Dragon Conjurer 4, page 11
“Yeah, one of the gargoyles was definitely bigger than the rest,” Nala added. “And the way it moved was like…”
The dark beauty trailed off and shook her head.
“Like it was giving commands.” I finished for her.
“So, what do we do with all this information?” Steffi asked.
“They can turn to stone, they fight in packs,” I murmured as I thought through the sparse amount of data we’d collected during our short skirmish. “They have a leader who gives them commands…”
Nala let out a soft grunt as she shifted off her makeshift dirt chair. Then the beautiful cadet flicked her wrist, and the chair began to crumble in on itself until a large, pointed rock came flying out.
“There you are!” Nala growled and flung the rock against the cave wall.
“What was that about?” Elisabeth laughed.
“There was a rock in my seat.” Nala frowned and rubbed her behind. “It poked my ass.”
“That’s not the worst thing that’s happened all day,” Steffi chuckled.
“I wish it was,” Nala snorted. “I’ll take a rock to the ass over a swarm of rocky assholes any day.”
The rest of the team snickered in response, and I joined along until a few clumps of dirt fell from the ceiling above us.
The gargoyles seemed to be making some headway. We needed to come up with a plan before the monsters made their way inside.
“Hey, Nala?” I asked as an idea occurred to me. “Can you pull the rocks out of any substance?”
“I think so.” She shrugged. “I’ve used my powers to get all the pebbles out of a swath of sand before, and once, I used them to get some stones out of my bike tires when I was riding around the academy grounds.”
“What if the rocks are ground up super fine?” I pressed.
“Yeah, of course.” Nala shrugged again. “Dirt is basically just ground-up rocks. Sand, too. Doesn’t matter how miniscule it is, I can bend it.”
“Hold on!” Steffi gasped, and I grinned as she seemed to catch onto my train of thought. “Matter can’t be created or destroyed, so the gargoyles couldn’t just create their stone out of thin air. If they’re not always stone, but can become more rock-like, then they must have all the components already in their skin, and sort of… I don’t know. Bring it to the surface?”
“Wait, do you mean?” Nala gasped.
“Yep.” I nodded.
“Hey!” Nick waved his hand up and down in the air between the girls and me. “Can someone please fill me in? It’s cute you’re all finishing each others’ sentences, but I’m not into it right now. I need facts and answers.”
“I think what they’re saying,” Elisabeth explained, “is that the monsters don’t turn into stone, they’re made of it.”
“The stone already exists under their skin,” Steffi continued. “The stone is in its molecular form probably, but it’s there. And when the gargoyles are attacking, they just bring all those molecules together in their skin layer, and voila!”
The fairy-girl snapped her fingers, and a sprinkling of sparkles materialized in the air.
“So, what you’re getting at,” Nick replied, “is that Nala has the power to manipulate the stone on the inside of the gargoyles’ bodies, the same way she can manipulate the rock in her chair.”
“Exactly,” Nala confirmed.
The nymph grinned. “That’s fucking grody.”
“We can’t make Nala carry the whole fight herself, though,” Elisabeth said with a worried frown. “She could wear her powers out too quickly.”
“Yeah, that is, like… a ton of complex stone manipulation to pull off,” Nala admitted.
“But you’re the only one with earth powers,” Steffi argued. “And, as we saw earlier, we can’t take out the whole horde of them.”
“You’re right.” I shook my head. “Brute force won’t do it. We’re going to need to work smarter, not harder. Smarter is to take out the leader.”
“I can take out the leader,” Nala said, “but as soon as I start to attack, they’ll swarm. So, you all will have to protect me.”
“Do you think taking out the leader will really stop the whole army of them?” Nick asked incredulously.
“The leader was the one giving commands,” I pointed out. “But all his commands were subtle. It was body language, not verbal language, and there’s no way every gargoyle out there had their eyes on him. Which leads me to believe the swarm operates as a hive-mind.”
