CHAPTER 36
The night passed without incident, save for the occasional brush of Kennedy's dreaming mind against her own. Each time was a shock of terror, and Cait hoped the fleeting comfort she sent her way helped. Without conscious action from Kennedy, she couldn't keep that link solid. The team had all slept relatively early, and woke with the dawn.
Kennedy started as she woke, recoiling from Cait's fingers in her own.
"Hey, hey," Cait said softly, releasing her. "It's okay. Bad dreams?"
Kennedy's mind linked to her own, apology floating over between them.
"No worse than usual," Kennedy said, groaning and rising to her feet. "Did you not move at all last night?"
"Nope!" Cait said, hopping to her feet and grinning down at Kennedy. "You remind me of my parent's old cat. If she sat on your lap, you considered it an honor and you stayed fuckin' put!"
"Thank you?" Kennedy said, eyebrow raised. "More meant, like, physically, aren't you sore as hell? Numb?"
"You're welcome, nope, and nope!" Cait's fully wakeful energy was probably a lot for the camp, still shaking off sleep. "Invincibility rules."
"Ugh," stated Kennedy, reaching down to pat Rose awake. "Hey buddy, time to get up!"
The catbird did a big stretch, rising as Kennedy took on her characteristic wings and feathers. Cait felt the odd primal touch of the flow-through from Rose's mind, and could see why Kennedy liked to stay linked to her. Simple emotions, simple wants, simple needs. Right now, she was hungry.
"Mmm, me too," agreed Kennedy, though no words had been spoken. "Coffee first though."
Her eyes shot wide, and Cait felt a shock of panic from her.
"We did bring coffee, right?"
They did, in fact, have instant coffee, which was promptly boiled over the fire and consumed. Cait passed, she didn't drink any coffee beverage that wasn't 80% whipped cream by volume, and that hadn't made it into the rations.
"Alright folks," Warhawk rose, stretching herself as the team finished their breakfast of shitty coffee and campfire eggs. "Pack this stuff up, and let's get moving. BREAST MAN, still got the trail?"
Double thumbs up.
"Perfect."
Samsara picked up the packed gear in a flash, and they were off. The group had fallen into a sort of comfort on this second day. While they still had the occasional opportunistic attack, there hadn't been anything that would have posed a threat to one of them, much less all of them. What's more, both Cait and Kennedy were getting pretty adept at picking up on the shifts in Rose's emotions that predicted a hidden threat. This combined to create a surprisingly relaxed atmosphere for a team trekking through hostile territory.
"Hey, Warhawk," Cait called, "you said Freeflow was on mission right? "
"Yeah? Why?"
"Aren't you two a thing? What is it?"
"No, we ain't," Warhawk growled in response, "and I don't know. Ask the deer."
"Ohmygod!" interjected Lira over comms, "is that where you've been every night Dawn!?"
"Chance was, apparently, specifically instructed not to tell me." Dawn responded, ignoring Lira's repeated questions. "He is nothing if not discreet. I only know what Warhawk said yesterday, he was deployed northwards."
Okay, so Warhawk was less successful at the welcome party than I assumed. Also, you go Dawn, not my type, but I know Freeflow is hot.
"Oh! On the topic of things to ask Warhawk about. Sharon Smart?" Cait called over the comms.
An instant later she was peppered by gunfire.
"Heh, Pete said you'd shoot me if I asked. What gives?" she pressed.
"Fuck, whatever, I ain't ashamed." Warhawk sighed. "I assume y'all have seen A Weekend in Warhawk?"
Cait definitely had, and the wave of aroused embarrassment she got from Kennedy meant the biggest sex tape of the Guardian era hadn't escaped her notice either.
"Absolute fucking cinema!" Cait replied.
"Those static eyes of Sharon's record everything, and she can upload it to digital. Weird as hell Altered power. She was my…. partner, during that weekend."
Breastman let out a low whistle.
