Knights Apocalyptica

Chapter 166: Great Lake

Once, they were called the Great Lakes.

Now, they’re little more than a monster spawning ground—and more like one massive ocean. We’re all aware of the dangerous state of the eastern coast, but up there? To the sight of these eyes and the data gathered, there is a stark difference in what’s going on. Those —lakes (if they can be considered ‘lakes’ instead of ‘lake’ now— are teeming with warring life, a veritable foreign ecosystem that subsists of several stitched-together worlds.

I hypothesize the bottom of each lake houses its own Rift connected to its own plane of water—the runoff from that horrible monstrosity that has claimed Minnesota and Wisconsin ended with the flooding of these great lakes and merging the separate stable rifts in one giant awful ecosystem. While such a thing seems a little too convenient to be true, stable rifts are and can be fundamentally different than what we see with emerging rifts. Intentional, even, by appearances, and the hidden history the cabinet is well aware of.

The President and his cabinet may not agree with my claims, but the logical basis and observed geographic patterns by drone and the substantial resources we’ve invested into this draw a firm conclusion on further action, whether or not we want to believe my multi-rift theory that (would) have resulted in what we see here.

Ignoring the science of the matter, Recon-2-Alpha concludes the following:

Any route to the territories previously held by Canada, should follow a purely land-based strip with a wide berth given from the eastern coast to avoid the dead-spawn of that ocean, but not far enough west to run into the runoff from the hereby dubbed ‘hell-lake.’ As my squad has unaffectionately named it.

Establishing territories and annexing the previous land of Canada would be too substantial a strain on our limited resources, despite its apparent natural restoration in comparison to most of the mainland US territory’s present state.

Recommendation: Exploring options to the west; despite previous conflicts with earth-raised humanity so far, the simple matter is there’s more tenable land in that direction connected to our base of operations. What we’ve seen in Canada could be replicated here. And while restoration will take large resources and a lot of work, expansion must be centralized to reestablish proper administration. Stretched supply lines with these difficulties will result in societal collapse at this pivotal junction.

-Ranger-Captain Sherwood, Matters Of The North, (301, 3rd Era)

It took all of ten minutes before Yniol’s care got stuck. Cars pulled ahead, and others had already stopped behind. They were already turning into one long stretch of a convoy, and the rain beating down defied imagination.

But, from what the Arch-Magi said, this ‘Sota’ was supposed to be worse. Erec couldn’t picture anything but an ocean for where this thing came from and the wall of rain around them. He’d seen Dame Juliana stopped in a group a few minutes ago. But the visibility was terrible. Anything short of a flare and a radio message conveying an emergency simply wouldn’t work.

Still, out of the group of three they were in, Yniol’s got stuck first.

Erec watched him rock the car back and forth, but the tires only kicked up dirt and slop behind them. Ahead was a jagged piece of asphalt, but they were three feet short of having that under them for traction. “Boy?” Yniol asked as he stopped pressing on the gas.

[That’s your cue.]

Erec jumped out of the back of the car, then got to work. He set two palms to the other side, in the best places to distribute the force he’d generate—helped by VAL pinpointing the best spots. Then, he widened his stance, leaned back, and straight-up pushed. His Armor was a significant tool in such a feat of Strength—But Erec wasn’t going to change it on just that. He let his mind swirl with fury, let that fire burn in his core the way of a hot drink in his gullet.

His body strained, and the Armor helped, but without much difficulty, he shoved the steel death trap forward those three feet until the wheels touched asphalt again, and Yniol could rev the engine and drag it the rest of the way back onto solid land.

They managed to drive for another seven minutes until someone else got stuck, and they had to repeat the process. Again and again, Erec would pop out and shove, ensuring they could keep going. When he wasn’t pushing cars free, they had to straddle a delicate balance between getting out of the storm and not going too fast. If they sped too much, they might catch too much water under their wheels and fly off the road into the mud, which was risky.

Without Erec, they would’ve already lost cars. In fact, he’d already heard the radio from Rochester asking for the nearest group to turn around and respond to a flair. But, people were clambering their way forward. The rain was lessening, but the dark storm clouds staring at them from above made it appear as if they were in the midst of a rainy hell, content to drown them.

Enide showered him with compliments every time he shoved a car back into ticking, and gradually, they were moving past other cars.

[Lightening… And…]

Erec looked around as Yniol’s car slowly plodded forward. There was a flash of light in the distance. They came in waves, and the waves were growing frequent.