“So…” The nymph leaned back against the dirt wall and placed his hands behind his head. “We’re going to pull an Independence Day on these assholes. Just roll up, fuck up their defenses, nuke the leader, and save the world.”
“Y’know, I think we are.” I grinned at my best friend. “We’re going to pull an Independence Day.”
“It is about-fucking-time,” Nick sighed. “I’ve always wanted to do that.”
“Let’s do this,” I chuckled.
Less than three minutes later, we had our plan of attack solidified, and we all stood up, dusted the dirt off our asses, and prepared to move out.
Knowing that the gargoyles were still focusing their attacks on our entrance tunnel, Nala and mole-Elisabeth worked together to dig out a new exit. While Nala used her abilities to sense where any grounded gargoyles were, Elisabeth used the dark beauty’s directions to dig out a safer path for the rest of us. Eventually, we made it out of the hole a safe distance away, and we crawled out of the makeshift cave.
Just outside, I summoned Ky and Goldie, and Nick and I each mounted one of the sleek dragons.
“Okay, team!” I whisper-shouted to my team so the monsters wouldn’t notice our arrival back on the scene. “We have our plan! Let’s go!”
All of the cadets snuck forward, and we stuck together since we’d need to maintain close range with Nala whenever she began her assault on the gargoyle leader. We managed to get into position right behind the largest part of the throng, and I was relieved to see the gargoyles were more disorganized now.
I could even see the sky through the group, and I hoped having them more spread out would mean Goldie could use her wind attacks again.
Even if she couldn’t, we were set, and with one, silent nod to my team, we threw our plan into action.
Steffi and Ky flew upward a few yards, and the three of us circled around our earth bending teammate so we could protect her from any gargoyles that attempted to attack her while she worked.
Nick, Goldie, and Elisabeth were our offensive troops, and as my nymph friend clung to the pearly-white dragon, our newest team member assumed the form of a gorgeous and terrifying Bengal tiger.
“Offensive crew, give ‘em hell!” I ordered.
The tiger charged forward, and she started ripping through the bodies of the unsuspecting gargoyles.
Goldie shot blasts of air through the sparser spots in the flock, and Nick picked off the stunned creatures with his rifle from his pearly-white mount.
The whole swarm reacted with a vengeance, but we had the jump on them this time, and we managed to tear through at least a dozen of the bastards while Goldie’s wind attack scattered the masses.
“I still don’t see the leader!” Nala shouted after a couple minutes of chaos had passed. “I’m gonna see if I can dig him out!”
Nala rooted herself into the ground and began to throw rocks at the smaller monsters so she could make a clear path to the leader.
I glanced around to see if I could spot the huge gargoyle, but it was nowhere to be found. The leader had to be giving the swarm commands from somewhere, but it seemed like the horde was protecting him, which meant the monsters could be smarter than I’d originally given them credit for.
This was a hitch I hadn’t anticipated.
“Wait, I know what to do!” I heard Elisabeth cry as she ran her tiger form back toward us. Then she morphed back into a human and craned her neck up at me. “Dylan, I can do this, just cover me for a second. I’m going to try something I’ve never done before.”
“Be careful,” I yelled back, and I led Ky down to where the redhead was standing.
A handful of gargoyles had already shifted to make Nala and Elisabeth their new targets, but my dragon used his icy breath to fend them off. Shards of ice and sprays of frost billowed over the incoming swarm, and the gargoyles snarled with fury as they attempted to break through the haze. Their wings and bodies were freezing up, though, and a few of them frantically beat their wings to break free of the ice while others crashed down in a frozen, gray heap.
Down on the ground, Elisabeth had already started to shift her form, and I kept half an eye on her while I directed Ky to send out another burst of frost.
At first, I thought the foxy redhead was turning into a lizard as her feet grew claws and her legs started to get scaly. Then, as the transformation made its way up her body, her torso began to expand, her arms lengthened, and her lips stretched forward and hardened into a beak. Once the French girl’s skin started to sprout speckled brown feathers, I realized she was turning into a giant golden eagle.