"Okay, wait, so that was, what, blackmail? Revenge porn? Why isn't she in the ground?" Cait asked, suddenly feeling real bad about enjoying the film.
Warhawk groaned, "Fuuuuuck, no, I didn't know her eyes were filmin', but I'd just escaped the DC and was sowin' my wild oats. She asked if she could upload it, and 22 year old Warhawk thought it would be a good way to boost my image and piss off the folks back in the DC at the same time."
"I mean, hey, it got a poster of you on my wall," said Cait. She wasn't sure if that'd be reassuring or not, but the chance to poke at Warhawk was too good to pass up.
"Really?" the flying hero responded, actually sounding a little flattered. "Anyway, I'm bettin' Pete told you to ask me cause Sharon was anglin' to pull the same trick with you."
"I'd definitely fall for that trick," Cait said, nodding and getting a burst of exasperation from Kennedy. "To be honest, that makes me want to call her a whole lot more."
"Hey guys," interjected Gwyn, "Do you have eyes on that big group a couple miles ahead? I can tell there's a lot of something, but my camera feed is fucked when I try to focus on it."
Cait's eyes shot skyward as their airborne trio flew ahead in formation. Warhawk drew in a hissing breath over comms.
"Shit, looks like a Skinwalker migration. Wendigo form." Warhawk explained, her voice all business, indicating things were serious. "Team, we gotta take these things out. Metric, give them a rundown."
"Right, these things are technically not the beasts of legend," Lira said, also all business, which was concerning. "But they could fool you. Tall, emaciated humanoids, fast as all fuck and much stronger than they look. I'd recommend everyone but Amaranthine, Bullrush, and BREAST MAN avoid melee combat at all costs. They are highly aggressive, and Warhawk is right, we take these things out or everyone and everything in their path is dead. In fact, we're gonna have to check along the heading they were taking, who knows what they've been up to."
"I was just thinking how things didn't really seem that bad out of the 'Shell," Cait said, running after their aerial scouts but not punch sprinting in case they could get the drop on the herd. "Then I find out wendigoes actually exist."
"Again, not technically wendigoes!" Lira said, "It's all Bullshit, obviously, but our scientists don't think their alteration was related to eating human flesh. I mean, they do eat people, but we don't think that caused them to be like this."
"Cut the chatter," ordered Warhawk, beginning to coordinate the team. "Sonder, drop your link with Amaranthine and take up Wilds Witch. Fall back and land if you can't switch while keeping Rose's. I want as much rot on these fuckers as possible, you and the deer are on artillery duty, you too 'Guns. Glue, stay back for this one, ain't your kinda fight. If anyone gets near our ranged, stick 'em up long enough for 'Guns to bullseye 'em. Amaranthine, Bullrush, BREAST MAN, get in there but keep each other's backs covered."
"Quiet or loud?" Cait asked as Bullrush and BREAST MAN caught up to her.
"Fuck it, go loud." Warhawk answered, followed quickly by a series of explosions and the crackle of gunfire.
Cait swung her arms, activating the nano-tech as she threw herself behind them. In just a few booming bounds, she slammed into the mass of horrors like a freight train. The first she hit, going full speed, had an enormous hole blown in its torso, its gaping jaw wide in a scream it couldn't voice without lungs. The shriek was taken up a hundred times over though as a myriad of tiny, sunken eyes in gaping sockets turned to face her.
"Yeesh, if I looked like that I'd be 'highly aggressive' too," she said as the first leapt at her, almost too quick to follow.
Unfortunately for the Wendigo, Cait had spent a week training with Freeflow, and even moving fast these things were slow motion in comparison. The thing was horizontal in the air as it hurtled towards Cait, so the punch she threw at its head ripped it fully in half.
Bullrush slammed into the horde the next instant, bucking his head upwards as his horns sent three monsters flying, impaling one. He shook it off, stomping its head to dust. A flurry of shots from above shredded a monster that had made for his back the instant he stopped moving.
