***
"There's not enough {space}!" Benny groaned as his 'troops' started quarreling all over Fort Skygate. He had asked for the heavy artillery, and he'd gotten all that he could possibly want… {too} much, in fact.
The idea was sound enough. Most of the saucers around here, both big and small, were more concerned with the peak of the mountain than this almost-there-but-not-quite fort. The few that did try to cause trouble here could be swiped with a few shots from the strongest firepower on the mountain. More importantly, at this height and range, they should be able to lend fire support to any of their friends forts from the top of the mountain all the way to the bottom.
The problem was that heavy artillery was big. And that meant big. Benny found himself swamped with Giant Mortartles, Cannonzillas, Boulder-slinger Golems, Queen Crysta-Blooms, and even a Doom-Whale. {Where the heck on the walls do I put a DOOM-WHALE?!}
Filling up his walls with eight or twelve of those big guns was all he could have hoped for. He definitely hadn't counted on half a hundred of them! Some of them, especially the Mortartles and the Doom-Whale, were too big to fit on the walls. For crying out loud, that Whale couldn't even get into the Fort!
"Whose whale is that?!" Benny began, but it was too late. Seeing the saucers beginning an attack run on Skycrown itself, the Travelers who commanded the heavy artillery started firing all at once.
That was the end of trying to organize anything. The sounds of all the big guns firing knocked Benny clean off his feet. It was all he could do to stick his fingers in his ears and try to get out of the way as everybody else made a mad scramble to get away from the cacophany.
{So much for being in command…} Benny thought gloomily. {I'm sorry, guys. I wanted to help you all, I really did... but it's out of my hands now. The Travelers here are doing their own thing and shooting whatever they want, and with all the noise up here, there's no way they're going to hear me no matter how loud I yell.}
For about ten seconds he sat there, feeling rather crestfallen, until he started seeing explosions and remembered that there was a full-scale battle going on and he really couldn't afford to mope around like that. He had to get up and do something.
It took him another five seconds to figure it out. Benny struggled to his feet. {I'm going to have to talk to them somehow. Try to reach them one at a time. It's going to be hard, and it's going to be really, really slow… but it's the only way.}
With a grimace and a painstaking effort, Benny took the first steps to trying to get his forces into some semblance of organization.
***
About that time, Shinji was at the lead of the reinforcements streaming down the mountain. They were flying straight down from Icewind, bypassing Icegard completely despite Little Tim's request for heavy flyers. Shinji knew full well that his Comrades qualified perfectly, but Satrox informed him that right now the biggest concern was Icegate; it was facing the main enemy force and was the weakest defended of the lot.
.
Map Image:
https://imgur.com/UdX8jYx
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{Or at least, it was, until the Celestial Comrade Home crashed there.} Shinji thought grimly. {I wonder how long they can hold?}
He didn't really know much about Big Tim, but everything he heard or saw about the guy today said he was a solid, dependable guy. Even in a situation as crazy as this, he was sure to keep his head and do what he could with what little he had. At the very least, Shinji thought, with the help of the Celestial Comrade Home, he should be able to hold out long enough for Shinji and the reinforcements to arrive. At the very best, Shinji figured, Big Tim might be wiping out the Cult forces clear off the map.
Shinji, however, could not possibly have anticipated what greeted him at Icegate.
First, a flying saucer dropped out of the sky almost on top of him. Second, a crazy giant White Wolfcat with green-orange eyes came snarling at him and tried to rip his throat out. Then, a breeder girl screaming "I'm the GREATEST!!" tried to lasso the Frenzied White Wolfcat with the remains of a half-torn net and got blasted with what appeared to be orange lasers from the Frenzied's eyes.
Meanwhile the Cult of Gaia was bringing in the entire army. Once glance showed Shinji a formation of eight-legged spider artillery, two columns of hovertanks, plenty of armored troopers with big guns, and even a trio of hulking battle mecha. Oddly enough, the battle mecha weren't attacking; the huge walking giants were going around planting things in the ground. Shinji didn't know what they were doing, but whatever it was, it didn't look good. {Sensor towers, perhaps, for the artillery… or worse, an orbital bombardment.}
Shinji brought in his flyers and looked for Big Tim, guessing he'd be at the Fort's main gate.
