Chapter 12: Chapter 12

It was 9PM on an empty beach on the north side of town, away from the beachside homes that lined the coastline to the south, and away from human habitation outright.

Natalia wasn’t super keen on going out on patrol this late, but a paranormal life sign had been detected along the coastline, and Tharen wanted to go check it out, so off they went. Natalia just hoped it was a false alarm and that it wouldn’t take too long, but all things considered that was very unlikely.

Natalia was driving one of her vehicles - a two-seated armoured light utility vehicle with a mounted energy machine-gun on the rear. It did have hover functionality, but the wheels had excellent traction on the sandy dunes, and Natalia preferred the feel of wheels on the terrain. She had fallen in love with driving this beauty at the training grounds, and on top of that, it could emulate the sound of a proper combustion engine, even though it was electric. Tonight, however, that function was turned off and the car was running relatively silently.

Tharen was in the passenger seat, operating his personal human-sized exoskeleton, which was probably a good idea considering he was short and wouldn’t be able to see much if he didn’t.

Rather than having any headlights on, the pair were using advanced night vision integrated into their helmets and cybernetics. Natalia was astonished by how well it worked - while the colours were a somewhat washed out in areas with limited or no light, it was far and beyond anything humans had managed to develop. NIA had helpfully informed Natalia that the night vision was a mixture of multiple harmless non-visible light frequencies and AI reconstruction of colours, along with highlighting of targets.

“I don’t see anything yet, you?” Natalia asked, as she kept her hands on the wheel. Her focus was mainly on the terrain in front of her, but she occasionally looked out towards the sides.

“Nothin’ yet. Hopefully this doesn’t turn out to be some wild goose chase, to use a human phrase,” Tharen grunted as he scanned the beach around them. “Got a lot of ground to cover, the life sign was detected out in the water and moving towards land, so it’s probably on the beach by now. The radar ain’t tuned to paranormal creatures on Earth, though, so it’s a bit touch and go until we find the damn thing.”

“Right, fair enough…” Natalia continued to drive, making slight turns as she went along the curvature of the beach. Part of her was dreading what they mind find, but the rational part of her brain was trying to assure her that they’d be fine, they had plenty of firepower to work with, even a dragon couldn’t withstand a machine gun… Right?

That’s when she spotted something emerging from the water ahead of them, and she stopped the LUV, pointing. “Tharen. You see that?”

Tharen looked where she had pointed. “Yeah, I see it. Oh, boy, that’s a big one.”

‘Big one’ was putting it mildly. NIA was already calculating its size, at around 15 meters long. The creature was a quadraped, with reptilian scales, but it resembled a hybrid of a shark, a whale and a crocodile. Natalia certainly did not want to get anywhere near those teeth.

“Analysis complete. Closest likely match is the Taniwha, a legendary creature from Māori mythology,” NIA said, transmitting the information to Tharen as well. “They are known in some traditions are highly respected guardians, or in others as dangerous, predatory beings.”

“Well, considering it’s here, I doubt it’s the former,” Natalia groaned, “it seriously came all the way from New Zealand?!”

“Now isn’t that fascinating? But ultimately irrelevant right now,” Gartho spoke over the communications line. “What matters is that you two need to either kill it or drive it back into the sea. It’s already moving inland, and I don’t doubt it’ll cause death and chaos if it goes any further.”

“We probably should gt some backup before we attack, though,” said Natalia as she winced at the thought of just her and Tharen fighting that thing.

“Your sisters will be inbound soon, but you’re going to have to engage it immediately before it steps off the beach. The beach is the best terrain you have to fight it with the LUV.”

“Get on the gun, I’ll drive,” said Tharen with a nod, “I’ve got more experience driving these things and I’m sure you’re a good enough shot.”

It’s still gonna mean I’ll be first in line to get munched on if it catches up, though, Natalia thought grimly to herself as she got out of the driver’s seat, and got behind the mounted gun. It needed two hands to grip, and on the left side was a thumb-operated joystick to rotate the gun, with the trigger being on the right side. She could feel magnetic forces keeping her in place like an invisible seat-belt. “I’m ready!”

“Roger that, let’s light that big bastard up,” Tharen acknowledged as he took the wheel, spinning the LUV around so the Taniwha was behind them, “fire when ready!”

