Chapter 5

This Means War

The Regulators had a tough time not talking for a week. They couldn’t let the extraction team know they were planning an attack and any time someone spoke there was an immediate response from the tyter ship asking them to speak louder and more clearly. Finally in the middle of October of the third year, they saw a ship descending from the sky. It was almost box shaped and had glowing orbs on the bottom which grew brighter as the ship slowed down and made a soft landing on the island next to the building. A hatch opened near a seam at the top and dropped down to the ground. Torger couldn’t see very clearly because they were nearly at the back of the ship which was blocking their view of the tyters, but five grey skinned lizard looking things walked out and into the tyter building, each carrying what looked like a tool box.

A minute later they heard a tyter communicate with the ship “They’re not in here. How accurate are those scans?”

“Our sensors show they’re on the island. Gurrip go look for them, they may be injured, the rest of you fix the portal.”

A minute later the Regulators got a good look at a Tyter for the first time. It was an eight foot tall bipedal lizard with a face like an ape and six antenna coming out of its head. Its skin was completely dark grey and it wore an outfit that could best be described as a jumpsuit that was lavender in color and made of a material that looked like denim. Each hand had three long fingers with human looking fingernails and each foot had three long toes with claws at the end instead of nails. Their thighs were very thick made for jumping high. Antic used Analyze 2.

Predator (technician) Level 49

Health 600/600 Mana 20/20 Stamina 85/85 Strength 22

Antic told everyone the stats. “That’s not so bad,” said Torger. “But why does it say Predator and not tyter? Unless the dwarves have been mispronouncing ‘predator’ and shortened it to ‘tyter.’ But it seems they’ve been right about these things coming to hunt prey. OK they’re a much lower level than we expected so new plan. Our top priority is to not let them know we’re here until they’ve fixed the portal. Stay hidden. Graul and Antic circle to the left then come up to the entrance. Brun come with me we’ll circle to the right. Once we believe they’ve fixed the machine we’ll run in, kill them all and then use the scroll to get back home. Rome, Jex and Arden stay here and provide cover fire.”

“They’re kobolds. Giant mutated kobolds,” said Brun.

Graul asked what a kobold was and Brun told him they’re mythological creatures from medieval Europe that look like a mix of a dog and lizard. But the creatures in front of them, the predators, were almost entirely lizard like, except for walking on their hind legs and having an ape face with antenna, and three opposable fingers, and the ability to talk; so they weren’t really like lizards, or kobolds after all. Brun finished lamely with “Uh, never mind,” then they all started walking away.

“Wait up!” Arden spoke as soon as everyone started moving. “Torger you were in charge while in the village, but out in the field we were going to operate by democracy.”

“Yes, true. Do you have a better idea?”

Arden faltered for a couple seconds. “No, but let’s do this right. Who votes for Torger’s plan?” All hands went up, including Arden’s. Torger shook his head and Jex sighed but everyone moved into positions.

The tyter, or predator, suddenly stopped and looked directly towards Arden and at the same time they all heard the transmission from the tyter captain. “Gurrip, they spoke from a little to your right and less than two hundred yards away. It sounded like they’re planning some sort of attack. Go back to the extraction point.”

All seven humans groaned. Their week of near silence was just ruined in fifteen seconds. Torger signaled for everyone to resume the plan. After ten minutes they were all in place, and three technicians were standing near the entrance holding futuristic looking staffs and scanning the horizon. Another announcement came into everyone’s ears. “Hunters, the technicians will be ready in two minutes. Assemble at the extraction point now or be left behind.”

Antic’s nerves were frayed. His hands were shaking from a combination of fear and excitement. He was so close to going home, just two more minutes, but he was also very near death; would he make it in on time? This plan had better work, it was their only shot and he didn’t like the chances of respawning if he got shot with one of those staffs. The pressure built in intensity for him every second, waiting, wondering if he will make it back to Earth. Finally after what seemed like an hour had passed he couldn’t take it anymore. He raised his halberd above his head and screamed an intense battle cry while rushing the startled technicians.