But he wasn't. In fact, as far as Shinji could see, the fort didn't have any gates any more - just a pile of rubble and torn metal. Half the north wall was gone, and none of the defense towers on the north side remained standing.
What really, really astonished Shinji, however, was the fact that the Icegate defenders weren't fighting the cultists. It was hard to believe, but defense force and attack force alike all seemed to be fighting a pack of Frenzied White Wolfcats.
There were a trio of Cult Zealots in combat armor back to back and firing every which way, tossing grenades and ducking for cover from stray shots. A single gigantic white wolfcat paw came smashing down on them and all three vanished. Two Cult tanks fired their cannons at the paw, and then a Spider Artillery cannon hammered down on the knee attached to that paw, but then, the offended Frenzied Wolfcat Howled at them with enough power to cause orange ripples in the air and all three went boom.
At that time, nearer to the besieged fort, a pair of Red Badge Breeders had taken shelter behind a Giga Granite Golem, with six Star Nova Blossoms behind them combining their powers for long-range attacks. A single blast knocked a Frenzied White Wolfcat clear across the battlefield, where it toppled and stayed down, at least for now. Another Frenzied wolfcat pounced into the middle of them and whacked everything on all sides with its tails. Breeders, Blossoms and Golem vanished.
Everywhere Shinji looked, it was the same. The Frenzied Wolfcats were winning.
"Where's Big Tim?" Shinji yelled as he arrived at the ruins of the main gate with the few reinforcements he managed to cobble together on the way.
"He's dead and respawned!" the woman who answered was a brown badge Breeder with streaks of gray in her hair and a sharp violet visor on her face.
"You seem to be in command here. What's going on?" Shinji asked.
"We've lost Icegate." She summarized shortly. "Right now, our priority has to be saving the Celestial Comrade Home. This fort was never going to last anyway, but there are experimental breedings in that Comrade Home that could make things go very bad very quickly if they went Frenzied."
Shinji gulped. "Class-10's?"
"Try Class-12's." She said grimly. "If even one of those things goes Frenzied on us, we can kiss this continent goodbye."
"How many of 'those things' are there?" Shinji eyed the falled Comrade Home.
"Six."
Shinji winced. "That can't be good."
Just then, Big Tim stumbled up, looking rather gray, but with a determined look on his face. He looked at Shinji, looked at the 'reinforcements' and said, "Hmm?"
"The rest are on their way." Shinji assured him. "But what's this I hear about class-12's going Frenzied on us?"
"He doesn't know." The Breeder lady said. "I was keeping it confidential unless we absolutely had no choice."
"Then why did you tell me?"
"Because we now have absolutely no choice."
"What?" Big Tim eyed them both suspiciously.
The Breeder lady explained. "The Celestial Comrade Home has baby Class-12's on board, and they can't be removed. We have to save the CCH or at least their cubicles or run the risk of them going Frenzied on us."
Big Tim grunted. "This job just keeps getting tougher and tougher."
***
"What do you mean, they're abandoning Icegate?!" Sora barked over the comms as he battled a Frenzied Drake outside with the help of a few volunteer champions from the Mountain Clans.
"Far as I can tell, there's nothing left to defend." Colin tried to explain while he and Casiphia watched screens depicting the battle from each of the forts in turn. Malcolm was nearby on the other side of the throne room surrounded by his own screens and looking very harried as he rushed to pool together what information he could on these attackers.
"I'm going to give Sora a hand." Alicia announced. She glanced at Phillip.
"I'm going to watch a bit more." Phillip said, frowning at the screens in a way that seemed to almost knit his eyebrows together. "There's something… strange."
"We're getting hammered at the bottom through no fault of the Cult, but everywhere else, we seem to be holding our own." Colin said, summarizing the entire battle. "What's the matter?"
