Mask of Humanity

The line of tracks led Nicolai to a cliff face, a sharp rise of soil that formed an abrupt mesa.

He gazed at it from afar. Odd in shape, at least by the standards of Earth. It exploded out of the ground and rose in an almost vertical line to the top, which was flat. There was something up there, or rather some things. He made out the shrieking of birds. One of the drones rose high, giving him a view of its top.

Fewer trees, mostly just scraggly brush, but the mesa was far from deserted. There were birds up there. Spirit Birds, with nests. They resembled parrots, plumage of red and green, feather crests rising from their heads. They were each the same size as him. Quite a bit smaller than the bird that had held dominion over the skies above the castle, but still far bigger than any airborne creature had a right to be, and there were a lot of them.

The Modules roved curiously through the increasingly large store of digitised information he held on Spirit Beasts, and presented him with the details. These were Cliffshriekers, a typically Tier 1 Spirit Beast though the larger and older variants be Tier 2. Threat Analysis, going through the info, noted that they tended to have Symbiotes built around sonic attacks and airborne mobility. They were smart, territorial, and vengeful.

Useful to know there was a colony here, but they weren't his targets. The Gorothune should be nearby. Gorothune had a tendency to gorge and thus, after eating, his sources suggested it would find somewhere to relax and sleep off the meal. Gorothunes tended to stay within about five to ten metres of the surface when sleeping, because when not moving they needed to make small holes to draw in fresh oxygen, using some innate earth-poking capabilities of their Soul Sense to do so. They were able to make these tiny breathing tubes about ten metres long at most. That deep in the ground they were protected from whatever was on the surface, with plenty of time to move away if something started digging or attacking.

However, they liked places where they wouldn't be disturbed. They disliked it when creatures stomped over their resting spot. Under trees or thick bushes were thus a common choice.

Nicolai scanned the ground, looking for signs of recent movement. He noted a tree with some signs that something may have been digging near to it, and focused on it.

The air the Gorothune breathed out wouldn't be hot exactly, but it would be warmer than the air around it.

Where? His eyes roved around, and fell upon the rise of the mesa. He tilted his head. There? He felt it would be odd for a ground-burrowing creature to dig into a mesa and rise to a higher level, but that was simply his own assumption. When tracking prey one had never tracked before, assumptions needed to be discarded. Certainly it wouldn't have to worry about something heavy stepping on its hiding place, if it was in the wall. How high would it go?

Not high. He didn't think it would hunt the Cliffshriekers. It preferred to tunnel under lone prey then strike, killing and retreating before something else could arrive to interrupt. On top of that, it had sensitive ears and used vibrations to feel what was around it. A large group of smart, vengeful, birds armed with sonic attacks were far from its preferred prey.

Thus there was no reason for it to climb high, and it should prefer to stay near the ground. That way, if it detected prey passing by it could quickly dive lower, and begin to hunt from below.

Based on all that, it should be just where the mesa began to rise. Nicolai set his bionic eye on the mesa, starting from the middle, from his current position. After observing for a few seconds he moved his gaze to the next portion to the left. Then went to the right, passing over the portion he'd already scanned.

Gradually, he worked his way out with the eye, and after a minute he found it.

Tiny blooms of heat. It looked like little puffs of light grey against the near-black of the earth wall. Warm air escaping from the Gorothune's breathing tubes. No reason for it, except that a Gorothune was sleeping there.

He'd found his target.

###

A large, yellow-furred deer cocked its head, hearing something, feeling something. It turned, wide eyes peering through the brush.

A 9mm round caught it in the head. The click of a suppressed, subsonic gunshot echoed through the trees, quickly absorbed into the ambient noises of the jungle. The deer's legs gave out and it collapsed. Its tiny Soul dispersed, creating some faint ripples.

Nicolai melted out of the shadows.