All his friends were shocked he had jumped the gun. Only about a minute and a half had passed and there was no word that the portal was fixed, but Antic had just blown their cover. Antic had forgotten their shield was up and ran straight into it nose first. He felt the cartilage break and was thrown back by the Lightning 2 spell the shield was infused with.

Arden had already lit the fuse of the first cannon and Rome was lighting the fuse of his cannon. Jex stood ready and drew back the Bow of Artemis the Huntress. Torger, Graul and Brun remained hidden behind brush.

Arden’s first cannon went off. The four pound ball of crude copper shot out and towards the building entrance. The shield disintegrated into millions of pieces and disappeared as soon as they touched the ground. A second later Rome’s cannon went off. The aim was true and struck a tyter mid chest, then another. The creatures flew back with a gaping hole in its chest. The other two sentries recovered from the shock and started shooting what looked like red lasers out of their staffs. But they were no warriors and their aim was erratic.

From inside the building a technician yelled “We’re under attack!”

Jex held her bow and Torger, Graul, and Brun remained hidden. Arden fired the last cannon and it hit a tyter in the shoulder. Its arm fell to the ground along with the staff. Torger yelled “NOW!” He jumped up from the brush and ran at the building.

Jex released an arrow and it took the fourth tyter in the head. The thing staggered but didn’t drop. At the same time the tyter captain yelled “Air support now! Activate the portal! Get the hunters here!”

Before they could cover the fifty yards there was a bright green flash from inside the building. Torger looked at Arden and received the hand signal for clear away. Torger yelled out “Step back!”

Arden had reloaded the first cannon and put in the special cannonball. It shot out and flew into the doorway of the building, hitting the far wall and rather than punching through, it exploded. That one wasn’t solid metal like the others, it was hollow inside and packed with thermite and black powder. Brun ran forward and cast Fire 3 into the doorway. The spell hit the first technician and separated into four more small fireballs. One hit the other technician and one hit the newly arrived hunter. The other two went to the floor and lit the black powder which then lit the thermite.

Immediately there was an intense searing heat and the whole inside of the building was charred in a few seconds. Rome was familiar with the layout inside the building and the thermite burned the left back corner of the building, because the glass tube was on the right and the touch screen control panel was in the middle of the back wall. Arden had set up the cannon to go in the door but away from the important equipment. When Rome had tried the touch screen he repeatedly got the same message that the system was not operational.

Everyone was focused on the fire and no one looked above. The air support the captain had called for had arrived. It was perfectly rectangular about fifteen feet wide and forty feet long and ten feet high. It flew over the Regulators several feet off the ground. It flew over the cannons and Rome, Jex, and Arden heard a humming noise. They looked up to see the perfectly flat bottom and saw the three cannons vibrate in the ground for a second before flying up and sticking to the bottom. It was a giant magnet! Arden tried to call out but he, Rome, and Jex were wearing steel bracers and greaves, and Arden was also wearing a steel chest plate. The three of them were sucked up and stuck to the bottom.

Torger was slicing Red Fury through the neck of a technician, Graul and Brun were taunting the hunter and Antic had just impaled the technician with the missing arm. All five technicians were dead, the fire had gone out inside the building, and another bright green flash came from the inside of the building. “Oh no, we’re not gonna make it, another hunter has arrived” Torger thought as he stepped away from the dying headless technician.

The hunter was trying to fight Graul, but Brun kept hitting it with Fire 1, Ice 1, and Lightning 1. It was all the mana he had to spend. The hunter had a javelin in its right hand and a wicked bracer over its left hand. The bracer completely wrapped around its hand and extending past his knuckles was a six inch stiletto. The bracer went almost to its elbow and along the whole outside edge was a slightly curved axe head, and on the part just below its left thumb was a three inch fish hook, obviously designed to catch sword strikes. But most dangerous was above his wrist was a small square box that shot the same red laser as the staffs only smaller, and seemed to recharge once every eight seconds. The javelin was a little taller than the hunter, who was eight feet tall. Covering all the rest of its body, including the fat short stub of a tail, was a thin flexible material that seemed to absorb Brun’s magic. The outfit wasn’t a jumpsuit like the technicians wore, it was individual armor pieces like the Regulators wore. The outfit was the same dark grey as their scales.