"That's exactly it. This all seems… too easy."
"Easy?" Alicia echoed, staring.
"He's right." Colin agreed. "Every time the Cult attacked, they threw overwhelming power at us and all but wiped us out, only to dally around for us to retaliate later. It's as if they want us to win a few battles, just to make us look good."
"That's to avoid interference from outside. That's why they let their saucers get shot down by the Knights' Alliance after they make an attack. They're not {trying} to win a war; they just want to catch me." Phillip explained.
"Or me. Or Katrin." Colin agreed. "They don't care about winning the battles. So why are they fighting like this now? Why aren't they coming straight for us?"
"We're the most heavily defended position." Alicia guessed. "We got the Mountain Prince {and} the Mountain Princess and all those Wilds outside. Plus, the other forts are blocking their ground troops and shooting the saucers coming up."
"That's exactly the point. Why even come up when they had to come {down}?" Colin asked. "They came from space. They had to come down to get here. Why not just drop in on the top of the mountain straight away and ambush us like they did with the other Tournaments?"
"They did." Alicia said. "They just didn't land their ground forces here."
"Why?" Colin pressed.
"No space?" Alicia guessed. "They'd have to land in the arena, right in the middle of an all-out fight between two candidates for the Mountain Prince."
"Maybe." Colin shook his head. "Or maybe there's something else they're pulling. Something we're not seeing."
"See?" Phillip glanced at Alicia. "He gets it."
Just then, Malcolm shouted, "I got it!"
"Got what?" Casiphia asked. She had been quiet, and this was the first time she spoke in a while.
"It's not Liara!" Malcolm announced. "This is the work of a new commander! An Executor Priest from the Temple of Millenium… Karodius Somar."
"A new commander?" Phillip echoed. His frown deepened.
"Previous data indicates regular Zealot Troopers along with Drone Swoops and a few Frigate-class. They never brought ground vehicles into combat until now. But those forces moving in on Icegate are Fox Zealots. Which is weird, because Tammy isn't known for outright force like this. Karodius must be borrowing her forces."
"Who's Tammy?" Alicia asked.
"Tammy is current leader of the Fox Zealots. She is a Mythic-rank Zealot, which means a top commander of their forces, or an instructor or some big office, like chief of security. The Fox Zealots focus on intel gathering; that's why it's surprising to see they actually have some sort of army."
"Intel gathering by force…" Alicia snorted.
"The data matches your conclusion." Malcolm nodded. "But Karodius Somar is not a Zealot, he is an Executor Priest. His Order answers to the High Council."
"Which are?"
"Usually not concerned with kids in a playland." Casiphia cut in. "Any idea who on the Council is giving him orders?"
"We have no data on that." Malcolm admitted.
"I'm guessing Liara or Tisha. This just doesn't seem like something one of the guys would pull." Phillip told Casiphia quietly.
Casiphia rolled her eyes. "Sure. Blame the girls."
"If it was Hades, for example, the entire Dreamworlds Network Security system would be blaring off alarms like crazy. There's no way he could get in here without alerting Dreamworlds Admin in a split-second."
Cass nodded. "A Psionic as strong as Hades wouldn't need an army to get eight kids. But that is besides the point."
"The point is, there is a new commander and he has an army. Question is what he's doing with it." Phillip mused. "I can't believe they're moving so slowly. It can't be just the cold and caution. Fox Zealots are still Zealots."
Casiphia's watch beeped. She had an incoming message. She took a glance and said, "Michi."
Colin's head snapped up as Phillip sighed. Michi? What… how…?
"She wants you out of here. Now." Casiphia mentioned. "She's calling in the Rangers."
"Rangers?" Colin blinked.
"Not your Forest kind. She meant the guild of explorers who mapped out most of the Higher and Lower Plane." Phillip explained. "Michi has friends among them."
{A Guild… beyond any single Dreamworld. A Guild that maps out entire Planes.} Colin whistled. He hadn't even thought such a thing possible until now.
