Commander Marshall was dead. A level 5 Blessed, the only one to survive the Temple of Unification due to power rather than luck- the highest leveled among them by far- Who could have potentially fought the lightning dragon himself in the right conditions-

  If he’d had his powers, he could have broken the gun that had slain him, as well as the black ship itself, in half before a blow landed on him. His armor would have stopped any of those magicless attacks from harming him, except for the last, perhaps, but it wouldn’t have cut him in half!

  Gadriel could tell how the Commander had erred. It wasn’t what had befallen the Assassin, a sudden removal of active benefits throwing him off guard. Marshall had lived in this environment for months and gotten used to it. No, it was pride that nothing without magic could break him. That the Blessed of the Octyrrum would always triumph over the Crest. Arrogance.

  He’d seen it when the combined attacks of most on the two ships that now felt like fortress walls had come far faster than they’d anticipated. Marshall hadn’t expected that but had persisted as he remained unharmed. It wasn’t until he’d landed, and the most fearsome of their foes’ arsenal was unleashed, that he’d found himself in a trap of his own making.

  The charge didn’t slow. Most were canny enough to realize that retreating would mean running with their backs to the sharp stings and explosions chasing them. The only cover worth anything was ahead, in the shadow of the broken ship with a star on its hull. Where the terror that was the black ship couldn’t see them.

  That didn’t change the distance. Gadriel could have closed it by now if he wasn’t advancing carefully, out of necessity once the attacks against them started. Rushing through seemed safer, but only Marshall had been immune to the rain of their weakest weapons.

  He was breathing. In and out. Step by step, taking the world in flashes as the everpresent, soulcrushing pain of the forcibly bound artifacts assaulted his will as they always had.

  Masika was behind him, crying out something at the death of the Commander. In grief or vengeance he didn’t know, perhaps both. He was too consumed with keeping her safe, keeping himself safe. Of getting to the two ships and, and, resolving this conflict! He could speak some of this distant region’s language, perhaps, with the right words.

  A childish dream, nothing more. The aspiration of a Hero who had yet to depart from the spirit of the class and live solely in the name. The hope he might have had if his sword was not already stained by blood.

  Yet, there was still life. He would save who he could, and then…

  Retribution from the Octyrrum’s side came shortly after the Commander fell. Some had passed where he’d gotten with the first jump, risking themselves after seeing that he was absorbing most of the enemy’s attention. Some had bows, and while magic was suppressed, even items, some had been enchanted.

  The enchantments themselves no longer functioned, not the basic ones, but it still made the items stronger than normal, able to bear a stronger draw. A trick of Foci. Perhaps if Marshall could have bound armor instead of his fists, he could have survived.

  Half a dozen arrows sailed out, one enterprising archer going for Marshall’s initial target but unable to pierce the far window. The others were more successful, managing to strike one of the keenest of the enemy at the top of the black ship. Retaliation was swift, a shot from the second archer at there cutting down a charging Blessed. Marshall had at least been able to survive those powerful weapons, though anyone without his attributes would be far worse off. That wasn’t considering that there were those suffering from level disparity, not that Gadriel was one of them. He might be the strongest Blessed left on the field between his attributes and enchanted equipment, and that was taking into account the cost of using them.

  A distant boom as Marshall’s slayer took action. Gadriel’s eyes widened, trying to catch where the projectile was in the air. He was already doing his best to block what was coming for him and Masika with his shield, his reflexes strained to their breaking point. It wasn’t coming for him, at least. The ground shattered far and to the left, multiple impacts erasing a group of Blessed. They’d taken the same gamble Marshall had, charging straight toward the black ship instead of at an angle to take cover behind the one with the star. Perhaps they’d hoped such a fearsome weapon couldn’t be fired again so soon, but it seemed to only need time to aim for the next target.

  The world shook for a moment as one of the tubes raining from the air struck nearby, knocking Gadriel to the side midstep. He could feel shards of something cut and embed into one of his legs, but it didn’t hurt worse than his arms, and he could still move them, so he kept going. He did spare one look back, unsure what he would do if no one was there, but Masika still followed him.

  It’s so impersonal, he thought as he assessed the fighting style of this foreign region. A group of men standing from afar, farther away than any fought below level 2. You could feel the eyes of the lightning dragon on you, its instinctual hatred and willingness to destroy you, even if it would have preferred to kill with lightning from afar as well. This was just a wall of bright lights and black bows.