Graul jumped to the side as another laser flew past him and burned a half inch hole two inches deep into the ground. The hunter looked up and saw the ship above. He smiled and stepped into the building. There was a brief hum and Arden, being stuck to the bottom of the ship, yelled “Run!”

The other four looked up and in shock saw their friends stuck to the bottom of a floating space craft just six feet above them. Torger, Graul, and Antic all had steel armor and weapons, and they all flew up a little sooner than Brun who had just the steel bracers and greaves.

It only took a little more than a second for all of them to be stuck to the bottom of the ship. Then it began ascending rapidly. They rose to a hundred feet, a thousand, two, three thousand feet in just a few seconds. Right before he passed out from the g forces Torger uttered “I’m sorry guys. Set your respawn to Calico.”

Torger’s fear of heights made him woozy and vomit at around twenty thousand feet. Arden stayed awake the longest. He made it to fifty thousand feet before he lost consciousness.

Chapter 6

Regroup

They all found themselves standing in the abandoned village of Calico. They were all naked of course. Before anyone could say anything the Bow of Artemis appeared at Jex’s feet.

“Alright, we have provisions and weapons stashed here. Meet up in two minutes.”

Everyone quickly obeyed Torger’s command and went to rooms around the mayor’s house. Three minutes later they were dressed and sitting at the conference table. “So what did we learn from that?’

Rome answered first. “First, I didn’t know you convinced Baybil to make this back into a human city instead of a dwarf one, since we can’t teleport to dwarf or elf cities anymore. Good job. What I learned is we need to wear nothing metallic, at least not magnetic.”

Torger nodded and Antic answered next. “We were so close! I’m glad we didn’t die permanently, but how can we fight that? Those tyters are huge and well armed! We can’t get that close again!”

Arden answered “That’s what we’re trying to figure out Antic. We need another plan. The cannons worked well. It showed us they’re not invincible. But the cannons are long gone now. Rome your thermite mix worked well. Can you make some more?”

“Yeah. It’s a low grade thermite, not as good as industrial companies can make, but the recipe is easy. But I don’t know how to deliver it effectively.”

“I found out that dying of suffocation sucks,” said Brun. After he got a few dirty looks he continued. “They wear an armor that looks like Kevlar, but it absorbed my spells. The Kevlar, we’ll call it, whatever that armor is, it covers their whole body. The only exposed parts were its head, right hand, and feet. Your swords, spear, and arrows will have small targets.”

Graul said “We need to lure them into our terms, fight on our ground at our choosing. We need to set up an ambush.”

“What do you have in mind?”

“First I have that scorched earth spell. It’s a one time use-“

Torger frantically waved his hands to get Graul to shut up. Torger motioned to his ear and pointed to the sky. Graul understood that everything they were saying could be heard by the captain in the ship. Everyone gasped once they understood. All their plans would have to be done with writing and hand signals. Even their location could be monitored from space. But that worked two ways. They could hear anything the captain said to the hunters or other tyters on Nuva.

Eventually they were all dressed in only leather armor. They headed to the mine and began swinging picks to extract silver. The weapons and armor they had stashed were steel and iron, but silver is not magnetic so they would have to make do with crudely made silver swords and shields. It wasn’t ideal but nobody had a better plan. Less than an hour into it a different tyter voice spoke directly into their ears. Although that had been happening for months, they still couldn’t get used to it, and this was the first time they hear a voice other than the captain’s.

“Attention all prey. Our systems failed and our hunt has been modified. I have decided to bring in the hunting squad that was originally scheduled for this year. Captain Shug has insisted we not use aerial surveillance to find your location. However I have limited the time to two weeks. Three deaths results in permanent death. Our hunters have thirty-three species of prey to hunt and kill three times each. There will be a team of seven hunters. Furthermore Captain Shug has requested we mute your conversations. I have reluctantly agreed. Listen humans, never has a group of humans killed more than two hunters before they all died three times. Yet you have already killed five predators, and although they weren’t trained warriors, your skills and ingenuity have been quite a surprise. I don’t know how you show up as partial predators on our scans, and I don’t know how you found the Scorched Earth spell, but our race admires strength and success. I guarantee you we will keep this a fair fight. That is we will not attack you again from the air. I don’t intend to give you false hope of winning, but I’m looking forward to watching a good battle.”