[No thunder.]

That was it. Erec had been so focused on the job he hardly noticed. He’d chalked up his discomfort to the knowledge of an imminent danger’s arrival. But… Though he hadn’t seen a storm like this, he’d heard stories. Seen simulations in the bio-caverns in particular environments. After the lights flashed, they would have a loud crash sound out over the speakers, like a heavy drum beat. But out here, there was only the flash. Never the follow-up with the sound. And in the darkness, when it flashed, he swore he saw something light up.

Yniol drove, leaned forward, eyes locked on the road, so Erec waited—another flash.

There it was, a blur in the distance, moving closer. “Threat,” Erec said, shuffling in his seat to grab onto his axe. Yniol didn’t bother looking; the next stretch of the road was rough, multiple mud pits. All of his concentration needed to be on driving. Understandable. It was a Knight’s job to protect.

Thirty seconds later, lightning. And he saw a figure. A skeleton, basically. If someone took the bones from a human, ran them through a roller, and stretched the bones to an unnatural degree. The bones inside were dark black, but around them was a transparent glow that caught the skin—reminding Erec of those old medical texts they’d looked at in preliminary school. X-Ray’s—though, the structure wasn’t quite what he remembered seeing, other than the obvious unnatural stretch. The head, too, was oblong like a deflated ball. Each pop of light showed the monster’s progress and the fact it was beating their car in the race.

Eventually, this thing would catch up. More of them were on the horizon but ran in different directions. This one was intent on them. He was sure of it, and VAL confirmed with the Q.A.P. its charted path.

When Yniol’s car floundered in the mud, Erec jumped out—prepared to deal with the problem.

But he wasn’t alone. Enide appeared next to him, Lasrifle at the ready. She braced it, waited for another flash of lightning, then shot off the weapon right at the menace heading their direction and hit it straight in the chest. It lit up, but instead of a transparent white, that strange flesh of it went stark red, like blood. It didn’t stop. Didn’t react at all. It only moved faster. The red lingered longer in its skin than the lightening, which made tracking its progress easier and made the details at this distance more apparent.

Not only did it have a deformed head, but the legs and feet were all off. It was joined at the ankle in a weird angle that reminded Erec of a goat, yet it ended in massive toes and feet instead of hoofs.

Enide fired off the Lazrifle twice more, hitting on the second shot. The speed increased, as did the visibility. The creature was enraged and leaped closer, but the weapon wasn’t doing the damage it should be. She cursed, threw the rifle on her back, and unholstered a pistol.

These sorts of monsters were the type that gave him a deep, sinking feeling. Those with human-like traits were a mockery of the world's existence. A declaration that they weren’t special, that compared to other creatures, they were damn near inferior. But today, Erec would teach this twisted image of a person who the actual superior being was.

Enide unloaded a lead right into the thing from ten feet away—unlike with the Lazrifle, this brought a reaction. It jerked but stumbled forward. Forced to deal with the sudden off-kilter weight distribution from the bullet hitting, which presented the perfect opportunity. Erec traced the ghost of its predicted movements, took his war axe, and brought it to his hip. Then he swung, completing a circle as the axe extended outward, momentum in the windup—and as he was turning to face the creature again, he let the handle of his weapon go.

It spun outward, a giant wheel of death perfectly horizontal to the ground. It skimmed the surface of the desert the fifteen feet it took to sheer right through the monster's left leg, then buried itself halfway into its right leg, right below the knee. The other leg spewed a viscous clear liquid as its severed leg collapsed.

Erec flexed, waiting for the creature to fall to the ground. Then he’d pounce, landing on its neck with a heel and ending the fight.

But it didn’t fall. Lightening flashed far above. The instant it should’ve fallen to the ground in a heap, it didn’t. Instead, a bone shot out from the newly made stump as its whole body glowed blue; the bone leg slammed into the ground, and the clear goop flooding out of the stump congealed around the bone. Reforming into a rough approximation of the leg it had been before. The monster’s head careened back, letting out a warble that tickled Erec’s mind and brought a cinnamon taste to his mouth. Which should have been impossible, given he was wearing a helmet and the Armor filtered out environmental hazards.

This broke the Q.A.P’s predictive model, and it readjusted on the fly. Showing the monster already catching itself from the attack, then leaping at Enide.

She shot the creature with her pistol as it hit the air.