Natalia spun the gun around, pointing it right at the huge beastie. “Here goes nothing…” With no small amount of trepidation, she pulled the trigger, and the gun whirred to life immediately, firing off blue bolts of energy that slammed into the Taniwha’s side, ripping into its flesh.

That certainly got the Taniwha’s attention, and it spun towards the source of its pain, roaring furiously in a way that sent shivers down Estella’s spin, nevermind giving her a good view of that terrifying maw it had. Tharen immediately floored it, the LUV immediately going from zero to sixty almost instantly even on the sandy terrain as the monster began to give chase, its feet loudly stomping on the sand as Natalia focused on continuing to open fire. The machine gun continued to fire quickly and with a regular, satisfying rhythm, and it certainly was ripping into the beast’s flesh. She was trying to aim for the eyes, but they were just so tiny and barely visible.

Suddenly, the Taniwha leaped into the water. Putting aside how astonishingly high and far it could leap, Natalia quickly noticed that it was speeding up while in the water, starting to catch up with the LUV. She kept track of it via its thermal readings, but it was moving much more erratically in the water. “What’s it doing? Even if it leaps out we can probably dodge…”

“I don’t like this, it’s gotta be up to something. Keep shooting!” Tharen snapped as he suddenly turned the LUV around, speeding off in the other direction along the beach. Natalia was startled by the whiplash, but the magnetism kept her in place, and it gave them a bit of a reprieve as the Taniwha was forced to turn around to keep up.

As Natalia continued to fire, the water suddenly began to rumble. What the beast was doing became immediately apparent as a huge wave, two stories high, suddenly surged into existence, and was launched violently at the LUV at a speed that it simply couldn’t outpace. “Aw, crapbaskets. BRACE FOR IMPACT!”

The wave slammed into the LUV, sending Natalia flying right off as the magnets weren’t enough to keep her on top. She crashed into the sand, tumbling several times over as the wave passed over her, her personal shields mitigating the impact of the fall and leaving her fortunately unscathed for the most part, though parts of her did still ache a little.

She began to regain her bearings, quickly getting back on her feet and drawing her blade rifle from her chest, turning towards where she had tumbled from. The LUV was on its back, Tharen trapped under it and trying to get out and flip it back over.

The beast was moving in on the LUV, with the look of a predator anticipating its next meal. Tharen wouldn’t be able to escape in time. There was only one option left to her, and she needed to act quickly. She was absolutely terrified, but it was something she had to do.

She charged a shot, and fired, the bolt of blue energy slamming into the beast’s side. “HEY! You big bastard, get the hell away from him!”

The Taniwha spun towards her, growling in pain, but it then made a toothy grin. It spoke in a masculine voice with Māori language, but her cybernetics provided an instantaneous translation. “<If you insist on being my first meal, then I am happy to oblige, girl.>”

It charged. Natalia started backpedalling as she opened fire. The main problem was that the beast’s flesh was multi-layered, it didn’t seem to be encumbered by blood loss, and its wounds were slowly regenerating, so she either needed to do a lot more damage very quickly, or in vital areas. Problem was, she didn’t know where its vital organs even were.

Then again, there was one immediately obvious vulnerable spot that she could take advantage of. She pulled out a grenade from her suit, and waited for the monster to get close as she armed it.

“<Too slow, little girl… Now die!>” The beast gloated as it lunged for it, maw open wide.

Natalia swallowed her fear, and used her suit’s leg boosters, hurling the grenade into the beast’s maw as she launched herself to the side, “how about you eat this instead!”

In the middle of spinning around to continue its pursuit, the monster suddenly collapsed as its maw lit up with a violent bang, scorching the inside of its mouth and its throat. It choked and gagged, speaking hoarsely, “<you impudent human… What did you do…?!>”

“Someone’s not familiar with modern explosives!” Natalia dashed past it, slashing rapidly at the beast’s legs and side, hoping to enrage it further. Once she was on the other side of it and was clear by a few meters, she immediately switched weapons again.

The beast spun around, roaring hoarsely as it prepared to charge her again, “<don’t you dare mock me->”

At this point, Natalia had armed and charged up what was functionally an energy-based rocket launcher. She fired it off, watching as the large explosive sphere of energy went right into the beast’s mouth, going right into its throat, and exploded with even greater force than the grenade did. Natalia tried to ignore the putrid stench of burnt flesh.