They all looked at each other and were afraid to talk for fear of being overheard, but Arden decided to take the gamble. “Commander, I am Arden, the human. Are we to understand we can fight captain Shug and his men, or kobolds, or whatever they are, using steel weapons and armor? I mean we’re not going to be stuck to the bottom of a ship again? Is that right?”

There was a pause. After several seconds there was still no answer. About twenty seconds passed with the friends looking at each other with blank expressions. Finally a reply came.

A different tyter voice began speaking. “Human prey, consider yourselves lucky. It has been several generations since one of our kind has deigned to speak with lowly prey. It would be like you trying to converse with a deer before extinguishing its life. Not only am I, a lowly cook speaking with you, but our great commander Karzik has spoken to you. By commander Karzik’s orders no airship or communication shall assist captain Shug in his hunt. We shall monitor the fight, but we will not interfere. Do not speak directly to us again.”

They looked at each other seeing who would talk first. Arden broke the silence. “I think that went well. So from space they will listen to us and watch us, but they promise to not use that information against us. Now the question is do we risk using our backup equipment?”

Torger answered “I think we have to. This silver won’t be good for anything. It’s just so infuriating we worked so hard to get the best equipment we could in preparing for this fight, and now it’s all gone. I had my sword with fire three and my mithril boots with haste two. Arden you had that huge dragon scale shield and the cannons, Graul had his sword with fire one and lightning one, Antic had his halberd with fire one and lightning one, Rome and Brun each had a diamond staff and wool mantle, and Jex had nearly three hundred silver tipped arrows. Now that’s all gone and we’re left with a combination of steel and iron equipment. Most of our gear was steel anyway, but it’s like we’ve been set back twenty levels.”

Torger let the frustration continue to build as he spoke until he ended by punching a cave wall. That caused immediate swelling in his hand and he quickly cast Cure 2 on himself.

Brun mused “I wonder where our stuff ended up? When we die the stuff stays where we died at, so does that mean it’s still in space?”

Rome thought about it and answered “Either they released it or they didn’t but I don’t think we’ll find it either way. Our next task is to figure out where they are and how do we kill them?”

A few moments of silence passed before the usually quiet and reserved Jex spoke up. “As much as I hate it, I think we have to split up. One group should try to locate our gear and the other should try to find the tyters.”

A few more suggestions were brought up and the Regulators headed out. Brun, Graul, and Torger headed toward the beach to see if the hunters had crossed over from Catalina yet, and the others headed toward Modesto to once again beg the dwarves for assistance.

The next day Torger crawled up a hill to the top of a bluff that gave a great view of the ocean and the island. As soon as he crested the hill and looked across the waves he stopped and waved Graul and Brun to join him. A form of a hover ship was speeding along a couple feet above the waves, with seven tyters in it. When they were a couple hundred feet from the shore, a sangler (octopus style creature) wrapped its tentacles around the ship. The ship lurched and the tyters fell into a heap at the front of the hovercraft. Two immediately used the lasers attached to their wrists to shoot the sangler, and a third used a one handed axe to split its skull wide open. The biggest tyter shook his head and gave an order, and the ship resumed to land on the beach.

The humans were too far away to hear the order but were already en route to ambush them. Torger’s quick thinking allowed them to move while their foes were distracted with the monster and they huddled behind a boulder on the beach just as the tyters were beginning to offload.

They were a quarter mile apart at that point but didn’t know how good the tyter’s hearing was, so they stayed as still and quiet as possible. After a few minutes they heard some tyters talking, and were relieved that Translate still worked.

“This whole mission is a joke. We have to kill thirty-three species, three times each, and they’re scattered all over this planet, not just this Western sector. Not only that, we have some of the toughest enemies running around and they’ve already killed all our technicians.”