Sort of.
The bird standing in front of me was ten times larger than any real eagle I’d seen, and the immense creature cocked her head to the side while opening and closing her beak with a powerful clacking sound. She must have been satisfied with her newly-acquired form, because a moment later, she flapped her wings and ascended in a rush of air that sent dust flying all around me and Ky.
The great eagle screeched as it soared upward, and I grinned at the beast’s majestic form against the bright blue afternoon sky. Then eagle-Elisabeth circled above the swarm of gargoyles, and as she let out another screech, the throng began to move upward toward her.
“Oh, no!” I heard Nala gasp from her rooted position a few feet away. “She’s using herself as bait!”
“Shit,” I cursed, and my stomach dropped.
The dark beauty was right.
The golden eagle continued to circle around until she had caught the attention of all the small gargoyles, and then she veered to the left and tucked her wings to pick up speed.
As the crowd of smaller monsters followed the massive bird through the air, they revealed the figure of their leader, who appeared to be commanding them to chase their newest, biggest, threat.
“Nala, now!” I shouted to the earth bender.
My petite teammate nodded and thrust her arms outward, and even though the leader was flying a few dozen yards away, she looked like she was trying to grab him from here. As she worked her invisible magic, the monster leader let out an anguished cry and whipped his head around to try to find the cause of his pain.
Then his eyes locked on Nala with dark, loathing energy. The hulking monster growled and bared its maw of razor-sharp teeth and then began speed toward her with his claws outstretched.
But he was too late.
Nala let out a guttural scream and wrenched her arms to the side as if she were ripping a phonebook in half, and the huge gargoyle burst like a balloon.
A shower of gray dust exploded across the desert floor, and bits of the creature’s rocky flesh cascaded down as his roar became a faint echo.
Nala dodged an incoming shard as she let out a devilish laugh, and Nick cheered from his pearly-white mount.
“Woohoo! We did it!” The nymph pumped his fist into the air.
“Not yet, we didn’t!” Steffi responded.
I glanced up at her and saw that the crowd of smaller gargoyles appeared to be frozen in the air. Their wings were still beating, but they were just hovering and looking around like they had suddenly forgotten where they were or what they were doing.
It looked like my hive-mind theory had been correct. We killed their leader, and without someone to give them commands, the little buggers were lost.
The giant golden eagle soared over the cloud of monsters and screeched, and I swore it sounded like she was saying the word “skeet!”
“Clever girl,” I muttered, and I whirled around to give the final command to the rest of my team. “They’re easy targets now! Let’s finish them off!”
The stunned gargoyles were easy to hit, but the fight still took several minutes because of the sheer number of them. None of us let up for even a second, and I sent my two aerial dragons into the fray while Steffi’s balls of energy soared past us.
Gargoyles froze and were thrown from the air only to end up colliding with Nala’s incoming boulders, and Nick covered the rest as he burned through the last of his ammo with headshots. Elisabeth used her massive wings to knock the stragglers back toward our onslaught, and by the time all the gargoyles’ bodies were shattered on the ground, we were completely exhausted.
I slid from Ky’s back and leaned up against a rock as I summoned Ky and Goldie back to me. They both looked as tired as I felt, but a glint of pride shone in their big eyes right before I gave the command, and they nestled under my skin like they needed a long nap.
Then I brought out Beyblade to start incinerating the bodies while the rest of us took a breather.
“That… was exhausting,” I muttered. “This day is never ending.”
Steffi flopped down onto the ground beside me and silently nodded. Her chest heaved with her deep, gasping breaths, and sweat glistened on her pale skin.
“Let’s not do that again,” Nick sighed.
“My arms are going to be sore tomorrow,” Nala groaned as she rubbed her biceps and winced.
A giant golden eagle touched down next to me with a whoosh of air that kicked up a cloud of dust, and in a blur, the creature’s body shrunk down and morphed back into the French redhead we all knew.
“That. Was. Amazing!” Elisabeth giggled.
