A Piece of the Pie (Chapters 29-31)

Chapter 29 – Never

The circle of shapeshifters started to tighten in around us, and I felt a bead of sweat drip down the side of my face. I looked over at Sam. The look of fear on his face I assumed was reflected in my own. Strad stepped a couple of feet outside our gathering toward the oncoming horde, then he turned to face us all, his soldiers. He – for whatever reason that I couldn't comprehend – didn't look worried at all.

"Well, it's not looking like I have time to give my usual pre-battle speech," he said with a dry chuckle, "I guess we'll just have to see how things play out..."

By this point the enemy line had reached the front of our battalion, one shapeshifter with a deadly looking battle axe began to swing this midstride in the direction of the king's head.

"I had a great inspirational monologue ready, and they've got to go and do this!" – there was a great whooshing sound as Strad drew his heavy broadsword from its sheath strapped on his back, and in one fluid motion spun around swinging it in a wide arc.

The assailant who was previously swinging the battle axe fell in a crumpled heap, and a rousing battle cry pulsed from the heart of our party. I snapped into focus and drew a sword from my own sheath, and charged with a yell at the nearest enemy. I held my sword high and swung with all my force at the shapeshifter. My blade connected with their chest.

My blade promptly fell to the ground in pieces.

"Shit–" I muttered aloud as the shapeshifter grabbed me by the legs and shoulders, and – from what I gathered from context – prepared to tear me in half.

All of a sudden there was a flash of light and I dropped back to my own two feet.

"Man, these things are incredible," Mouk breathed in heavily and indicated his laser-shooter thing, staring down at the hole blown through the stomach of the shapeshifter's motionless body.

I had no time to thank him, and he had no time to puke, as the next attackers were already on us. I drew my own energy blaster – I will from now on refer to it as my plasmatic for short. At least until I find out what they're really called.

I drew my plasmatic from my belt and we launched a few quick volleys at the on-comers. I heard a sound reminiscent of burning ravioli being stirred in a steel pot, and turned to see another shapeshifter drop to the ground, their helmet – and I'm assuming their face underneath – looking badly disfigured.

"You've got to watch your back," Vera shouted, taking a stance to cover that back which I should have been watching.

"I'll try to remember that. Where's Uly?"

"She was hurt bad in an attack two days ago, she's still recovering in the hospital."

"Is she –" I had to cut myself short and blast a shapeshifter heading for Sam.

"She'll be fine," Vera assured me, effectively close-lining her own attacker, knocking them to the ground and driving a blade through where I expected their heart would be.

"Didn't you just start fighting this war a couple of weeks ago?" I asked her with no small degree of shock as to how she became an absolute weapon in this short time. I'm afraid to admit a little gasping noise left my mouth as well.

"We've been training since we were very young – we are supposed to be guardians of a sort, you know," Vera smiled warmly, which calmed me down a little – though she still scares the crap out of me.

In a good way though, that way that you're glad the badass ninja is on your side and one of the good guys, but if it was the other way around, you would not want to meet them in a dark alley. You wouldn't even want to meet them in a brightly lit alley in the middle of the day with plenty of witnesses and a personal bodyguard that stands seven foot four and eats raw eggs to wash down his burnt toast and gravy.

"Let's head out, we have to rescue Feo and the others," the badass ninja said to me. She directed me to an opening in the on-rushing horde, out to where Strad was holding up against impossible numbers. Jake, Mouk, and Sam saw us on the move and followed as close as they could.

"Vera, you must go," the king said when we reached his position, "if the threat that man made to Dmitri is followed through, you only have a short time to find Feo and anyone else who might still be alive. The second sun is beginning to rise."

The early morning light was starting to slowly get brighter.

"But Strad, we can't leave you alone –" I started to protest.

"I think I can handle myself, and besides, my people are brave. Now duck!"

Without hesitation we dropped to the ground, and fast, just as Strad swung his broadsword around in a circle. The surrounding shapeshifters who were hoping to get the jump on us were not so quick to react.

"Now go!"

We obeyed and began to make our way to the edge of the fray. Regrouping at the top of a short dune, we looked into the distance to see a large stone structure.

"That looks ominous..." I turned to see Jake was pointing at a group of shapeshifters slowly making their way to the battle, hauling between them what appeared to be some large, deadly looking cannon of sorts.

"I've wanted to see these things in action," Vera said as she pulled a coco-grenade from my backpack.

Pushing the little knob in and twisting it, she lobbed it in the direction of the cannon carriers, and it landed about a foot in front of them. About three seconds later, there was a loud explosion and sand flew everywhere – even more so than it had already been flying, what with the heated battle in the middle of the desert and everything. Now all I could see was a large crater where the coconut had been. The cannon carriers, as well as cannon, seemed to have been vaporized.

"Let's go find Feo, we can't leave her or the others," Vera called from further down the dune. She was already on her way to what we believed to be the shapeshifters' desert base.

"Never," I agreed and ran after her. 

Chapter 30 – Behind Enemy Lines

We made our way to the shapeshifter stronghold remarkably unheeded. The creatures we had been fighting were rather busy tackling our main forces. The stronghold reminded me very much of the Egyptian pyramids – except for the fact that it was box shaped, apparently thrown together, and at its front door stood two very large armoured guards that would scare the hell out of, well... anyone who saw them. So really the building bore no resemblance whatsoever to the pyramids other than being surrounded by sand and being large. It appeared as though the shifters just took what was an ancient structure and quickly adapted it for their own needs.