The thing twitched, its jump thrown off as its body rolled over, tugging and pulling itself back up after being shot in the head. A dribble of clear ooze leaked from the bullet hole, but it wasn’t down. That wasn’t enough to end this creature, no more than losing a leg.

Erec looked to his empty hands, then at the battle axe past the creature. The Fire inside whirred into life as the instincts within demanded a bath in blood; in the end, he didn’t need a weapon. He tossed himself forward and rammed the ten-foot-tall creature with his shoulder and the ton of steel coating him. The poor thing didn’t stand a chance and bowled over. One of its arms smashed his side, denting his plate, but not enough to do damage. It tried to rake him with its second hand, and Erec batted it aside before squatting down and shoving his hand into the thing’s collarbone.

It’s ‘flesh’ parted easy. This close, he could see it was a transparent, jiggly membrane—somewhere between gelatin and meat. Not muscle. The collar offered an excellent grip and latched him to the creature.

Lightening flashed above again, the ‘flesh’ of the monster lit up, and a shock ran through Erec. His body seized for an instant, then returned to normal, a number than before. But functioning.

[That wasn’t electricity.] VAL cautioned.

Whatever it was, it didn’t matter. Not anymore. Not with this thing below and in perfect striking distance. Erec balled his metal fist and then smashed it into the creature’s head. The puddy-like mass burst from the hit, revealing the obsidian skull beneath. But there was no crack in the bone. No wonder Enide’s bullet hadn’t ended it. He threw more fists, but it didn’t budge. In a fit of anger, Erec let go of the collar, grabbed the mangled skull with both hands and tore it free from its paste-like neck, ripping off bits of pudgy flesh.

That didn’t do the trick, either. At the next flash of lightning, it glowed, and its spine shot out from the head—which, like pinching off a stem from a flower, Erec broke again.

Too much time. Time that he was keenly aware was better spent getting away from the oncoming cataclysm-level threat.

But if he left this skull here, it would reform, then chase them down. Or chase down someone else in the caravan. He could only speculate how the rest of the Pack was handling these things—there was the option of getting his axe and unleashing that silver-flame on that. That, he was sure, would end the creature.

As pissed as he was, he had to pull back from that trigger. If he did that, he’d be out of strength. Couldn’t free the cars.

So, Erec grabbed the skull and stalked back towards the car, having to rip a growing spine free from it once more to stop it from reforming. With a quick order to Yniol, he got another chain. Using VAL as a guide on knots and adequately securing the chain around the skull, he wrapped it up. Then waited. It didn’t take long before another flash of lightning started to regenerate the creature. When it did, he whipped the chain through the air as fast as possible—the regenerating body had no chance. Its bones were too weak, and the force of movement and unsteady hold on the skull due to the chain caused the bones to snap off and translucent gore to fly with every bump.

Good enough. If he couldn’t kill it, couldn’t leave it behind, then it would suffer along with them until he was in a place to end it.

With that, Erec secured the other end of the chain to the back of the car, got his axe, and shoved Yniol onto the road.

As they rolled forward, the creature would reform, then have its body torn by the bumps in the ground. It wasn’t perfect, but it kept it weak. Whenever they stopped, Erec would decapitate the mangled body it managed to accrue from the skull. They ran into another fifteen minutes later, which was much easier to deal with. It joined its brother at the back of the car, slamming against asphalt as the rain slowed and they got further away. As it turned out, Erec didn’t need to call upon his Soul to deal with the monster. The further they pulled from the storm, the more regeneration slowed. The skulls got more brittle, and the road itself broke them as they reached the edge of the storm, where the rain became a drizzle.

Rochester gave out commands on a radio—Boldwick and the Duke’s groups went back to collect some of the Pack that had been left behind, but mile by mile, all cleared the worst of the storm. They pulled together to regroup, down ten cars, and shoved together in the remaining ones like canned old-world sardines.

It was then that they heard thunder.

A massive boom echoed across the wasteland as if a thousand explosions went off down below. The world shifted beneath their feet and shook as a pressure washed over the air; deep within the pit of that rain, somewhere near that tower, the Storm Giant arrived. Impossible to see, but staring into that black storm cloud, Erec imagined its massive body looming, feasting on the building it’d made.

Erec’s hand shook—something in him dared him. Insisted he go into that darkness and face the monster within.

Not today. He promised the fire that surged. But someday. I will.

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