Chap 105: Predator

Tee paddled with one hand toward land, but she couldn’t escape the thoughts of her grim reality. The venom was wearing off, letting her move again, though that wasn’t what occupied her mind.

She pushed through the morass until it thickened enough for her to drag herself onto solid ground. On the wet, soggy grass, she sat with her legs stretched out before her. The wide sheet of dark green water blurred before her eyes until she looked down at her missing left hand.

There was nothing below her elbow but dripping blood and scraps of her elbow pad. Yet the mission wasn’t over. She tore off what remained of the pad and pressed several painkiller patches against the wound. Whatever the Commander had taught her about special veins had long fled her mind. Biting the plastic wrap from her roll of bandages, she began wrapping the stub of her arm.

The patches needed little time to work, and she welcomed the dull, numbing pain. It was her cue to move again—until something shifted in her mind when she looked back at the dark water.

She had scanned the entire swamp for the Leak but hadn’t found it. It couldn’t have been invisible. Her Absolute Vision would have revealed it. The reason she hadn’t found the Leak was because it was underwater—just like the drake. She gasped.

She had never scanned through water with her foreseeing vision. But there was a first time for everything. Then came another thought. Find the Leak, and then what?

She had two options—find her teammates and report the monster’s location like a good Sentinel, or take it down herself.

Her wet lips curved into a wicked smile. She would end that Leak—with one less arm. It wasn’t defiance. She simply had no telecom to report anything anyway. Besides, she needed to prove herself the best Sentinel before her secret ever came out. Imagine the look on their faces when they realized a Xenoid outdid them. Priceless.

The thought made her tilt her head back and laugh. She slapped her hand against her thigh and didn’t waste another second. Fire surged through her soul as she blinked, activating her foreseeing vision, and plunged her gaze beneath the surface.

The deep green haze obscured the drake’s horns and long body, but she could tell it was still. She needed no further confirmation it was dead. Served it right.

Then she noticed something. The land wasn’t the earth’s crust at all. It was thick layers of sediment where grass and trees drew nutrients. That explained the soggy ground everywhere she stepped. The twisted shapes of the trees, though, came from malnutrition.

A few roots outgrew the sediment, weaving into tangled webs beneath the surface, but they didn’t hinder her sight. The water below was spacious, free of real barriers. She could trace her vision in a straight path through the swamp without obstruction.

It was hard to make out much through the cloudy particles, and the few crawling creatures on the murky lakebed were too small to be a threat. But unlike her search above ground, that time her search bore fruit.

The red glow from the object gliding near the surface couldn’t have been an oversized leaf or a floating log. She darted her vision back to it and realized the red light came from veins—veins that traced along six moving legs surrounding the creature’s oval body as it pushed itself through the water. She moved her vision closer, taking in its details to understand what she was up against.

Atop its flat, oval body was an extension rising toward the surface—a thick neck, twice the width of her waist and at least five feet tall. On both sides of that neck were limbs tipped with pincer claws. Yet there were no eyes, no mouth—no face at all.

Around the dark stretch of water and the creature’s location, she could see orange lilies growing along the distant banks. They looked like scattered dots from where she stood. Before her thoughts could wander, she drew her vision back and sprang to her feet, heading in the creature’s direction.

Not running into any of her teammates confirmed that luck was on her side. The slush from her boots quieted when she reached the edge of firm ground—solid enough to leap from. Matching the small bulge on the water’s surface to the top of the creature’s headless neck, she estimated the distance to be about a mile of water between them.

She summoned a sword with her one good hand. With all her strength, she hurled it through the air, spinning fast toward the creature’s neck. A red, translucent dome flashed around it—the sword bounced off the barrier and vanished into the distance, making her lips twitch in irritation.

The creature rose, bursting through the surface in a ripple of waves. Its headless neck and pincer claws shimmered as water slid down its dark, chitinous shell. Tee’s brows lifted at its sheer size. It was as large as a hover-van.

Its six legs splashed against the water as it turned toward her. But with no head or eyes to focus on, she didn’t know where to aim her glare. Should she summon another sword? Or would it just bounce off that barrier again?

The energy bubble around it faded. The thick exoskeleton below its neck split open, revealing rings of white teeth and slick pink flesh. Her gaze froze when red light flickered from within and a beam of energy shot toward her.

She dove to her right, barely avoiding the massive laser. The trees behind her weren’t so lucky—obliterated for several yards in a burst of searing light.

Far away in the swamp, Zod, Saeda, Miko, and Kie froze where they stood, their ears twitching at the faint echo of destruction. Zod pressed his telecom to his cheek to activate communication.

“Guys, did you just hear something?”

“Yes—finally,” Saeda replied in her low, steady voice.

Kie heard their voices twice through the extra telecom he carried. “It has to be the Leak. Change of plans. End your search and head toward the source of the disturbance.” He turned left and dashed off.

Miko kept running in circles to stay atop the water. She wrestled with the thought of whether to keep searching for Tee or obey orders. No—disobeying Kie was like disobeying the Commander. She swallowed hard and sprinted in the direction of the faint sound.

