Chapter 50

“So, Seeker. You have met Ar-Thenna and her allies in the flesh?” Karkol noted rhetorically.

“Yes, revered Archimandrite. It was ... interesting,” Crnnch replied. “The sword they gave me gives off an interesting signature in the realm of quantum and they said it would be effective against the Vultoqi ... as well as the Beoghra.”

“You may well need it, my son. You have a grave enemy in the shape of Folar, whom once again you humiliated in public, or rather he engineered his own humiliation,” Brnnt nodded. “Your popularity, combined with our status, has several unfriendly eyes upon us, including those of the Most High, despite our apparent support of him still. However, it is almost unheard of for members of the Beoghra to have the support of another organ of the regime as we do with the MilitaryYr’ch and this has raised their paranoia to new levels.”

“I will be careful, revered Archimandrites. For all our sakes,” Crnnch replied gravely as he took in all the implications of Brnnt’s warning.

“Now tell us what you have learned of Ar-Thenna’s allies, our old enemy,” Karkol requested.

“They are Yr’ch-like in appearance, if smaller, as like an adolescent; some of them their skin has a pinkish tinge to it, others jet black, with many shades in between. None have the green of the Yr’ch. Some, the ones I met at least, are very skilled psionically, hence their ability, I believe, to detect the Vultoqi when they are cloaked. The one who led the group who rescued me is also a skilled warrior with the sword as well as being female.”

“They are followers of Ar-Thenna as well?” Brnnt asked.

“No, revered Archimandrite. Ar-Thenna calls them allies and friends. She is not like any goddess I had ever imagined. She has the utmost loyalty of her Yr’ch followers, including the former Adept Pugard, yet treats those who do not worship her with friendship and openness. It is most confusing; she also spoke of a true supreme being, one above her as well.”

“This makes some sense. It is obvious that Beog, who claims to be all-seeing, all-powerful and all-knowing, is nothing of the sort, hence must be some sort of creation himself. After all, we use the Orbs of Beog to neutralise the gods of the other worlds,” Karkol mused. “Beog claimed that this ability makes him the god of gods, yet never explained why we actually have to make the things, rather than he create them. Ar-Thenna’s admission of a higher god over and above the planetary godlets makes a lot of unexplained facts and data fall into place.”

“We often suspected there was a higher ... cause. Now we have it confirmed, brother,” Brnnt nodded. “Ar-Thenna is truly a goddess of truth and wisdom.”

“My heart and loyalty belong to her, revered Archimandrites,” Crnnch stated.

“As do ours, noble Seeker. She will be a worthy goddess of the Yr’ch and no doubt in time will impart great wisdom to her followers.”

“Her ability to work with allies being a case in point,” Karkol mused. “This is an area new to us; always in the past we have been told to extirpate all rivals. Where would we be now if we had stretched out the hand of friendship instead?”

“I suspect the Vultoqi would still be an issue, brother,” Brnnt chuckled. “But I look forward to the day when we can meet Ar-Thenna ourselves. Now, Seeker, we require you to go and talk to the TechnoYr’ch and prepare a report listing their sloth and corruption in regards to not preparing the tools by which the MilitaryYr’ch can at least defend themselves.”

“I shall get on it immediately, revered Archimandrites,” Crnnch replied, recognising it as a dismissal.

“All is prepared patripure,” one of the adelshaut in charge of breeding the beasts of war announced to the caveatra.

“Let us hope they will take the bait,” the senior patripure announced as the rest of the caveatra watched mentally the structure that had been carefully created by the ghosin move out of the neardark. The creature was capable of preventing any form of psionic scan on itself as well as being capable of blocking teleportation, and other psionic abilities.

“Any ideas?” Roxanne asked as the rest of us studied the apparent structure from where the Seers were projecting it on the screen in the command tent.

“Totally impervious to the type of scan we can do at a distance. We may do better if we can get closer,” Melanie stated for the Seer gestalt. “However, the fact that it appeared after our rescue of Crnnch suggests it is a trap.”

“Agreed,” Arch nodded. “That doesn’t mean we need not take a look though.”

“With all due caution,” Roxanne replied with a shrug. “Alice. Take your team and infiltrate the area. Take two teams of Drow with you. John, you are the ‘go to hell’ plan, your job is to aid the withdrawal of Alice’s team by any means necessary, including the use of overwhelming force. Melanie, I’ll want the gestalt available to pull out any casualties and leave behind no evidence they can use. Be careful people, we do not know as yet just how deadly these Vultoqi can be when they set a trap.”

“Yes, Roxanne,” we all replied and dispersed to plan our moves.

“I’m afraid we cannot increase production merely on your say so, Seeker,” the senior TechnoYr’ch of the manufacturing plant almost sneered.

“It is not on my say so,” Crnnch replied in frosty tones. “The writ of demand was signed by Archimandrites, Brnnt and Karkol.”