The pleasant surge of nostalgia surprised him. He found himself reflecting that he'd killed a lot of his targets in precisely this manner, back when he'd walked the Earth. Just for old time's sake, he angled the pistol and put two more shots into the deer, both in the heart. That had been his preference when using 9mm back. Two in the heart, one in the head. "Overkill" was not a concept he believed in.

He unscrewed the pistol's silencer then tucked both away before moving his poncho to the side. He crouched down, grasped the corpse and slung it over his shoulder. There was nothing to worry about nearby, so he started into a jog.

It wasn't long before he was approaching the mesa. His footsteps lightened as he activated a Pegasi ring—only one, as he wasn't able to conceal the ripples of two with the Lurker Symbiote. With the weight of the deer he couldn't fly, but his steps were lighter than a child's and he moved at a glacial pace. The Gorothune would feel no ground-based vibrations nor spiritual ripples to alert it of his presence. He carefully placed the deer onto the ground, then floated away.

Nicolai returned in a rush. He skittered on all fours, imagining himself as a deer. His hands and feet drummed the ground, doing his very best to impersonate the proper gait.

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He was an injured deer, his frantic steps cried out. A bleeding deer. A dying deer!

Ah! The injury was too much. Deer-Nicolai collapsed to the ground, right beside the corpse. He beat at the ground, the reflexive thrashing of a dying animal. His movements slowed. He breathed his last.

And Nicolai floated silently off the ground, slipped through the air, wrapped himself around a tree. His poncho covered him once more. He gazed at the mesa wall where he'd seen the Gorothune's faint heat emanations.

He faintly saw a Soul Sense tendril emerge. Just the slightest amount, so subtle that he'd never have noticed if he wasn't watching for it. The tendril stared at the deer. Glanced around. He could almost feel the Gorothune's thought process. It wasn't particularly hungry, after its nap, but it could eat… and free food was free food. The tendril disappeared back into the wall.

Nicolai slithered up the tree, onto a low branch. He put his shoulder against the trunk and wrapped his legs around the branch to anchor himself, pulled the M99 from storage and took aim. The Gorothune would show itself soon. He would shoot it in the neck in the instant it emerged from the ground and seized the corpse. Ideally it would just take the one shot, but he didn't mind putting more bullets into it if necessary. However, shots to the head and stomach needed to be avoided as that was where its most valuable organs were, the one the buyer was after, and the type of Symbiotes he was most interested in were likely in its heart Node, so no shots to the chest either. Its neck was thus the best target.

He tracked the Gorothune's movements by the emerging of its Soul Sense tendril. At first the tendril just poked out here and there, as it crept closer to the corpse. As the deer was unmoving, it wasn't able to track it via ground-based vibrations. However, as it got closer the Soul Sense tendril stayed out, and he saw its speed of movement increase, homing in toward the corpse.

Nicolai held tight to the M99. His bionic arm made the task of keeping the heavy gun raised and steady much easier than it otherwise would have been. The Gorothune's Soul Sense tendril was within only feet of the dead deer.

The deer was centred in his vision. It was less than twenty metres away, so he'd removed the scope and viewed it over the iron-sights. The information said the Gorothune would leap out beside its chosen target, strike with its claws for a quick kill, seize it and disappear back into the ground. Merging with Aiming, he raised the rifle slightly, anticipating the height its neck would be at when it emerged. The Gorothune's Soul Sense tendril paused, right beside the corpse.

Now. He and the Modules were attuned to the world. He breathed slowly out, finger squeezing gently at the trigger.

But the Gorothune did not emerge. Instead the ground shifted beneath the deer, seeming almost to boil, dirt shifting and roiling. And the deer corpse… simply fell into the ground.

Nicolai blinked and raised his head, staring. That wasn't the way the information described it going. Threat Analysis pointed out that the information only talked about how the Gorothune would strike a living target, not scavenge a corpse. It must also have a decent, versatile earth-moving Symbiote, added the Module. As they commonly did.

A dozen calculations flashed through his mind as he merged closer still with the Modules. When resting, the Gorothune would be several metres away from the surface. Impossible to shoot. Very difficult to reach with any methods he had. But right now, right now it was very close to the surface. As close as it would ever be, and he had at least one method that could reach it.

