“Some of the crustaceans will probably escape the killing field; if they’re smart, they’ll ignore the loaders to get at the gunners. So we need to have a barrier that will stop them long enough to kill, even if there are large numbers coming at once. Or at least slow them down; that will be enough. I don’t know why we have several construction sites’ worth of equipment, but we should use it.”

Behind the dirt piles lay an obstacle course. It wasn’t designed to kill; the only way to have it directly kill would be to use explosives, and no one was confident in how well mines would affect arthropods. Their legs would be damaged, which would likely be enough, but that lack of confidence combined with an abhorrence for minefields let Rissa win.

Instead, there were four hundred yards of broken terrain. Ditches were laid out parallel to the berm; they were close together near the protected area and spaced farther apart as they got farther away. Scattered across the terrain was everything from wooden pallets to rolls of chain-link fence (unrolled to make a trip hazard). Rissa proposed making large lobster traps, but there wasn’t enough time to make many, so only a few were scattered across the landscape.

At least, those were the parts Serenity knew about. He was fairly confident there were things he’d missed; once they finally agreed to Rissa’s plan, the defensive planning portion was handed off while Rissa explained the next part.

It was a good thing the crustaceans didn’t appear to be smart; instead, they depended on large numbers. Of course, enough numbers could make up for many things.

The crabs were surprisingly capable climbers, but the lobsters backed up in the ditches, unable to easily make their way up the walls. They spread out to the side or climbed over others that were stuck in each ditch. They slowly dug at the wall, burying the ones in front in order to give the ones behind them a slope they could manage to climb.

It split the assault into two distinct segments. The crabs came first, spread out by obstacles and climbing over the dead or stuck bodies of their fellows, scattered by the obstacles into a disorganized mass instead of a single wave. They fell one by one at first, but the closer they got, the faster they fell.

Despite their numbers, they made it less than a third of the way across the field.

The lobsters did a bit better, but that was mostly because they weren’t really attacked until the last of the crabs were down. Even with that advantage, the ones that made it the farthest were less than halfway across the field when the wave ended.

The field didn’t go silent; the soldiers continued to watch and wait, taking care of the trapped crustaceans as they became visible.

By then, Serenity and his team were well on their way to their objective.

“Do you think there’s anything else? Anything that won’t just charge when we disturb the area enough?” Katya looked over the overhead photos.

They showed a mound in the middle of the former fields, surrounded by disturbed dirt. It was clear that any sign of Man in the area had been deliberately destroyed; there was a large pile of rubble that Serenity had decided not to examine too closely.He didn’t want to know if the bodies of the people who should have been in the area were there or, worse, if they weren’t.

“Giant scorpions,” Rissa stated confidently. “Other than that, there’s something in charge, but I don’t know what. Everything else … I think we only have to face the other stuff if we wait.”

Serenity felt a smile form on his lips. It wasn’t much of a smile, but it was definitely there. “You’re trying to peek into the future, aren’t you? To find out what we’ll be facing and how we might beat it.”

Rissa looked a little proud and a little sheepish, all at the same time. “Yeah. It’s only possibilities, thankfully, but that also means I see some odd things. I can’t tell if they’re going to happen or not. So I’m looking for the ones that seem to come up a lot and trying to plan around them.”

“What sort of odd things?” Serenity wondered just how strange things could get. Surely looking two days into the future wasn’t that hard?

Rissa shrugged. “Giant mushroom cloud over the area. I don’t think it was a nuke, though. There was no feeling of …” Rissa paused and frowned. “Lingering problems? The way I assume there would be after a nuclear explosion. From radiation, I mean.”

Her face seemed to lighten. “That one was a week or two away, and it feels less likely now. I think it was connected to the giant burrowing worm, and that one’s definitely at least a week off. We should make sure we look out for any breeding grounds, eggs or … whatever worms do. I think it’s capable of causing problems even if it’s not directed, and I can’t tell if the problem goes away when we go in there or not.”

“Do you know what’s in there? Is there a hive queen?” Katya glanced towards the occupied area, even though all that could be seen was a wall.

Rissa shrugged. “I can see us arguing with or fighting something, but not what it is. Seeing the future is like what tracking something you don’t recognize must be like. You need a starting point and you can see the signs of its passage, but you don’t actually see it.”

“Then how do you know there are scorpions?” Raz sounded worried. “If you’re not really seeing the future?”