  These people and these weapons, with powers and enchantment behind them, would be a force to be reckoned with. That said, they had taken losses of their own. These were pure mortals, unable to compete on even ground. As the Hero looked up at the twisted ruin of metal that was currently his salvation from the attention of the enemy, he said to Masika, “We must act quickly to put an end to this. Even so, act mercifully. Remember their weakness.”

  “They killed Marshall,” she returned, and Gadriel hated to hear that voice turn so ugly. “They-”

  “We do not know who they are!” Gadriel shouted, not worrying about being overheard amid the noise from the rest of the battle. “Marshall erred in his haste. Do what you must, kill if you must, but one should never revel in death. You should know better than any that we have no god of it.”

  She still had a frown, but her eyes softened slightly. “Fine. But I will bring destruction.”

  …

  Condor had been a part of the Menagerie for less than a year, but that wasn’t an excuse. You didn’t sign on to this kind of job without experience, and the knowledge of what you were getting yourself into. And he’d stood his ground, hadn’t he?

  Stolen story; please report.

  Past that fucking weirdness with the invisible island and the city in the distance, which gave him the creeps to look at. Then that, that thing had jumped out of a forest and eaten god damn automatic fire, and grenades, and rounds that would down an APV.

  All this time, he’d been hanging with his ass out at the front of the Rigel, a good two minute run from where the ladders had been thrown up from the Menagerie. That was the kind of dedication expected of a six figure salary.

  Everyone had their breaking point. His wasn’t even the counterfire they received in arrows, fucking wooden arrows, that had punched through Eel’s vest. The guy had bled out among all the spent casings littering the floor, the others not hesitating to scavenge his remaining, bloodstained mags.

  No, it was when the charging enemies got close enough that he could clearly see what he’d mistaken for strange helmets. Condor had been lost for words when they’d seen the first one survive so much, but he had one now.

  “Aliens!” he shouted, flinching as an arrow came for his group but just hit the railing instead. That did it. “Fucking aliens!”

  He kept a grip on his rifle at least. Stoat, the highest up in the company on this section of the Rigel, turned his head and cursed as he saw Condor running. “Condor, get the fuck back in the game or I’m putting one through you!”

  “Should’ve named him Rabbit,” another, Condor was too panicked to pick out the voice, disparaged. He didn’t get how they were just ignoring the obvious; they had to get on the ship and get out of here before they were taken to pieces. “Hey Stoat, they went under the railing. Not saying we run, but should we back up?”

  With a snarl, the other mercenary turned away. He was probably thinking he’d mark Condor for deferred punishment, but he’d have to be alive to do that.

  The comm came alive, Eagle speaking on the general channel. Condor prayed it was a general retreat order he could BS as having been following later, but it wasn’t. “Attention, forces on the Rigel. Expect close contact. All surviving enemies are now outside effective firing angles of the Menagerie’s fixed guns. We are employing standard defenses, hold until the fallback order is given.”

  Eagle had gone insane. Planning to hold the homeship against this? Gold wasn’t worth this, hell, this job wasn’t worth-

  Screams and a heavy impact made Condor stumble and turn around. Landing on the deck after what must have been a 7 or 8 meter jump was one of the ones that looked human, or a poorly misunderstood attempt of one. He was wearing the armor and a cape of some medieval European knight complete with a shield strapped to his arm, and yet the katana sheathed on his side was unmistakable. It was, frankly, a bit ridiculous, but there was nothing funny about how he moved.

  The false human had just cleared the railing, grabbing it with one hand to swing himself up into a sweeping kick that knocked Leopard and Boar to the ground. That left four to contend with him, five if Condor could bring himself to raise his rifle, but watching the man move terrified him into inaction. Personal cowardice/reasons aside, they were all trained killers, but it seemed to hardly matter.

  Against knives and sidearms, the fighting too close for rifles to be effective, the caped man was making Condor’s side struggle. Part of it was being able to ignore or block most of what they could do to him. Boar tried to stab a leg while he was down, only causing a shallow cut from what should have gone to bone. The man kicked backward into the head of Boar after that, and it was down to 3 with barely a mark on him.