Cait looked up to see Warhawk swooping back upwards, holstering her guns to toss more grenades into the howling mass of beasts. From high above, a corrosive rain began to fall, huge drops melting through the wendigos' tough but parchment thin skin.
Even with Warhawk's assistance, another Wendigo was on Bullrush's back in the next second. Cait punched through another threatening her, pulling herself after her fist to rip the monster off Bullrush. He bellowed in pain as its claws tore chunks out of him, before it twisted unnaturally in Cait's grip, clawing at her face. She threw it to the ground, following after it with a booming blow to its head, ending its screech. She took up position behind the big Minotaur, trusting him to handle anything in front of him.
As she turned, she caught sight of BREAST MAN. Scary as the Wendigoes were, he was worse. Like thirteen enormous snakes made of swords, any of the monsters that entered within fifteen feet of him took a hardened tentacle tip through the eye, or found out what those tips could do when whipped at a neck with BREAST MAN's prodigious strength behind the blow. Cait and Bullrush were doing damage, but the little ball of horrors was piling up bodies like firewood.
"How's it looking from above?" Cait called, missing a punch and ending up with her fist in a monster's mouth. The thing chewed on her uselessly before she brought her other hand down on it.
"They're thinnin' out, but this was one hell of a herd." Warhawk responded. "You and Bullrush are gonna have trouble findin' targets soon. I've got an idea, though. BREAST MAN, headin' your way, grab on to me. Gonna see if we can take your slaughterhouse mobile."
A few seconds later, the pair swooped low over Cait's head, BREAST MAN hanging from Warhawk's shoulders by a single tentacle. As they moved, his free tentacles stabbed out at any target that presented itself, leaving a horrifying swath of death in their wake. The gurgling hisses Cait could hear over the comms sounded positively gleeful.
"HaHA! Yes!" yelled Warhawk, unloading her guns at anything BREAST MAN missed. "Die trash!"
"Hey, could use some melee support on the backline!" Hotglue called, his voice on the edge of panic.
Cait cursed, already sprinting back towards them. With the things' speed and agility, it had only been a matter of time before some had made their way to the artillery.
She found a fledgling forest of stuck Wendigoes, all sizzling from Hotglue's sticky stuff. Most were speared through by vines that shot out of the ground, or slumped over their trapped body parts. Some had smoking holes in foreheads, Fingerguns' signature. One dropped from the sky, crashing into the ground hard and Cait looked up to see a proud looking Rose circling above.
Still, more than Cait had anticipated had run past her and Bullrush, and the rear group was almost in close combat as they tried to stem the tide through vine and blast.
Cait pumped her fists, slamming into a Wendigo leaping for Dawn as she speared another. She ran interference, body blocking for the group as they fell back, killing where she could and interposing herself where she couldn't. With her assistance, the ranged members of their team reasserted their position, quickly picking off the rest of the splinter group of monsters.
They spent another half hour chasing down the beasts they could, clearing them as best they were able. Eventually, Warhawk called a halt, indicating the ones they hadn't caught weren't likely going to be.
"Those things fuckin' sucked!" said Cait, adrenaline still making her jittery.
"Why are you complaining?" Bullrush asked, letting out a surprisingly high pitched yelp as his skin began to knit itself back together over a seeping gash when Dawn placed her hands over it. "You didn't even get hurt!'
"Yeah, but I did have to look at them," Cait shot back, "And one of them chewed on me, which is extremely gross."
That got her glares rather than sympathy, and she shut up. Everyone but Bullrush, Dawn and BREAST MAN had gotten out without more than scratches. Dawn had overestimated the strength of one of her vine barriers, and now sported a pretty cool scar over one eye, which she was lucky to have kept.
Bullrush was as beat up as he usually was, but even though Dawn's particular brand of healing stung, he seemed to relish collecting scars. His assertion that 'twinks love scars' wasn't one Cait had heard before, but she wasn't an expert on the subject. BREAST MAN had lost 4 tentacles, but his endlessly impressive body had already regrown the appendages.
