Chapter 29

S.R.D.

Search, Rescue, and Destroy, those are my orders ranked in their order of importance. A tall order given that my suspicion is that anyone who is still alive at this point is likely only alive due to one purpose, to be a living incubator. A quick scan around shows that most of the city is burnt to ash. Only burnt corpses and monster parts line the streets.

Now one might wonder why I don’t have a weapon. I’d like to think that this is due to people taking my briefing on the standard pulsing rifles used by most militaries in the universe as being superfluous against the largely gelatinous space faring monsters. The idea that a kinetic or energy burst round could do much of anything to these creatures is a crock.

The only time such rounds would be beneficial against the Scourge would be in space. The idea being for the split second the space resistant outer shell of their skin was removed by a blast, the resulting tension on their skin might be enough to cause decompression. Such shots were rare of course, as the beasts heal almost instantly and once, they suspect a strike they circulate their fluids within their body to prevent just such an action. They truly are an impressive killing machine.

Now you take that same creature, with the same biological processes that can heal and react to bursts and holes easily and you place them on the surface of a planet. Well, you have a monster that can gelatinously bypass most straight forward attacks. Men with katanas would be more useful in a fight. That said if you went against such a creature with a katana and expected to win, you are stupid. In the second you split one in half, both halves would have cognizant thought, if only for a second. That would mean you would now have to watch out for attacks from two different creatures, creatures that no longer cared about dying. Granted you would kill them, but at what cost.

No, best form of attack is flame thrower. By flame thrower I of course mean an amazingly handsome Pyrokinetic Psionic, or your run of the mill meh Fire aspect Mage. In this case I will not argue too much about which one would be better, especially when my winning the argument generally means I get sent to the front of the line to prove my words. Not that my having to prove a cocky statement has anything to do with why I am here now. It was just a coincidental statement I made, that coincided with several other things to get me here.

Flutter, thud, clap.

A body lands behind me. I don’t have to turn around to see that it is my Endarian handler. I suspected she was a bit more than just a liaison by the way she tried to chat me up, on the way here.

Drag, scuffle.

She is in the process of trying to pull her parachute away when I light it on fire.

Whoom.

The flames burn until every inch of the chute itself is gone, leaving only a few nylon straps. I would have expected the Endarians to have their own version of these, something more artistic. But apparently Endarians never developed the human need for jumping out of perfectly good airplanes as a fun way to bypass waiting in transit terminals. As such they never developed their own version of the parachutes and even now must outsource from human corporations.

She stares up at me with first shock, then a calculating gaze washes over her. To my defense I did buffer her with my Air element as well to keep most of the heat away from her. Not that she likely cared. Our eyes lock for a second, as I almost expect her to snap at me for being reckless. Instead, she surprises me when she nods her head.

“Thank you.” She says, still speaking in Endarian. Then she manages to take off the rest of her harness as well. From there we begin making our way. She has her phase rifle drawn at the low ready. Then looks at me and does something that almost makes me laugh.

“Would you like my phase pistol?” She asks, reaching down to the clearly visible weapon that is strapped to her leg.

“HAHAHA!” I begin laughing right there. She is too cute. “Oh, that is a good one. Want me to get some rocks and make it really angry?” I ask.

“Rocks?”

“Yeah, you know, to throw. Probably be just as effective against these monsters.” I state.

Truth be told I have already found, identified, and eliminated a squad of the monsters while waiting. She is all hilarious, crouched over trying to duck and cover. I guess in a way it makes sense, she doesn’t know where the little buggers are. As for me, I can feel their minds encroaching in a sphere around me. The moment they get close squish, I break their minds like little grapes. This whole thing is almost too easy, laughably so.

We turn the street corner, me out in the middle of the street, her pressed hard against the corner building for cover. As we turn the corner, we see bodies. The remains of Endarians who were mowed down, likely when the conflict first began. Then the number of bodies I killed from the other side of the street.

My handler just looks at them, a cute, if confused look comes to her face as she looks at the dead monsters. Who look like they just randomly passed out in the streets.

“What? What could have done this?” She asks me incredulously.

I look at her like she is stupid. My hands are still in my pockets as I set the bodies on fire. Making sure to burst their secondary sacs. I also burn the bodies of the Endarian citizens, as a protective measure.

I do all this without breaking stride and never going faster than my leisurely stroll down the road. I could do this at a lot faster pace, but that would get tiring. I will need food; food is my only true weakness at this point. Everything else I can overcome with my own Magical and Psionic affinities. But food, the one true bane of my existence. I have enough ration bars to last a day. Now a quick rule of thumb, ration bars are terrible. Ration bars are even worse when they are made for another space faring races palette in mind. Thus, I will eat these Endarian rations only as a last resort. I make a mental note to try to secure a supply of the bars.

“How can you just be so calm?” The liaison asks after a few minutes of silence. We are past the city center where I burned both Scourge and dead Endarian corpses alike.

Looking at her I just raise an eyebrow and continue walking. It is a human gesture, but one that I try to pull off with contempt. My attempt apparently succeeds when she is quiet for a bit. This is good, as it gives me time to focus my mind and find the different monsters around us.

Muffled minds.

I feel the faintest traces of muffled minds tingling my senses. It is a somewhat familiar feeling, though far cruder than what I was previously exposed to. These minds feel like the minds that were hidden by camouflaging matrices when I played for Mel in the fields.

In an instant I realize I have likely passed dozens of Endarians who have been huddling in fear all this time.