“No, you were amazing, El!” Steffi stood up and dusted herself off before pulling the other girl into a hug.
“Yeah, we’ve never seen you turn into a giant bird before,” Nala added.
“That’s because I haven’t turned into a giant bird before,” Elisabeth blushed and lowered her gaze.
“Seriously?” Nick asked while the girls stared in surprise.
“That was the first time you’d ever done that?” Steffi asked in awe.
Elisabeth nodded.
“So, you could say that you… did it on the fly.” The nymph grinned.
I chuckled as Nala groaned, and Steffi punched the nymph in the shoulder with enough force to cause him to skitter backward.
“We were all thinking it!” Nick scoffed.
“So, El,” Steffi said. “Oh, is it okay if we call you El?”
“Of course!” the French redhead purred.
“So, El,” Steffi continued, “do you have any other tricks up your sleeve? Any other badass creatures you can turn into?”
“Like I said before, theoretically, I can turn into any animal,” Elisabeth responded. “And I’ve done individual body parts from a bunch of different animals. But I’ve only done full-body transformations of some mammals and then the golden eagle today.”
“Never a fish or a bug, or anything like that?” Nala asked.
The shapeshifter shook her ginger head.
“Why not?” the dark beauty pressed.
“It’s hard.” Elisabeth shrugged. “Just like you didn’t have the strength to move huge mounds of dirt when you first got your powers, I wasn’t able to transform into whole animals at first, either. Even now, I don’t have the strength to change my body into anything very different from my human form, but I’m working on getting stronger so that someday, I can turn into anything!”
As the girls continued interrogating our new teammate, Nick and I began to pile up all the fallen monster bodies, and Beyblade kept the body pile ignited as we worked so there’d be no evidence left of the supposedly mythical creatures.
It was tedious work because there were about a hundred of the things littering the desert floor. Imps, Piasa Birds, and gargoyles all laid slain on the ground, and the gallons’ worth of multi-colored monster blood spilling out from all our vanquished foes seeped into the hard, parched ground.
“Man, I could really go for some lunch,” Nick mumbled as he tossed an armful of imps onto the growing pile of monster corpses.
“How can you even think about food right now?” I asked.
The stench of the bodies baking in the hot Nevada sun made my stomach turn, but I held my breath as I dumped the two gargoyle heads I’d been holding onto the pyre.
Beyblade scurried over the pile and lit the new bodies on fire and then started to munch on one of the Piasa Birds where its feathers had been burned away.
“See?” Nick laughed. “I’m not the only one who’s hungry!”
As my best friend and I continued gathering up the monster corpses, I couldn’t get my mind off the odd nature of the fights. Not only were there three different species all in the same area, but two of them had been working together, and the other…
Well, I’d never heard of hive-mind gargoyles before.
Then I thought of the message from the Siguanaba, and a chill ran up my spine even as the afternoon sun beat down on my shoulders. The message from the horse-faced siren gnawed at the back of my mind, and I tried to put the pieces together: the Wendigo, the Siguanaba, the imps working with the Piasa Birds, and the gargoyle hive-mind controlled by a telepathic leader.
I shook my head and decided that as soon as we got back to AIMM, I was going to head for the library so I could do some research on all the crazy shit I’d experienced today.
By the time Nick and I finished piling up the bodies, and Beyblade had burned them all down to ashes, it was late afternoon, and Nala worked on road reconstruction while we waited for Captain Silva to come pick us up.
When the plane touched down a few minutes later, we were tired, hungry, sweaty, and covered in dust and ash.
“No offense,” Silva told us as we boarded, “but you all look like shit.”
“Thanks,” I snorted as I clapped him on the shoulder, and the pilot let out a throaty chuckle.
We all flopped into our seats, and I struggled to keep my eyes open as I watched all my teammates drift off to sleep. I decided that a nap was probably a good idea, even though the flight was only a little over an hour long. At the rate monster attacks had been happening recently, who knew when I’d get another opportunity for sleep?