Vera motioned for us to stay low. Lucky for us we were able to hide behind a large dune to the left of the doors. She pulled a glass tube from a side pocket and loaded a dart into it, blowing this in the direction of the furthest guard, piercing just below the helmet where there was a tiny amount of open neckline before the rest of the armour started.

They dropped face first to the ground instantly. As their partner turned to see what happened, they took the second dart to the back of the neck, dropping next to their already prone comrade.

"Now what? We kick in the doors and seize the fortress?" Sam asked hesitantly, afraid of the answer.

"We've got to find a way in without drawing too much attention," Vera appeared to be thinking hard, "with the two guards outside, the door shouldn't be locked, so that won't be a problem. Why don't we start with that and see how things go?"

We shuffled quickly to the doors, and wouldn't you know it, they easily slid open. Stepping inside to the gloomy interior, we were still unnoticed. I think big baddies often put too much faith in their bumbling henchmen who they honour with the job of guarding the front door.

"Look for a way down, they've got to be keeping them in holding cells underground, just as they did with my father and his men."

"Right," the boys and I nodded in agreement.

Moving cautiously about the corridors, we had yet to run into any trouble. We came to a locked steel door, which Vera set to picking using a q-tip.

I'm not joking.

With quite impressive ease on Vera's part, we got in, and in here sat a number of monitors and empty chairs. Scanning them quickly, I saw images of vacated hallways, a room filled with a scary amount of menacing weaponry, and then a cell with four occupants.

"There they are!" I whisper-shouted. I looked at the next screen and saw the two guards Vera took out a few minutes ago lying in the sand unconscious.

"Oh shit," I muttered not so excitedly – upon realizing that whoever had been in this room had likely seen the guards get taken out, "that's why there's no one in here, they're already mobilizing to take us out!"

"Looks like we'll be going down in a blaze of glory," Sam said, raising his gun and letting off an accidental laser beam, blowing up two of the monitor screens.

"Careful with that dude," Jake breathed as we all rose from the foetal positions we had adopted on the floor.

"Let's move quickly," Vera, the only one who hadn't dropped for cover, pushed open the door again and we moved. 

Chapter 31 – The Cell Block

"These guys shouldn't be too hard to fight in the hallways, only a few can get at us at once, so if we run into anybody, just fire away and take them out one by one."

We were running now, with Vera spit-balling battle plans. Easy enough in theory, but I wasn't super keen on running around the hallways shooting dudes, who are probably going to be shooting at us with heavier firepower.

We finally came to a long hallway, at the end of which was a set of metal stairs leading downward – at the bottom of which lurked three large, armoured thugs, each wielding a monstrous gun apiece that looked like it could do some serious damage.

In a harsh voice one of them told us to drop our weapons and move down the steps. As you could imagine we obliged, and most of us put our hands behind our heads and knelt on the ground.

As she did so however, Vera blasted the lead shapeshifter with her plasmatic which she had conveniently hidden in her boot for just such an occasion, which caused just enough shock in our other two captors for me to draw my non-shattered sword and remove the one's gun hand from its wrist.

It was more of a reflexive jerk than a calculated warning blow. Meanwhile, Mouk wrested the blaster from the other and was currently training it on the two survivors, one now clutching at their stump.

Between the sight of them in close quarters like this, and their incinerated buddy on the ground, I was slightly less terrified of the shapeshifters than I was before.

I actually felt quite bad. But I've got to remember what we're here for.

"Nice work," Jake noted, breathing out a sigh of relief, "I've got some rope."

We tied up our prisoners and threatened the whereabouts of our friends out of them – a bit of a feat when four of the five interrogators were still shaking nervously from the capture.

It was a good thing Vera knew what she was doing and led us through the process. We stowed them in an adjacent storage room and moved off through the lower corridors. These were a bit more populated, so it was time to test out the capabilities of our newly purloined destructive tools. I'll just say I would not want to be on the receiving end of one of those things.

A piercing alarm began to sound. Strangely I found myself thinking it was about time – these shapeshifters are a little lax with their security. We hurried down another long hallway, at the end of which ran another set of metal stairs leading downward – up which rushed half a dozen shapeshifters.

Seeing only one real option, I pulled out a coco-grenade and let it fly. I followed this action by jumping in surprise due to the deafening roar of the explosion.

Once the smoke cleared – literally as well as metaphorically – at the base of the stairs, we realized we had finally come to the containment area. There was some serious structural damage to the building, but things seemed to be holding for now.

All the cells were empty, except for one on the far wall. I caught a glint from Feo's shining golden hair. We hadn't found any keys on our defeated foes. Not to worry though – Vera mentioned earlier she packed some blasting caps.

I was just thinking she could have just picked the cell lock as she did with the security monitoring room – but what's a rescue without blasting or smashing your way through things in a heroic manner?

"Stand back," Vera said to our friends inside.

Five seconds later, the front section of bars disintegrated in a puff of smoke.

"I knew you would come back," Feo smiled at us.