Tee shut her open mouth at the sight of the obliterated trees several yards away. They vanished as the fog closed back over them. Remaining in a squat, she locked her eyes on the creature’s pink, gaping mouth.

The stronger the beast, the greater the victory. Her mind shifted to the slow, painful sensation of claws protracting from her right hand. No—what if her teammates saw them? How would she explain that? When the claws reached full length, fear widened her eyes, and they retracted into her fingers. She decided to do things the old-fashioned way and summoned a sword instead.

She leaped high, soaring through the air toward the monster. Her feet thrust up seismic ripples through the swampy ground. She closed half the distance when its mouth began to glow red again—but it never released another blast. The sword she had thrown stopped spinning and lodged deep inside its mouth.

A red orb flared around the monster, but it shattered like glass beneath her spiked boots. She landed on its back with such force that both of them plunged several feet underwater. Dark green currents rushed in from all directions.

The chilling gush of water closed in, clogging her ears, but her eyes stayed open even underwater. One massive pincer claw tore through the murky bubble cloud toward her face, making her eyes widen. With her cheeks puffed full of her last breath, she cursed her missing arm and tilted her head aside.

Her left ear was sliced clean off by the claw at the same moment a sword handle solidified in her hand. The shock of pain fueled her strike—she whipped her blade and slashed through the creature’s neck below its two pincer arms, the cut tearing out the other side. A bubbling shriek burst from the monster, forcing the sword lodged in its mouth to fly free.

Dark blood flooded the churning water between Tee and the monster’s severed neck. Her hazy underwater view vanished when the creature shot back to the surface, buoyed by its massive body.

Tee’s head broke through the water next. Streams ran off her face and hair as she crouched low, gasping the foul air through gritted teeth. Her spiked boots gripped the creature’s slick shell even as water poured off it. Straightening her knees, she held her dripping sword downward in one hand, ready to strike—but didn’t get the chance to drive it in.

A violent jolt ran through the monster’s body, shaking every nerve in hers. Her boot spikes slipped from the chitin grooves, and she began to lose balance. She cursed her missing arm again as her view of the swamp tilted along with her falling weight. The creature was turning—rolling—with her still on its back.

She stabbed half her blade into its shell to hold on. Another shriek erupted from its mouth, followed by gurgling as water rushed in. The swamp’s dim horizon flipped in an instant to red, cloudy water once more. Her right ear filled and stung. The open wound on her left burned sharply.

Then came a crushing pain at her left ankle, vibrating up to her skull. The violent tug forced her to release the sword or risk being torn apart. Bubbles escaped her lips as she was yanked away from the monster with brutal speed. The grip on her leg released, and she spun wildly through the water.

Finally, the monster had rid itself of the pain-inflicting bug clinging to its back. It had caught the tiny pest with one of its side limbs and hurled it far across the water. With that done, it was time to enclose itself in an energy bubble, as it had planned all along.

The creature could only form energy barriers at close range. There was no logic in trapping itself inside one with the smaller being. But the instant it was stabbed in the mouth, it realized something—and the pain it had endured since confirmed it. That smaller creature wasn’t prey. It was a predator.

Tee stopped spinning and flailed her one arm and legs until she righted herself in the water. As soon as the bubbles cleared and she caught sight of the monster, she summoned a sword and hurled it spinning forward.

A red energy bubble began forming around the creature, but her sword pierced it before the barrier could solidify. The bubble shattered, and she threw several more swords. Within a heartbeat, the side of the monster facing her looked like a massive, writhing porcupine.

The pain in her ankle reminded her how lucky she was to still be underwater. With another sword in her right hand, she swam closer. The last thing she wanted was for her teammates to show up and finish the job she had claimed was done. Until that monster was in pieces, her work wasn’t over.

She circled to the other side—the one not yet gushing ribbons of dark blood. Her grip on the sword tightened, but she didn’t get the chance to swing.

A tingling at her neck froze her mid-motion. She didn’t move fast enough. A new energy orb flashed around the creature—and clamped around her neck, trapping her head inside it. Two bubbles escaped her lips as her eyes went wide with shock.

She tried to kick upward, but her knees couldn’t reach the orb. She dropped her sword and clenched her fist, punching the glowing barrier. The grip around her neck tightened—it was like a thin metal collar shrinking at incredible speed.

Pressure built as blood stopped flowing past her throat, swelling into a burst of agony. Each punch against the orb sent vibrations through the water and clogged her right ear. Her eyes rolled as her lungs screamed for air. Darkness flashed at the edges of her vision, and panic flooded her body.

She stopped punching and focused on contracting her neck muscles, straining to resist the choke. Little did she know—it wasn’t her muscles holding firm, but her skin hardening.

Bubbles streamed from her mouth as her control slipped. How could she escape that? She was trapped—alone. Damn her teammates. Where the hell were they?!

Then she remembered why she was there. She was fighting the Leak to prove she could be more than a victim—to show the world that even a Xenoid could rise above. The dogs weren’t going to win. Not that time.

Rage burned through her fear. She opened her mouth—and pain tore from the corners of her lips to her ears. Her cheeks split apart, her jaw unhinged, and her mouth widened to the size of a beach ball.

Her one good ear went deaf just as a devastating, supersonic scream blasted from her throat.