Carnival - A LitRPG Apocalypse

Bolfs summoned pack went through the rovers like a hot knife through butter. Kev stood staring as they waited for their reserves to tick back up as in his mind there were repeated spikes of terror and pain across the ground they needed to clear.

It followed the same pattern every time. Amusement turned to anger, turned to fear, turned to pants wetting terror followed by desperate determination to be anywhere other than where they were.

“Bolf, I think you’ve largely cleared up most of our problems. Are they gone yet?” Kev asked.

Bolf cocked his head to one side then shrugged. “No idea. My reserves are back up to three quarters but I can’t track the Pack once it’s summoned.”

“Ryn, take a look will you?” asked Bad. Ryn blipped up a hundred metres and did a quick spiral across the area. She caught some flak, wildly thrown powers blasting at wherever she appeared, but she never stayed still long enough for anything to land.

“Looks like they’re gone,” she said simply as she appeared back with her team. “Shall we hit the next bunker?”

They moved off and began taking out the Imps. After the third bunker was cleared a B-3000 came tearing up behind them and skidded to a halt in a cloud of dust.

“Who let the dogs out?” it asked.

“Don’t you dare start barking!” Kev glared at Sally and Bad who smirked in reply. “That was Bolf. They’ve dealt with the rovers. What’s the situation with the other bunkers?”

“Send a rover to catch a rover. I like it and it’s going to be used in my report for this shitshow. I’ve got spiders coming through to salvage the lost chassis’. The other bunkers are holding. They need relief, they've been fighting for hours, but they can hold a little longer.”

Ryn glanced upwards. Her mum was still duelling the acid woman. She must be high level and have a weird power to stand up for so long against Sunstrike.

“Mum still hasn’t put that outlaw down, Bob. We need to do this fast and then help her,” she said in a voice that brooked no argument. The drone turned glowing yellow eyes on her.

“I know, kid. She’s been my friend since before you were born. If we can deal with the interference we can coordinate properly with Vic. Let’s deal with the minor bunkers then take a look at the one with whoever or whatever is fucking with my comms.”

“We need to swing north. Standard formation, guys. Let’s go,” Kev cut in, reasserting his authority as team leader and the only person on their side who had any idea what was going on. The team fell in and set off, bruisers in the lead.

They collared and subdued the attackers, shipping them back to the portal with the exhausted defenders. Bob sent some drones as escorts as well. More to keep the French forces from punishing the now defenceless attackers than anything else.

“So you’ve no idea how many or how strong they are?” asked Armand as he leaned upwards to peer over the improvised battlements of the last bunker.

“I can sense Pierre and he’s extremely confident. He thinks the people around him are more than enough to deal with anything short of a team of Sigs. The others… they’re just blurs in my other-sense. They are there but how many of them or how strong they are, I just can’t tell,” frustration dripped through Kev’s voice as he spoke.

“So we do it the old fashioned way. You know we had to deal with the Scunners without any of this fancy tech?” said the drone.

“You had loads of post-system tech when you dealt with the Scunners. Dad doesn’t talk about it often but the B-800s and the Nagas from Shelly were crucial from what he said!” Ryn countered.

“He said that? I’ll have to find him a nice bottle of whisky. Shelly and I helped but he put Adrian down on his own, after he blipped the rest of us to safety. Against my own advice to cut and run,” said the B-3000. “On that subject: if we need to cut and run here now you need to follow my order. If Armand’s uncle thinks he’s fine against anything other than John or Gemini we can’t take that lightly.”

“Andrea and Ryn lead. They blip in, collar if possible, slice and dice if not then blip out. Any runners get taken on by the rest of us. Armand can send summons to distract them. Simon, do you have anything that can help?”

“What are you thinking?” asked the boy, looking up from the dirt he was transforming into god alone knew what.

“Perimeter control? Can you put something down to stop people escaping?” asked Kev.

“If they’re strong enough to fight a couple of members of the Carnival I’m not sure we want them trapped. A trapped animal is at its most dangerous. If they run it’s still a win for us right?” replied Simon.

“That’s… a good point. Something we can activate at need maybe? If they aren’t as strong as Pierre thinks, taking them hostage, er prisoner-” Kev corrected at a look from Claire, “-would be best.”

“Sure. I can put a kill switch on it. I’ll need to deploy them around the bunker in advance though.”

“I can help with that,” Armand said. “How heavy will the trinkets be?”

“Traps, not trinkets.” He held up his hand as Armand narrowed his eyes in response to the pedantry. “Not me! It’s the system mate. Trinkets are items a person uses, traps are things I put down and that activate automatically! They won’t be too heavy. A kilo and a half. I’m just throwing the design together in my head. Is that too heavy? If I cut the weight down, the effectiveness drops sharply.”

“We can manage something. If a summon won’t work, Ryn and Andrea should be able to blip around and deploy them, non?” He raised an eyebrow at the girls.

“No problem,” Ryn was running on adrenaline and the faint shakes in her limbs gave it away. None of the rest were in much better shape so they didn’t say anything.

“I didn’t like the slice and dice. I won’t be chopping people up. I just want to fight monsters,” Andrea’s soft voice cut through them.