Nicolai tore into motion, ripples erupting as he slammed Oma through his body, through his Nodes, into Symbiotes.

The Spectral Claw activated in an eruption of Oma, bursting into life on the end of his stretching Soul Sense tendril as he hurtled through the air, the M99 held by his bionic arm while his right hand extended, Claw reaching. He saw the Gorothune's Soul Sense tendril worm out of the ground and turn to stare at him, flinch in shock and surprise as it saw him dropping down toward it, saw the Spectral Claw bearing downward like the hand of God. It disappeared back underground… too late.

Nicolai arrived, and the Spectral Claw lanced into the ground. There, said Simulations. The Claw scissored tight around it, and the Gorothune's Soul Sense held firm, wriggling frantically, but Nicolai gripped tighter, flexed his will and Soul. Its Soul Sense popped and the Claw dug into its flesh.

He landed on the ground, wrenched upward, and the Gorothune was torn squealing from the earth in an explosion of soil.

It was as big as an ox. Dark, rough fur. Short and stubby legs. A large, rodent-like head with a vicious mouth. Its arms were oversized, big and strong, ending in large paws with huge arcing claws.

Those claws, and its stubby legs, were thrashing and tearing at the Spectral Claw around it. He clenched his fist, trying to crush and slice it between the talons, but it got its own claws against the great talons and held them, stopping them from closing.

Nicolai whipped his arm to the side and his Soul Sense and the Claw moved with it. He let the Gorothune go at the last moment, slamming it bodily into a huge tree trunk with a heavy thump.

The Gorothune tumbled to the ground, landed hard but flailed immediately to its feet, shaking its head dizzily. The moment it regained its wits it would burrow.

It never had that moment. While it had risen to its feet and shook its head, Nicolai had taken a knee and set himself around the M99, fitting the stock to his shoulder, his eyes to the iron-sights. The movements of its shaking head slowed, the world growing still. The time between the beats of his heart seemed to stretch into an eternity.

He squeezed the trigger and the M99 lunged against him, a .50 BMG round erupting from the barrel and boring a line through the air. It slapped through the Gorothune's neck, split the bark of the tree behind, and the Gorothune's head spun free from its body in a spray of dark blood. Ripples burst into the air as its Soul instantly dispersed, fading into the Aura.

No time to savour the successful completion of his hunt. Nicolai was up and running in an instant, pressing the M99 between the eager lips of the Big Mouth on his chest.

His Soul Sense roved out as he arrived at the fallen Gorothune. The eyes of its severed head stared up at him with familiar reproach, and he could only shrug. The circle of life, reflected Cyberwarfare. His Soul Sense tendril found the Gorothune's singular Symbiote, and a few quick and precise cuts with his bionic arm's extendable blade, plus some prodding from the tendril, got it out of the body and into his hands. He held it tight, suppressing it with his Soul Sense.

His other hand rested on the Gorothune, and he activated his Mark's UI.

You have slain a targeted Spirit Beast. Do you wish to transport it to the Slayers Guild butcher?

Yes, he told the Mark, and the Gorothune's corpse shimmered, outlined by green light. The light even spread to take in the severed head, then it flashed once and all was gone.

Score will be determined following butchery. Return to your local Slayers Guild for payment.

He also needed to get gone. Ever since he'd first attacked the Gorothune, the shrieking from above had grown louder. Glancing up he saw the Cliffshriekers had taken to the air, and they gazed down at him. They were not pleased to see a strange predator so close to their nesting grounds.

At the same time, the distant roars of who-knew-what had sounded. Other things were on the way. The ripple of the Gorothune's death and the gunshot of his rifle were beacons which would draw only trouble.

He floated up and away, wrapping himself once more in his shimmer poncho. Away, to find somewhere to take a moment to break in his new Symbiote.

His day in the jungle was not yet over. Once he'd broken it in, he had another task: treasure hunting.