Rissa shook her head. “I don’t. Not for sure. I know there’s something hidden that will attack us when we enter. Scorpions is a guess. I’m pretty confident they’re arthropods; almost all of the visions are. The next most likely is spiders. I’m having a hard time believing it’ll be wasps or grasshoppers, they’re just not that good underground. But I’ve seen all of those, and a number of things I don’t recognize.”

Rissa bit her lip, then continued. “I’m not sure this is really seeing the future. It’s not that much like the way an Oracle is supposed to work; it’s a lot more concrete but also more variable. It’s more like gathering information, but about a sheaf of possible and impossible futures, instead of the present?”

“Maybe it’s the way Oracles really work? We never really figured out what the curse was actually doing to you, but we know it was affecting your brother’s mind and maybe your mother’s?” Serenity had wondered about that for a while. He knew “destiny” wasn’t a simple, fixed thing; it didn’t make sense for free will to not exist.

He simply didn’t believe in a world where his choices were meaningless. There was no way that the universe was “supposed” to end in a cold, bleak, loneliness caused by the Final Reaper.

Rissa shrugged. She didn’t know.

There was an uncomfortable silence as everyone stared at each other for a moment, until Raz muttered, “Scorpions. That means a good bit of room. Do you know where we can enter?”

Rissa shook her head.

Serenity offered, “I can try to scout it out.” He wasn’t completely comfortable with the idea of being the scout, but there was no point in leaving capabilities on the table.

“No. Don’t go in alone. I don’t know how but they see you.” The words rushed out of Rissa. “If you go in alone, it’s a real fight and … I can’t see how it goes.”

Serenity stared at her. If that was the case, this would be the first time an enemy would notice his Sovereign form. “The point is to not be caught. If they can see me, it doesn’t matter how the fight would go. Uh. I wonder how?”

Did bugs have different senses or did they simply pay more attention to the ones they had? Motion would matter, but his Sovereign of the Origin floated; it shouldn’t cause anything like footsteps. “I wonder if I’m a different temperature? Or maybe they just pay more attention to shadows?”

It was something to check; even if it didn’t matter here, it might matter in the future. He’d have Aide order a temperature gun; they weren’t very expensive and it would let him check at least one of the options off for future information.

“So, we’re all going in together?” Serenity looked around the group. “While the controlling intelligence, whatever it is, is distracted with the mass attack, right?”

The group slipped across the barrier and hurried several hundred yards to the berm as the first crabs surged out of the ground. Serenity watched the progress on the image being projected over a webconference link; they’d implied that they’d be using a phone, but Serenity had no need to actually take out a phone to see it. “There are more than we thought there would be; look out for holes about ten or fifteen feet past the far side of the berm. That’s probably the entrances we need; if they’re big enough for these crabs, they’ll fit us.”

"Must be some big crabs,” Katya muttered jokingly. “Probably too tough to eat.”

Rissa grinned back at her. “I dunno, we can probably tenderize it in a pressure cooker, add some butter, might be decent.”

Serenity watched the crabs pour out, wondering why every single one was different. After a few minutes, the first lobster emerged. “There’s a lobster, too. It’s even bigger than the crabs… ooof. Yeah, they’re having no trouble killing them.”

The carnage was incredible. While it wasn’t anything that Serenity hadn’t seen before, seeing it done at a distance by Tier Zero and One people without magic was mind-boggling. He’d thought he knew how powerful guns were; he’d even planned on it. This was still shocking.

“Can we move forward yet?” Ras was positively vibrating with impatience. “I know we have to wait til they’re focused the other way, but surely they are by now.”

Serenity nodded unconsciously. “Yeah, they have to be. From here on out, well, you know.”

Serenity led the way over the undisturbed berm. They weren’t sneaking, but they were trying to be less obvious as they made their way into the occupied region. It was only about a mile wide, which meant that the portal had to be underground. Based on the readings from the portal detector, it was somewhere close to the middle.

Serenity kicked his own detector into action. Aide would monitor it and provide visual cues with distance and direction as best he could, as well as pulling the portal’s coordinates once they were close enough.

As he found one of the crustacean-holes, Serenity thought about the people following him into danger. Friends and more than friends, it was different and good. Janice and Aide, as well; not only did he like them, Serenity had gotten used to having people help him and to simply having friends around. He didn’t want to go back to the old way.

He’d fight to prevent it. Whatever it took.