Risen: Shatterverse

Getting the Fuck Outta Dodge ... Again

The rest was drowned out as two of the incoming swarm masses impacted into the ground less than two hundred meters away with enough force that we were momentarily lifted off our feet as the percussive wave washed through before being roughly dropped back down. Then we were fighting for our lives as, stabilized by their D-SANS nature and unaffected by the impacts, the marauders that had managed to work their way close, charged forward.

Bulwarks, heavy segmented metal triangles hammered point down into the ground with explosive bolts, groaned as they absorbed the physical force the charge created against the energy shield protecting the perimeter. Then the shield itself was whining with the strain as the massive vel'thik assault beings began pushing their way through.

"Tighten up, damnit!" the master sergeant snarled even as the company struggled back to their feet to desperately fire at the massive creatures that were now directly on top of them. "Push them back!"

"Sir," the synthoid lieutenant said as she stepped between the captain and I. "We need reinforcements but comms to Command has dropped." She paused to lift a hand to the side of her helmet. "I'm not getting anything back, not even a carrier signal."

"Is that unusual?" I asked and the lieutenant looked over at me and nodded.

"In all our time fighting the vel'thik, they have never shown the capability of disrupting our communications," she explained. "Even if Command was completely obliterated, we'd be getting a carrier signal from the planetary grid."

- The governing program is isolating them, - my passenger tersely pointed out. - And it's shrinking the world. In a matter of moments it will only be this place, some four hundred of your meters square. -

"Whatever is controlling this place is shrinking it to isolate you," I explained. "Everything in your command structure, logistics, support; it's all gone!"

"But what about all the other essences out there?" the lieutenant with the weird voice asked. "Have they also been lost?"

"Let's find out," the captain grimly said. "Rally point, Master Sergeant. Give me a tele-beacon and a shout out."

"Sir, yes, sir," the master sergeant said with a tight nod. Then he was pulling a heavy metal and ceramic spike off his back to punch it into the ground at his feet.

Almost immediately there was a bright pulse of light that ringed away from us through the marauders and into the dust clouds surrounding us. Then I could feel the ground beneath my feet begin to shiver rhythmically between the shudders caused by the marauders stomping all around us.

"Lights are on and the door is open, sir," the non-comm reported as he brought his rifle back up to start firing again.

"Good. Now push out the perimeter by ten meters and hold. We're giving anybody out there listening five mikes before our metal friend here zaps us off the grid."

- Do we have five minutes? - I asked my passenger as the terrans began to use their beleaguered energy field and increased rate of fire in combination to slowly but steadily begin pushing the marauders back.

There was a slight pause before:

- Marginally. If the governing program realizes what we are attempting, it could instantly collapse the pocket. -

- And it hasn't yet, why? -

- It runs the risk of having some of the rogue intelligences survive the collapse and escape before they could be hunted down, - the t'sang explained.

- They could do that? Survive the collapse of an artificial universe? -

I got the impression that my passenger shrugged.