“Yeah, I know we’re the best trained and best equipped squad that there is anywhere, but this isn’t a normal hunt. Why is it that Shug is so determined that we treat this like a hunt? We should gather the surveillance from commander Karzik and just quickly go through and kill everything and be done with it.”

The first tyter answered again “This whole mess is the fault of a few stupid technicians. Their teleport system failed, and we have to clean up their mess. But once we’re done, we might reach Legendary status back home. No squad in recent history will have defeated as many foes-“

A gurgling sound came out of his mouth as Graul’s simple iron sword stabbed his throat. The two had just passed the boulder the humans were hiding behind and were too busy complaining about the hunt to pay attention. At the same time Torger took a low sweep with his back up iron sword and it sunk deep into the other tyter’s ankle. Brun, having learned his lesson from their first match, didn’t cast a black magic spell but instead used Analyze 2.

Tyter Level 64

Health 641/700 Strength 25 Stamina 118/120 Mana 0/0

“That hit on his ankle did very little damage Torger! Try something else!”

By then Torger and Graul had focused on the severely wounded tyter. They used all the skill with swords they had to try to block its fury of attacks with its spear and gauntlet. Torger and Graul each circled to opposite sides of it and kept its attention divided, but even with their level 52 and level 61 in one handed swords, the simple iron swords seemed to bounce harmlessly off the armor. Just as Torger drew back to swing at its neck, the one with the wounded ankle swung his axe and took off Torger’s right arm. Torger never saw him sneak up from behind and a half second later the stiletto at the end of the tyter’s gauntlet punctured his heart from behind. Torger died instantly.

Graul used the distraction to circle around and once again stab the first tyter in the neck. It died immediately. Graul turned to face the second tyter. The sight of seeing his brother die, with only two chances left was more emotionally shocking than he thought it would be. So was how easily the tyter cut through Torger’s iron pauldron and chest plate with its axe.

Graul shook off the momentary lapse of concentration and just as he was engaging the next tyter, a message came up partially obscuring his vision. He quickly retreated a few steps and was glad to see the injured ankle of the tyter slowed it down. The tyter drank a potion as Graul read then dismissed the message.

The prey (Human) has killed a hunter! The western hunting zone is now shrunk by 10%. Check maps for new boundaries.

Graul didn’t have time to think about it, his goal was to kill this hunter, and if he couldn’t he still had to buy as much time as possible for Brun to run away.

Graul cautiously squared up against the tyter. At well over seven feet tall it towered over him. Each tyter held a different type of weapon in their right hand but they had the same modified gauntlet that looked like a halberd head attached to their left forearm. It sneered before giving a check swing with its axe.

Graul had to buy time. “I bet you’ve never seen one of your own killed by a lowly human. That’s gotta sting.”

His foe responded by punching at him. The strike was so quick Graul dropped to the ground ducking under the spear part of the gauntlet. He rolled away quickly as the axe was embedded into the dirt where his stomach had just been. Graul rolled again and got to his feet in a crouched position and swung his sword toward the previously injured ankle. He knew he didn’t have enough reach but succeeded in making the tyter take a step back, and it gave a low guttural growl. Graul jumped backward to get some distance .

“That’s right, you high and mighty hunters won’t deign to speak with us lowly prey. At least that’s what your commander Karzik said.”

“You maggot! You are not worthy to even speak the name-“ The tyter abruptly shut up realizing the human had successfully goaded him into talking to it. He wouldn’t make that mistake again. Instead he raised his arm and flexed his hand just right to get the laser to shoot at the stupid human.

Graul howled in pain as a burning hole the size of a golf ball tore through his pauldron and hit his left clavicle. The wound was about a half inch deep. Without the iron armor it may have burned a hole clean through. His quick dodge wasn’t quite quick enough, but it kept him from getting hit in the heart. The pain forced him to drop his shield, but that was okay because the iron shield probably wouldn’t do much good in this fight anyway. Graul cast Cure 2 on himself and the pain subsided somewhat. The tyter’s ape like face made a surprised expression and he almost talked but closed his mouth before he conversed with prey again. Graul used the moment of surprise to cast Cure 2 on himself again. He didn’t need to check his stats to know he had 76/100 mana left and his health was around 460/500. But this fight of attrition was not going his way. As the tyter raised his left hand to fire the laser again Graul rushed forward and stooped down. With all the strength he could muster he used both hands to drive the sword at the tyter’s chest. There was a tremendous resistance for a split second then the sword pushed forward just an inch before shattering. At the same time a tremendous shock came from the armor and electrocuted the tyter. Graul’s forward momentum carried him forward and he crashed into the tyter. He got caught in the electric discharge for a split second before it dissipated.