“None of us want to fight people, Andrea. Sometimes we don’t have a choice. You don’t have to do anything you aren’t comfortable with, ok?” Kev said gently. Andrea fixed her eyes fiercely on the boy but after a moment nodded and dropped her gaze.

“Pierre is mine. None of you are to touch him!” snapped Armand who clearly had no issue fighting another human.

“You aren’t exactly a damage dealer mate. We’re happy to help out if you-” Bad began before Armand rounded on him.

“He is mine.” The boy’s voice was flat. Bad raised his hands and backed up a step.

“Ok dude, fine.” Bad shared a quick look with Sally as they both resolved to step in if Armand was out of his depth.

“What’s his power?” asked Ryn, trying to divert the conversation away from infighting.

“He is an ice caster. Armour, blades and walls. Unless he has levelled significantly and got some kind of ability evolution or reached his class two enhancement he will not be an issue for me as I am now. I would like some additional incendiary grenades though?”

Ryn and Adnrea passed him their incendiaries, Ryn took a moment to take stock of the boy as she passed over the two grenades she was carrying. He was only twelve after all and this murderous determination seemed out of character for the clever, diplomatic boy she’d grown to know. He met her eyes and nodded grimly.

“Pour mon Pere,” he said quietly and Ryn pulled a forced smile in reply as she passed the explosives over.

“They know we’re here. They must have a psyker with them. Pierre just started ranting about putting the brat down.” Kev barked and Armand bristled at the word brat. “His bloody words, not mine mate! Ok, scrap the last plan, it’s rumbled. We’re going to have to do something unpredictable. You all know each other fairly well, work together, keep each other safe and go smash that fucking bunker!” Kev pointed a finger bravely at their opponents. Bad slapped it down as he shot off, Sally looping around the other way. Kev shook his hand to remove the sting that had penetrated through his armour.

Ryn vanished, as did Andrea. There was a series of screams and yells from inside the oblong pillbox, hastily thrown together from magicked rock, and then gusts of smoke and flame briefly surged out the firing slits and rose from the entrance to the rear.

The two girls reappeared, floating in the sky to north and south of the defensive position before blipping back to Kev and the other second line fighters. As Ryn appeared she raised a hand and blasted a spike of fire into the front of the defence, partially melting the structure and eliciting further swearing and shouting from within.

“Where’d Simon go?” Andrea asked.

“He’s about.” Kev’s tone made it clear further conversation on the subject of their teammates was ill advised and Andrea vanished again.

“They’ve got three bruisers. The rest are casters and healers. The bruisers are fast though. I had to blip Andrea out before she took a hit,” Ryn said quickly. “Maybe we should-” A modest swarm of B-3000s arrived and rushed at the defences. Blasts of light and ice pinned them down and picked them apart. These new drones being grist to the mill of a high level team wasn’t shocking to Ryn. What was shocking was the laughter now coming from the bunker.

“Those fuckers! Where the hell is Simon?” Ryn demanded.

“He’s over that way,” Kev pointed reluctantly. Whether they had a psyker or someone with preternatural hearing wasn’t clear to him and he’d been trying to stop anyone discussing their plans for that reason. If it was someone like him any efforts at secrecy wouldn’t matter but if they were just listening it could make a big difference.

Ryn vanished once more, moving quickly until she found Simon emplacing a dagger of dull grey metal into a wall.

“I need something that will go boom,” she said. He jumped and spun, raising both hands and brandishing a disc of copper in each of them.

“Christ, I nearly killed you! Just use a bloody grenade!” he snapped as he pulled more dirt into his palms and grey mist swirled out to cover it.

“Gave them to Armand. Need a big badda boom, mate. You’re the Urchemist, make me a bomb!”

“Dammit, I’m never going to seal this area! Between you and Andrea treating me like a kid… You’re not making me feel like I belong, you know?”

“Simon, I’m only here because I need you to make me something. I’m more than happy for you to run around and cause mayhem on your own,” Ryn said as she suppressed a smile. Andrea had a crush?

“Oh. Right. Give me a minute.” The mist covering his hands changed the direction it was swirling in and he began reaching down to shovel more dirt into the mini maelstrom.

“Time is something we don’t really have, dude!”

“Ryn, I thought you were the easy going one. Jane is a psycho, Andrea is shy, Bad and Sally are locked in a weird competition and I’m sure they’ll never start dating in years to come- Ow!” a rock had plinked off his helmet at high speeds as a column of dust sped past them. “Which one of them was it?” he asked quietly.

“No idea but they’ll both know soon. Maybe if I can blow up that bunker they’ll forget about what you said?”

“Ok.” Simon passed Ryn a large cube of black metal. “Pull this ring here then get very far away very quickly. Not a problem for you but I strongly advise against dilly dallying once you pull the primer. It’s a three second fuse.”

“Thanks!” Ryn vanished back to the fray. The casters were keeping Bad and Sally at a distance. They had to constantly duck and dodge to avoid the attacks. Armand had thrown up some conjured defences for Kev, Claire and himself to shelter behind. Bolf was nowhere to be seen but if he took after his mother that probably meant he was sneaking through the stone to attack from underneath their opponents. That could be a problem. If he popped out just as whatever-the-hell bomb Simon had handed her went off it would be suboptimal.

