"Everybody hold yer position," Kham ordered. "Dwarf's right. Keep it down till ya know what yer lookin' at."
Kham considered swapping the magazine in his AK-74 for the one with explosive bullets. If it was a tank coming, the shells wouldn't penetrate the armor, but they might decouple a tread on a tracked vehicle, or jam a thrust vent if it was a hover type. If it wasn't a tank, then it was trash; the shells would wreak fine havoc with anything unarmored. On the other hand, maybe it was just that John Parker was jumpy and the explosive shells overkill, and overkill was expensive. Before he could decide, Sheila was on the radio net.
"Got an aircraft coming in from the southwest," she reported.
"That ain't a plane," one of the cyberboys contradicted. "It's organic."
"Movement on the west," the other cyberboy reported.
That could be bad. John Parker was on the eastern perimeter and Sheila to the southwest. They had activity in at least three directions. If they were all hostiles… "Fraggin' drek! It's a wyvern!" Sheila yelled. Kham heard her without benefit of the radio. He also heard the automatic weapons fire and the hissing bellow of the beast. Tracers lit the sky to the southwest with trails of orange fire. In their light, Kham made out the snakelike body and bat wings of the creature. It was headed toward the clearing, straight toward him and the elves.
Kham didn't bother climbing down from his perch; he just jumped. His heavily muscled legs took the strain with ease and he bounced up and ran for the clearing. He hit the open space just as the monstrous beast cleared the treetops opposite him.
The Light One spoke without turning from his work. "Do your job, ork."
The wyvern swooped up, rising high over the center of the clearing. The serpentine body writhed as it twisted in a tortured spiral, higher and higher. Then it snapped its wings up and darted its head down. Body followed head in a rush like a speeding bullet train. The beast screamed as it came, its jaws gaping wide. Wings beating, it dove on the elves. Kham fired, and the slugs from his AK ripped divots from the beast's flank, but still it came on. Behind him Kham could hear the elves talking.
"Deal with it," the Dark One said.
The Light One's response sounded worried. "But the spell?"
"I will manage."
His weapon dry, Kham fumbled for a clip with one hand while he popped the release lever to eject the empty. As his fingers closed on the magazine with the explosive shells, he heard the elf moving behind him. The wyvern slapped its wings down in a mighty stroke, suddenly arresting its progress. Wind tore at Kham, staggering him. The beast pulled its head back, neck arching in a sinuous curve.
"Drek! It's gonna breathe."
Kham's suddenly sweaty fingers fumbled with the magazine. He couldn't get it loaded in time. Turning, he readied himself to barrel through the elf's position. Maybe he could carry them both out of the beast's line of fire if he was fast enough. Seeing that the elf was standing still, staring up at the beast, his hands glowing with arcane energy, Kham rethought his plan; he didn't want to get caught between fire and magic. He turned again and raced away. If the elf wasn't bright enough to take cover, Kham knew one ork who was. As hard as he could, he ran for the trees, his precious magazine of explosive shells clattering on the ground behind him.
Turning his head to look back as he ran, Kham stumbled and fell. He twisted, trying to get his shoulder under him into a body roll, but he didn't make it. He hit hard and flopped on his back, stunned.
Above the clearing the wyvern seemed to fill the sky. Flames and a billowing cloud of sulfurous smoke burst from its open maw. The Light One stood firm as the fire crackled toward him. Then he raised his hands, the arcane energy around them shooting out to form a barrier between the elf and the monster. The beast's flames hissed as they struck the faintly glowing shield, rivulets of flame sliding along the surface of the magical barrier and falling to scorch the earth in a circle around the elves and their ritual apparatus. Smoke roiled above the clearing, boiling up in a cloud that hid the wyvern.
Kham scrambled to his feet, grabbing the AK from where it had fallen. The sounds of weapons fire and strange crashes and howls were coming from the woods to the west of the clearing. That had to be John Parker and Greerson engaging whatever had spooked John Parker. Kham could also hear fire and bestial roars from the cyberboys' position on the west.
With a thunderous noise, something large and armor-plated smashed through the last trees and bushes on the east, bursting into the clearing. It might have been a tank, but Kham had never seen one so big nor one that ran on four legs. The new beast halted, seemingly taking in the scene before it. Its toothy jaws gaped wide, dripping with saliva. Above them the beat of the wyvern's wings sounded like thunder. But, for a moment, nothing happened.
The respite gave Kham a chance to slap in a new magazine. Ordinary rounds, but better than nothing. This new creature was alive, which meant it had to have some soft parts; the eyes at least.
Firing, he dodged as the beast charged. As expected, his slugs had little effect. The beast crashed into the arcane barrier the Light One had erected. It howled in fury and lashed its tail. Too close, Kham was caught by the tail and lifted from his feet. He sailed through the air, directly toward the center of the clearing. Expecting to be smashed into the barrier, he was surprised as he flew through its perimeter in a flicker of green light, landing ignominiously on his butt next to the dark elf.
The Dark One's magical mask was gone, and Kham could see his features contorting with the effort of his concentration. Despite his earlier casual assurance, he was having trouble maintaining the spell he and his companion had set into motion. Kham checked the other elf. The Light One's mask was gone, too. The conjuring the two elves were now doing obviously required all their strength and concentration, leaving insufficient energy to maintain their disguises.
Neither was familiar to Kham, but he marked their faces.
Greerson appeared at the edge of the woods, his weapon raised. Though he was aiming at the armored beast, Kham could see that Sheila, emerging from the trees on the opposite side of the clearing, was in his line of fire. Kham shouted a warning, but it was drowned out by the beast's bellowing. The scene flickered before his eyes, lit by the strobe flashes of the Light One's lightnings as the elf scoured the sky and ravaged the wyvern screaming overhead.
The dwarf fired.
Sheila fell howling. Flesh and blood exploded from the armored critter's neck in a fountain, covering Sheila's prone form with gore. Unmindful of his previous bashing by the beast's tail, Kham leapt over the thrashing member and ran to her side. She was alive. Scorched by the explosion of the dwarfs rocket, but alive.
"You crazy halfer, you could've hit me!" Sheila screamed.
"I didn't." The dwarf popped the one-shot launcher from his weapon and replaced it with another. "If you'd been doing your job, you wouldn't have needed my help."
"I was handling it."
"Your version. Looked otherwise to me." The dwarf shrugged and inclined his head toward the center of the clearing. "I suspect it looked that way to our employers as well."
The three all looked to the elves as if expecting confirmation.
The elves, no longer engaged with their magic, said nothing, but they seemed to chafe under the stares the runners were giving them. The Light One muttered something under his breath and the variegated colors again sheathed the elves' faces.
There came one last burst of fire from the western perimeter, then silence descended over the clearing.