Flame Rider II: Rise of Chaos

And forth he will come

I couldn’t believe what was happening. I knew that I was on Earth, and yet I found myself at the entrance to Mt Death on Anaglifa. Whatever was going on was definitely not normal, and yet it was actually happening.

And before my very eyes, I could see what looked like Blaze talking with Eran and Erith, the two Death Riders that sworn to protect his body. He was explaining something to them, his body somewhat visible through the clouds of dark matter that seemed to also crowd around him.

“If my body is able to stand up to the war that is looming over our heads,” Blaze copy said, “Then we may have a fighting chance. But alas, I fear this body may be too familiar to what my body was like before I was empowered with Nitrogalfe.”

“Either why, it is good to have you back,” Eran said bowing, “What shall you do once you have found Erath?”

“I shall have to travel to Earth,” the copy said, “Maria and the human race is under attack from a race of beings that I have never seen before. They look like insects, and yet many of them also have human characteristics.”

I followed the copy-Blaze, Erik and Eran, learning a lot about where the strange copy was for and what he supposedly represented. For the most part it was a lot like my brother, and yet he seemed to have a heck of a lot of gaps in his memory.

Before long though, I felt my start to get torn away from whatever vision I was part of. And when I returned to my own body, I realised that I was being carried by something, or rather someone.

*-*-*-*

I kept the squad moving at a decent pace, halting them every once and awhile so that I could scout ahead. Price had original given me this command as to test my skill, but it soon became apparent that actually she was trying to mimic Blaze’s command ability.

‘Like that’ll do us any good. Especially when the shit finally hits the fan,’ I mused darkly.

‘Shadow Jones, I am detecting about three insectoid beings just ahead of our current position,’ Del said, ‘Can I suggest taking them out, so that we may keep pace with two-five platoon?’

I hefted my rail gun onto my shoulder so that I could get a clean line of fire at the figures that Del had pointed out. I then squeezed the trigger gently once, twice, three times, before replacing it with my F16 Assault Rifle.

As I pinged the rest of the squad, giving them the all clear, I quickly did a quick scan of the surrounding buildings, before letting my sight settle on the three unmoving bodies.

They belonged to a group of insects that High Command had dubbed Grunts because of the fact that we were finding them everywhere. Our squad had encountered another group that almost looked like a hybrid of human, insect, and bird, and had been named Scuttler.

They were harder to take out, because of their increased shielding and apparent experience. They also travelled in large groups that were the equivalent of our platoons.

As we cut through their ranks though, we managed to gather bits and pieces of their equipment, Price taking what looked like a pair of side arms, and some kind of streamlined Assault Rifle.

Cole had managed to rip the head off of an insect that looked more human than anything, and had taken its melee weapon. I had nicknamed the humanoid insect bugman but it didn’t actually stick, as we didn’t actually find any others like it.

“Sit Rep Ghost,” Price ordered, “Where are we, and how does it look from mission control’s POV?”

“Can’t tell ya where we are,” I said, “But if Del has been guiding us right, we should be roughly three klicks from the main line at Lower Hutt. If I am guessing correctly, then we have another nineteen klicks to the objective.”