  Then… it came over the side. The only similarities between the two contacts were in silhouette and armor. You could have mistaken them as the same from a distance, and he had, but from this close? Beak. Feathers. The eyes, they were hauntingly familiar. Like you’d taken a person and put them in a living mascot suit. Hadn’t there been some kind of horror thing about that on the internet? Wait, was this, somehow, the crew of the Rigel that had been experimented on?

  Condor’s thoughts were erratic, panicked, logic hard to grasp for after what he’d seen. They were coming for him. He could hear others around him, bangs against the hull where some were no doubt climbing up. These things were swarming the Rigel, and from the sound of it there wasn’t much support fire coming his way. Neither sniper had fired recently, and every other big weapon couldn’t be pointed this way.

  “Surrender.” The word was thrown at him from the man who’d first boarded, the other, feathered one standing behind him. Everyone else was… alive? Breathing, but down, some bloodily.

  Condor still had his rifle pointed forward. He could easily line up a shot, but what good would that do? The man must have known that, he didn’t have that sword drawn. But… but he wasn’t going to be goddamn taken.

  The first shots landed, but as he’d feared, the armor and whatever the skin underneath was made of took the shots. The false man ducked under the rest, impossibly fast, moving closer and-

  …

  “We can’t take risks like that, Gade,” Masika said chidingly, her mace in her hand. The two were taking temporary cover from the black ship and those still firing from it, a moment of rest. “They are trying to kill us.”

  “Pain for a life is an easy trade,” Gadriel replied evenly, though he winced as he moved his shoulder. The impact of the few shots that had hit him had collectively felt like he’d been punched by Murdon.

  “Not when it’s yours. I don’t like seeing you hurt.” Gadriel couldn’t help but read her face and she cursed. “Fuck, it’s not like… sorry.”

  “No, I shouldn’t, I should know how things stand.” His face cleared with a shake of the head, his eyes finding something else. “There, near the peak of the black ship. Where Marshall struck. The leader is there, I heard her giving orders. She can stop this.”

  “What then, Gade? Marshall’s dead. We’re going to wind up with more prisoners than Blessed.”

  “I will not let future inconvenience condemn others to death,” he said resolutely, taking a breath and then breaking into a run for where the black ship was nestled toward the back of the broken one.

  “Should’ve known better than to try and stop you,” Masika said to herself, almost wistfully, before she made to follow him.

  …

  By that time, Lograve and Chris had finished making sure the yacht was clear. They hadn’t wanted to take risks with the twins vulnerable, despite Lograve’s Telepathy indicating they were alone. While at least one of the two wanted to rush to where the fighting was, there were problems.

  “Why isn’t anyone responding?” Lograve asked, thrusting the radio into Chris’ hand. “Is it suppressed?”

  “No. Best guess is everyone that has one has them turned off or muted, if they were hitting the place these boys came from.” His eyes fell on the body of one of the armored mercenaries who had a golden dagger sticking out of his neck. “What the hell was in that ship that made them hire these idiots?”

  “I need to return to the center of the island,” Lograve decided. “We’re just outside of my Telepathy range there, and-“

  “You’ll be too late,” Chris said sadly. There was a knowingness to his voice that made Lograve’s head turn, and the Arcanist remembered why he had initially followed the unassuming human. “Whatever’s happening will be over by the time you get there. Might already be, haven’t heard another big shot go off in half a minute. Doubt your side’s doing too bad unless they brought an air force with them.”

  “Who are you?” Lograve asked forcefully, not needing to keep his voice controlled for the twins’ sake. Poisoned, but better than dead.

  The man had the gall to take out a flask and drink from it, slowly, before he sighed. “There’s a long version of this story, one we don’t have time for if you want to get in touch with Eido. I do have an answer, but it’ll suffer for its briefness. Still, we’re past the point where ‘I’ll tell you later’ will leave you satisfied. I don’t fancy another gentleman being stabbed on this boat, assuming you have any of those daggers left.”

  “I have plenty, I assure you.”

  “Fine, fine.” Chris took another drink, closing his eyes this time and tipping his head back to indicate he was almost out of whatever was in there. When he finished, his voice was the same, but there was something older to it. “This man you see before you, he is Chris. I am Chris, but also… more. There’s nothing I could put in terms of your system to help you understand, not with the time we have. Suffice it to say, there is a force in your world that would see the destruction of this one. I am here to stop them at any cost.”