel.

  “All of that, he took enough to down an airliner, to the face!” Marmot exclaimed as they both took in the results of their efforts. “It took all of that to kill him?”

  There was no denying it. The absurd toughness of the lead enemy had begun to seem impossible to fully break. Now, he was in pieces. Mainly two, to be fair, but one of the cannon shots must have struck upper center mass. There frankly shouldn’t have been anything left, but the body was unmoving.

  “The others are slower. Weaker,” Eagle replied, forcing calm into herself as she tried to sound convincing. “Anyone else tries jumping we’ll do the same thing, otherwise they’re running into our mortars. We have over a minute to dismantle the landscape around them before they reach us. I don’t care if this is some fucked up supersoldier program, androids, or hell, aliens. We’ll ground them all to dust before they set foot aboard the Menagerie.”

  Marmot was about to say something, but an arrow struck the window right in front of his face. Unlike the rock it bounced off, though not before leaving a crack in the window that a shotgun would be impressed with.

  It was then that Eagle realized that while she had spent so much time and ammunition killing one man, the others of the enemy force had been running into their effective range.