“What is it?” She asks, I should really ask her name at some point. I’m pretty sure she told it to me at least three times, but I was so frustrated at the time of meeting her that I really didn’t care. Shaking my head on not being able to remember her name. It began with an ‘R’? Never mind, I think to myself as I focus on the next stage of my task.

“I can feel a few minds, they are trying to hide under some type of cloaking field.” I speak. I remember the small portable versions the Endarians used in the field, such structures could be set up nearly anywhere.

“Oh, you likely mean defensive shields. We must be in a military control section.” She says, looking around. “To operate one of those would require a lot of energy. Which means we are looking for a building that is mostly intact, with individual power supplies.” She says scanning the area. Then her eyes stop on a large building that is roughly the size of a fifteen-story high rise. The other much larger buildings next to the one she pointed out have all been toppled or destroyed in some way. Yet, she is correct, if we are going by the availability of resources, and access to light, what their species uses as a primary power source, that building would be a perfect candidate.

“Come on.” She says, as she takes off in a mad sprint forward. Within a few steps she is at full speed and well past me. I noticed that while we were going through the city, she was more than fine with me taking point this entire trip. That is why I don’t open my mouth about the trap she is walking into.

See I wasn’t apparently the only person to notice the barrier. I could tell that a more than a few Scourge were also within the barrier. The only reason I didn’t destroy every mind was because I couldn’t be certain whether the scourge had found the survivors or not. There was a greater than fifty percent chance that I would have to kill everyone here regardless, but I have been known to be wrong on occasion. As such I decided to look first, and fire kills shots second, this time.

Panting.

She is huffing so loudly, that I’m surprised she hasn’t drawn the attention of the scourge on the other side of the illusionary barrier already. As she gets to the spot where my mental perception of minds starts to become fuzzy, she waits.

“Come on!” She insists and waves a hand.

Meanwhile I continue my slow plodding pace like an old serial killing monster. Funny that this image comes to mind, as I really see the parallels to what I have become in this world. In fact, I almost wonder if someone was filming this, would they see me as stalking this crazy liaison woman who darts headfirst into danger? Would they think that I was the cause for her fear, the reason why she would rather dart into unknown danger than be near me? I think all this, as a slight smirk forms on my lips. Not for the first time this life I think, I really am becoming the villain.

Finally, I am within a few dozen paces of the liaison and the barrier. That is good enough for her, as she nods to herself before darting in.

“Oh Gods!” She screams as she backpedals and turns to look at me. Within a second, she is darting forward towards me. Well not towards me exactly, but she is trying to get around me. Trying to use me as a human shield. One word comes to mind as I see the act and shake my head at her. Racist. Always must put the human in danger first.

She does a weird stumble, crawl as she falls to the ground and then tries to huddle up into a tight ball behind me. Apparently, something about walking down the street like a turn of the millennium killer inspired confidence in her? I don’t quite know.

All I know is that there are a dozen scourge minds coming out from the barrier. The minute they appear to my senses I cut them down.

“Ccc…” She stammers from behind me.

I turn to look at her, when she points back the way she came and finally manages to scream out “caster.”

I turn to see, that she is correct. There is a caster. Or at least the scourge equivalent of a caster.

Once again, I see glowing green energy pulsing before me. I guess this has something to do with their energy source. Or maybe the way the implement their powers. Regardless I see the energy and then on reflex that has been practiced and honed over countless lifetimes I snatch the power. In a second, I lock the power in place.

The caster scourge pauses as it looks at the spell that has suddenly been pulled into the physical world.

“What the?” The Liaison asks from behind me.

I just keep my focus forward as I intend to use the monster as a magical grenade of sorts. I change the targeting rune to be the immediate area around it. Then I open up the energy flow to allow for the monster’s full energy to be drained into this one spell.

“GHAHAHA!” The monster screams and tries to rip itself free of the spell that is no longer under its control. The spell glows a bright green, then when there is no more residual green energy left in the monster. The monster collapses to the ground, at which point I release the spell.

BOOM!

The ground breaks apart. I must turn my head and cover my eyes due to how intense the bright green glow is from the monster.

Rumble.

The ground shakes and vibrates.

Once everything is settled, I stop to look forward, and see that the monster and its kin that had swarmed with it are now little more than ash. Ash with little green fragments of demonic energy attached to it. This is not the wholesome green of nature. This is more the dark putrid green one would expect to see as part of nuclear waste being used to empower sludge.

Phwoom.

A sound of an electrical generator going down can be heard. Then in a matter of seconds the protective barrier that had been erected drops, revealing dozens of Endarians who are huddled into different rooms of the building. A quick glance shows that there are still hundreds of Scourges on the grounds as well, though they too now seem to be able to see once more. As they shake their heads as they find the new targets and begin to move forward.

“Oops.” I say, as I continue to stroll forward. Though now that I both have clear line of sight and can clearly distinguish the two mental signatures, those of the Endarians and those belonging to the Scourge easily, I begin mowing down the monsters like they were nothing.

Pop. Pop. Pop.

The minds of the monsters’ pop, a few are mere feet away from the Endarians who are still attempting to hide in the same spot, despite their spot being revealed. This is like trying to hide under the blanket, only to have the blanket ripped out from over top of you and still trying to hide. I shake my head at the sight.

Behind me, I can hear the liaison rising to her feet.

I continue my pace forward to the building with Endarian civilians who can still be saved. As I do, I have one thought come to mind. I wonder if they have any food in this building?