Having worked in home remodel construction for years, Graul had been hit with a hundred ten volts twice before. This felt exactly the same- painful but not dangerous. But the tingling sensation left over lasted for four seconds in which he felt like he was moving through syrup. The tyter recovered after only one second and split Graul’s skull in two with its axe, easily cutting through the iron helmet.

Brun was jogging, being careful to stay in view of the tyter that had just killed Graul. He wanted to look weak and slow so the tyter would start running after him from a mile away. As he kept jogging and looking back over his shoulder he saw the tyter drink four potions that it took from a single small pouch that was tied to its side near the left armpit. Brun had been impressed by the elves’ ability to make satchels, back packs, and duffle bags with reduced weight and increased capacity, but their skills in magic paled in comparison to the tyters skill in technology. The tyter took off his armor and from that same small pouch pulled out something like a bazooka. Brun began running frantically as it took aim at him from a little over a mile away!

The tyter fired five rpg’s in rapid order that Brun barely had time to dodge. The concussion of the blasts left his ears ringing and his vision blurry, but he kept running. After the fifth and final rpg, the tyter gave chase.

Brun had to keep up a decent pace without letting his stamina drop too low. The tyter was slowly gaining ground on him. After several miles he drank his only stamina potion, a weak one giving him five more bringing him up to eleven. He hoped it would be enough.

The chase lasted for four hours. Brun had mixed emotions as he saw Kellogg hill a few miles away, but the tyter was only a quarter mile behind him, and his stamina was at two while the tyter had kept drinking potions throughout the marathon, probably stamina potions. Not only that, but the other remaining five tyters had picked up on the chase like bloodhounds in a fox hunt. They must have had some sort of radio communication in their suits, assuming the mother ship hadn’t breached their promise to not interfere.

Brun finally reached the entrance nearest entrance to the cave system beneath the hill. He came to a pile of rocks in front of the cave and made a show of removing them so he could squeeze through, but he knew he wouldn’t have time. That didn’t matter, he had led the tyters to the caves and that’s what counted. When they were a hundred feet away he cast Teleport 2 and was soon in the large pit in the center of the tunnels. It was the same as it was before, eighty feet in diameter and eighty feet high, with a single dirt ramp up to the nearest tunnel. There was crude oil and natural gas filling the cave. There was the lack of two huge rabbits and five baby rabbits at four feet tall, since this was Rome’s cave now. Brun had a few minutes to think about the plan as the tyters would be breaking up the rock pile of the entrance then smashing in the magic shield. The fumes gave him an instant headache but he distracted himself with thinking of their options. They had the abandoned town of Calico, Jex and Arden’s cave in Indio, Antic’s cave near Palm Springs, and the abandoned town east of Lake Tahoe. The tyters had destroyed the single buildings on Catalina and Long Beach, and the dwarves and elves left them to their own peril; since they were no longer allies he couldn’t teleport to any of their cities.

From a distance with a lot of strange sounding echoes, Brun heard a lot of rocks come crashing together and he knew he had to wait just a minute. He slowly counted to fifty then cast Fire 3 as far down the tunnel as he could. Instantly the natural gas filling the caves ignited, and the tyters were just a few yards in from the entrance- the only place a large volume of air could come in from. Fire flashed in every direction, going down all the tunnels, but all the gas and the most intense heat rushed for the freshly opened exit and burst out like a flame thrower, right where the tyters were standing.

As fire encompassed his body Brun cast Teleport 1 and found himself in the mayor’s house of Calico. He used the last of his mana to cast Cure 2 on himself, bringing him half way back to full health. Graul and Torger greeted him.