"Lira," Cait said into the air, "you said this was a migration right? Does this happen a lot? We fared pretty well but these things would have torn a civilian, or hell, even an ARMOR convoy to shreds."
"Uh, Gwyn, get me a corpse on drone…." Lira responded, waiting a second before continuing. "No. I mean. Once a year, but not at this time. They're a winter monster, only come down to our parts when it starts to get cold like up north."
"That probably ain't good," volunteered Warhawk. "Can't predict shit with the waves, but ain't great when even the things we know start shiftin'."
"Yeah…." Lira said, trailing off. "I'm not getting any more specifics with my readings. I guess just keep an eye out, good thing y'all were here to take 'em down."
"Hey," Cait asked, "how often does stuff like this reach DSM and the public just doesn't hear about it?"
Kennedy made a superhero landing next to her, quickly followed by Rose, gnawing on a Wendigo arm.
"Quit it," the winged goth said, slapping at its dangling hand. "That can't be good for you! Uh, from mom's records we have major incursions like the Coonbeasts from yesterday or this horde reach the 'Shell maybe once a month?"
"Holy fuckin' shit!" Cait exclaimed, "that often!?"
Kennedy nodded gravely.
"Yep," she said, "that's why there aren't more Guardians. You've seen the shit we deal with day to day, and that incursion yesterday cost us a Guardian to deal with, nearly two. Even with new Guardians emerging with nearly every wave, it's rare we have more than fifty active at a time."
Cait looked around at Rodeo Squad, most of whom had been operating since Cait was a teenager, with a newfound respect. These sumbitches had survived a lot.
"Still got daylight to burn folks, BREAST MAN, you keep the scent?"
Three thumbs up this time.
"Then let's move on out!"
Two more days passed, but they were more similar to the first than the second. No more major hordes, they did run into a patch of angry Treants, but besides being big, most of the team could have dealt with the whole group on their own. Breastman indicated that the scent was getting stronger on the evening of the fourth day, and the team called a halt.
"No point in goin' in tired." Warhawk said, walking over to the bags Samsara had dropped off. "Rest up! Breastman thinks we're heading into action tomorrow. Cait, I'm gonna post a guard rotation in addition to you. If we're gonna get jumped, it'll be now."
The team had gotten excellent at setting camp over the last few days, and 15 minutes later were once more sitting around a fire. There was a little of the same nervous energy there had been when they'd set out a few days ago now, since their goal finally seemed in reach.
L K C
C: Sorry Lira, no phone sex tonight, Mommy Warhawk thinks I need mindin'
L: then who the hell is gonna use this!?
The nude she sent was excellent, and faster than seemed possible
K: I will!
L: oh fuck, didn't realize this was the group chat
C: yeah you did, exhibitionist
L: I did ☺
K: do you just have a backlog of those saved? That was way too quick
L: that question is offensive
C: and also not answered
And it wouldn't be, apparently, as Lira offered no further explanation.
"Ya know," Kennedy said, sidling up to Cait as the rest of the team found their way to sleep, "I've got first watch. I don't mind if you and Lira want to get a little face time."
"Why do you think faces would be involved?" Cait asked, grinning as Kennedy elbowed her in the ribs. "Appreciate it, but no. I think Warhawk is right, and B-money seems pretty agitated. Better to actually stay focused."
"And if I wanted to fool around?" Kennedy purred, her golden eyes locking onto Cait's and immediately bringing her to attention in every sense.
"Then I guess everybody dies," Cait said with a shrug, "I ain't passin' that up!"
Kennedy chuckled, and swatted Cait on the ass.
"Another time, horndog. Good to know how to distract you when I inevitably turn traitor."
"That should have been obvious, like, immediately."
Cait popped a squat on a log Bullrush had dragged near the fire, settling in for a watch. Kennedy sat between her legs, resting her head back on Cait's abs.
"If you fall asleep, I'm pinching you," Cait warned.