Casiphia shook her head. "This is getting bad. If the Rangers get involved, chances are the Reapers will get involved too. This battle might turn interstellar and interplanar overnight."
{Interstellar means other Dreamworlds are going to get involved. Interplanar means there's going to be fighting on the Higher Plane and Lower Plane too… this is big… this feels…}
Coiln froze. {This feels… okay. Why am I not even surprised or amazed?}
"She's not listening to me." Casiphia added, still messaging with Michi on her watch via holographic keyboard. "She's coming here."
And then the mountain started shaking.
***
Benny was shouting at the top of his lungs just to be heard. "I said, we need to…"
The wall rocked under his feet. He dropped to his hands and knees, looked for the Saucer shooting them, only to find that there was no Saucer blasting his segment of the wall and that the entire wall, in fact, all of the Fort was shaking.
"What…?" it was all he managed before structures and buildings started to crumble, and Benny decided it was high time to get off the wall before it fell apart beneath him.
***
"We're almost ready!" Makoto said jubilantly to his new lieutenants, the two Travelers who had reached Icewind Fort with him. At last the support teams were done getting organized, and all their artillery was in position to take down the saucers or lend fire support to Forts below if necessary…
The ground trembled. Makoto thought at first that someone had made a mistake, some huge Comrade had been summoned and was running around the Fort, but the shaking didn't have that sort of rhythm, and there was nothing big enough in sight.
"What's going on here?!" Makoto protested, before the wall crumbled under both his new lieutenants and he had a split second to choose which one to save.
He saved the girl. He'd like to think it was out of practicality, that she was nearer, or out of strategic importance, because of the forces at her command, but the truth was, her forces were already in place and could function without her, and she was a bit further away besides.
So while he grabbed her by the hand and she grabbed his with both of hers, the guy lieutenant let out a long yell as the wall gave way under him. The yell faded away as he went falling right off the Fort walls and down the mountain.
The girl gulped. She grabbed him around the neck. "Thanks, Makoto."
"Um…" Makoto found himself blushing as he pulled her back from the brink and thought, {I really need to find time to talk to this girl properly.}
***
Icegard collapsed. Mounted on his biggest Comrade in the lead of a formation of heavy flyers, Little Tim saw it go and winced. "Um… is it my fault?"
It probably was, he supposed. It was his fog that set Saucer after Saucer crashing into the mountain side. All that crashing had to be bad for the nearest Fort. It was no wonder the walls were collapsing and roofs were caving in.
"Sorry!" he wailed.
But there was nothing he could do. There were no words he could say, no command he could give, no face he could make that could save the Fort once everything started to fall apart.
***
"W-w-w-w-w-what….?!" The chief Breeder grabbed Shinji for support as the ground seemed to bounce under them.
"Mmmpfh!" Big Tim grunted as he stumbled into what was left of a wall and then tumbled to the ground only to be left hanging in mid-air as the ground dropped what looked like an entire foot under him. It rose up again to slam into his back, {hard}.
"Grab on!" Shinji leapt on Rain and grabbed the lady Breeder. They swooped past Big Tim, who managed to get a hand around Rain's foot as they lunged out of the makeshift command post they had been planning in and out into the open air.
Around them was pandemonium. Frenzied White Wolfcats and defenders alike were bouncing around like basketballs as the land and mountain seemed to heave and jump. The cultists, Shinji realized belatedly, were withdrawing. Fast.
"Where… why…?" Shinji stared. "What have they done?!"
Then the Fort dropped. The whole area seemed to sink into the snow and the mountain a sheer foot as if a crater was forming right there.
Big Tim grunted. "This job just keeps getting harder and harder."
And then the entire mountain dropped. The whole of Skycrown, the largest mountain in Nakama World, simply fell a clean six feet into the ground and then started sinking. From where Shinji sat, it felt like the entire world was collapsing.
Big Tim took a deep breath and let it out explosively. He dangled in mid-air, hanging on by a hand to Rain's foot, with the mountain falling away beneath them, and made an announcement in the same voice he'd always spoken in.
He said two words.
"I quit."