“They still need to submit it through official channels,” the Yr’ch sniffed.

“They have,” Crnnch interrupted what he suspected would be a whole litany of excuses and reasons why the TechnoYr’ch couldn’t do as had been requested. “I have been sent to see why you have failed to come up with a single extra unit to protect the defenders of Vultoq.”

“Such requests take time to filter through the various checks and balances. Workloads need to be shifted to accommodate such requests,” the Yr’ch prevaricated.

“Let me be blunt,” Crnnch stated. “Should production not increase, I, personally, will start conscripting various TechnoYr’chs to the front lines, starting with you and your entire department.”

“You do not have authority to do such a thing!” the Yr’ch blustered.

“I am a Seeker. My job is to protect the regime. If I believe conscripting various members of the TechnoYr’ch to the front will aid our war efforts against the Vultoqi, then that is exactly what I will do and, yes, I do have the authority in such matters.”

“I will speak to my superiors over your attitude!”

“Do as you will. If, however, production has not increased, you will be the first of my ‘volunteers’, followed by your superiors,” Crnnch replied in deadly earnest.

My team were carefully scanning the area and the structure Mage Alice’s team were to investigate. What we couldn’t detect were Alice’s team. They were being very careful not to leave themselves open to any form of detection at all. More worrying was the absence of signs of any Vultoqi. Knowing how dangerous they were, it was a dead giveaway that whatever was in the structure was even more deadly.

“I do not like this, friend John,” Lenna sent over the encrypted sub-vocal low-powered radio system the Loegrian Special Forces normally used.

“Neither do I. It feels wrong,” I replied. “Dunon, do your people have a clear view?”

“We do, John, but there is some sort of field effect which is partially distorting our sights,” he replied. “We’re compensating for it.”

“Clara, get ready to drop a nulled mortar round on my order.”

“Yes, John.”

“I think they’re there,” Ilzik sent. “The ... doorway is moving slightly.

I looked through a set of high powered binoculars aided by my enhanced Mage vision but could see nothing. Still, I trusted Ilzik implicitly and if he said it had moved, it had moved. It was then that the door snapped open and shut revealing the structure to actually be some sort of creature as it burst into action amongst Alice’s team. Limbs suddenly unfolded, extending from what we’d assumed were walls, as the thing spat what had to be the disintegrating arm of one of the Drow scouts out as it speared three others whom it could clearly detect although they were in cloak.

“Dunon!” I yelled.

There were several loud cracks as Dunon’s people opened up on the creature only for the bolts to bounce away from what had to be some very tough natural armour.

‘Seers! Get them out of there!‘ I demanded mentally, not caring if the Vultoqi ‘heard’ me.

‘We can’t, John, ‘ came Jemima’s frantic reply. ‘It has us blocked!‘

“Dammit, advance!” I sent out via the link. “Stay visible! Take it out with whatever works!”

We advanced rapidly, throwing caution to the wind to a limited extent, to a point where we knew Alice’s team had to be aiming for. All the time I could feel the sheer mental terror of her team as the creature relentlessly hunted them down, fending their weaponry off mentally whilst its armour shrugged off any nulled bullets or darts.

“Hope you’ve got a plan, my love,” Róisín gasped as she kept up with me.

“Armour piercing Teflon jacketed rounds. All Alice’s team have are normal rounds as far as I’m aware.”

In the closing distance there was a dull boom as the creature fended off what had to be a grenade as another one of its limbs unfurled to punch right through the spine of Mage Fiona, felling her and dragging the body into an opening maw. I swiftly raised my semi-auto assault rifle and opened up with a series of three round bursts some of which punched through its armour and caused it to rear into the air as it looked for its attacker.

“Dunon, got any AP?” I sent out.

“Digging it out now, we normally have no need for it!” he sent back.

“Kate! RPG behind the bloody thing, distract it!” I ordered, noticing one of the wounded Drow dragging the flopping body of Fiona away.

I reloaded and loosed off another burst at the creature which was now heading right towards me at a fairly fast speed, impeded only by the debris piled around us. The creature was momentarily distracted by Kate’s efforts in toppling a pile of debris on it, but seemed unaffected by the weight of it if the way it shrugged it off was to be believed.

Relying on Alice to get her team ... or what was left of them, clear, I kept up a constant rate of fire at the creature until I began to feel the effect of a magic dampening field, at which point I began backing up as another explosion bowled the creature over, followed up by a sharp crack as a railgun round finally punched a small hole it its side.

“Pull back! I’ll cover!” I ordered to the squad members who had followed me down.

There were more loud cracks as the Loegrians finally brought their armour piercing darts into full play as the creature now began to flail around, obviously stung by this new weapon. I then opened up with a full clip at one of the holes the Loegrians had made causing the creature to finally wail in distress as it now began to back up away from us.