“Fire in the hole!” Ryn yelled before blipping in close, ripping the cord out of the cube and dropping it behind the Imperium fighters. She vanished back to the defences and ducked with her hands over her ears. An entirely futile effort as her helmet was up and would counter any noises loud enough to disorientate her.

She counted two heartbeats before a rumble passed through the earth below her. She jumped up and looked at her handiwork. The defences had been blown apart sending rubble across a wide area. Within the smoke the attackers were still cursing but now at least one of them was crying out in pain.

She tuned her mask to filter out the smoke and blipped in close again. Bad and Sally slammed into the bruisers who were suffering from the blast wave. They both smacked their targets clear out of the remains of the bunker to tumble like rag dolls across almost fifty metres of ruined town.

They were still tumbling through the air as Bad and Sally took off in chase of their chosen opponents, the hideous insectile collars that would cut their enemies off from their power gleamed in their hands as they rushed after them. Ryn blipped behind a woman who was missing half her left arm and slapped a collar around her neck. She wailed like a grieving mother and began scrabbling at her throat with her remaining hand as the tiny legs began sinking into flesh to stop her removing it.

"UNCLE! SHOW YOURSELF!” screamed Armand as he stepped out from his summoned barriers. Kev tried to pull him back but the smaller boy shoved the lanky teenager away and strode forwards into no man's land.

“Petit Armand! I am sorry it has come to this!” called a voice from within the dust and smoke. Something began to take form, rapidly growing to tower nearly five metres tall. It took an earthshaking step forwards and the air cleared around it as a wave of cold washed out over everyone.

Armand stood and stared upwards at the icy golem that housed the usurper. The traitor. He tossed something in his right hand. Up and down. Up and down.

“Perhaps you will reconsider, Uncle. I assume you were not involved in Fathers death and am willing to be merciful,” The boy said in a steady voice.

“Ha! I wasn’t involved but my brother was only Comte due to being born first! I was always the superior choice! Bow down boy, pass me the title and I’ll let your friends live.”

“Pierre!” a woman ran from the ruined bunker and spoke quietly to him, staring up at where he was encapsulated in the summoned ice. Ryn didn’t hear what was said but she saw the blood drain from Pierre’s face.

“How? How did you get so strong? You’re friends aren’t level twenty five but you’re level forty?” Pierre snarled as he stomped forwards.

“I have my ways, Uncle.” The object he’d been tossing up and down in his right hand landed in his palm and vanished. A moment later fire poured down over the ice golem, hissing steam billowing out to obscure everything.

A dozen copies of Armand sprinted away from where he had been standing, the original laughed as he watched the flames coat the golem. Pierre yelled and swore, another wave of cold washing out to try and quench the fires.

Ryn tried to follow the woman who had rushed out but she was lost in the smoke and steam. She blipped higher and appeared in the air. She moved over and blipped to where Jane was glowering down.

“I think an ice monster is a good combo for both of us?” Ryn asked. Jane grinned in reply and they shot lower to bathe the centre of the cloud of steam in yet more fire. “Keep an eye out for a woman in Imp armour. She could still use Identify, but she got Armand’s level wrong. I think Kev has figured out how to use some of his power!”

“Over there!” Jane yelled as she pointed one hand at a distinctly feminine armoured form scurrying back beyond the devastated bunker. She got perhaps thirty feet before there was a flash and she was cocooned in something Ryn didn’t want to contemplate. Some kind of black goo that moved like oil on water as it flowed over her body and the ground around her. It was like something the Dragon might make, it looked alive.

“Simon got her! Let’s focus on Pierre!” Ryn called and the girls redoubled their efforts, pouring fire down from above.

The Armand’s danced and jumped through the flames. The illusions untroubled by the temperature and the real one protected by his modified armour.

“Uncle! Father taught me many lessons, not all of them pleasant!” The clones yelled at the same time. “Perhaps the hardest of them was that putting down an enemy is a necessity sometimes, whoever they might have been before they became my enemy! Godspeed Uncle!”

Another Armand stepped out from behind the barricades and ten throwing knives appeared on a strap across his chest. Both hands flashed and the conjured weapons flew through the air to slam into the melted ruin of the golems head. The giant stood for a moment then toppled forward and began to dissolve.

“Bon chance, Oncle,” said Armand sadly as the illusions vanished. He walked forward slowly, his shoulders hunched in resignation at having killed a family member.

“Systems are back up!” yelled one of the surviving B-3000s. An unknown being appeared in the sky above the battlefield. Kev blanched as a wave of unnatural indifference washed over him. Whoever that was didn’t care at all. He and his friends were all less than worms to that being.

“Acid bitch is dead! She was a tough cookie. I was watching for a while, I’m proud of you all-” Vic’s voice called down from just above their heads. “Holy shit!” she exclaimed as she noticed a new arrival. “Kid’s, get your shit together and run for the portal! NOW!”