She switched back to her blade rifle, using her boosters to launch herself right over the beast and onto its head, driving the energy sword right into its skull. With both hands, she pushed it down right to the hilt, and ripped a line through the skull, hoping to hit the brain.

“<You… YOU…!>” The monster spluttered before the blade indeed ripped through its cranium, causing it to fully collapse as it died.

Natalia waited anxiously for a good minute just in case, before pulling her blade rifle out of its skull and deactivating it, wincing at the blood on the weapon. It didn’t take long for her to realise she was also covered in the beast’s blood from head to toe. “Ugh, ew. Monster-slaying is a messy business.”

“You alright, Nat?” Tharen called out as he came over with the LUV. “Gotta say, you handled yourself really well with that big bastard! Pretty brave of you to take the heat for me. I owe you one.”

“Well, you saved my bacon when we first met, so let’s just call it even,” Natalia chuckled as she jumped off the corpse. “Now if you excuse me, I’m gonna go wash myself in the sea.”

“Nah, let me handle that, Nat,” spoke a familiar voice. Natalia turned as Estella and Anja approached in their heroine outfits, and Estella cast a cleaning spell, completely cleaning away the blood and detritus on her body. “There you go, nice and shiny.”

“Damn, Nat, I didn’t think you had it in you, killing this big guy,” Anja whistled. “Didn’t even need our help.”

Natalia felt a bit faint, leaning against the LUV as the adrenaline finally wore off, turning off her helmet and putting away her rifle. “Oh wow I guess I did. I… Just… Wow. I can’t believe I actually pulled that off.”

“You did good, Nat. Just take a breather, you’re probably in a bit of shock after facing down death in the form of big nasty pointy teeth,” said Tharen as he put a hand on her shoulder.

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“Indeed, marvellously done, Natalia,” Gartho said over the communications line. “Its paranormal life signature has been recorded, so we can more properly track others of its kind. But I’m still detecting a faint paranormal signature, must’ve been masked by the Taniwha.”

“We’ll go look for it,” Estella remarked. “Tharen can patrol the beach with the LUV, Anja and I will check the wooded area. Nat, you can stay here, guard the corpse and rest, you’ve earned it.”

“Thanks, Es,” Natalia laughed as she sat down. She didn’t realise how exhausted she was until now. “Yeah, I need a breather.”

“Righty-o, we’ll meet up back here soon,” Tharen grinned as he started driving back up the beach.

Natalia took deep breaths as her sisters disappeared into the forest, and got back up on her feet. She walked down the shoreline towards the water, taking in the salty ocean air. She forgot how much she missed going to the beach. The only sounds around her being the sounds of the wind and the waves was unbelievably soothing and wonderfully serene. She wasn’t sure how long she stood there for.

“You were quite impressive, dealing with that brute.”

Natalia spun around in immediate alarm. That voice was a new one.

Standing a few metres away from here was a humanoid figure, slender of frame but not lacking in muscle. It took her a couple of seconds to properly register that he was an anthropomorphic fox, with three big, bushy tails, and vivid red eyes. He wore an exquisite red yukata with an embroidery of traditional Japanese scene of vivid fields and clouds on it. Even with her exhausted mind, Natalia easily connected the dots. “You’re… A kitsune? A fox spirit yokai?”

The fox bowed formally, with a smirk. “You’re quite correct, young lady. I am Hanzo. Greetings from the land of the rising sun. I was drawn to this quaint little town by all the odd goings-on here. I was not expecting to encounter such a lovely and voluptuous young lady here.”

That instantly caused Natalia to blush - she wasn’t expecting the compliment. “Um, thanks, but can we wait until-”

“Why wait? We have plenty of time to become familiar with each other. I don’t have any ill intentions towards you, you can trust me,” Hanzo spoke with a sultry tone as he came closer, with an incredible self-confidence that almost made Natalia swoon. Sure, he was a fox-person, which was unusual and new, but he was rather handsome, and he seemed nice…

She was so utterly distracted that she didn’t even register the multiple voices in her head calling out to her with alarm. “I guess I don’t see why not…”

Hanzo was right in her face, and she took in his scent. God, he was so dreamy. “Excellent. You’re so cute when you’re flustered and smitten. I’m going to enjoy this so very much…”

He brought her in for a kiss, which she reciprocated without hesitation. Sure, kissing a fox was new, but he seemed to be quite experienced with human lovers, so she allowed him to take the lead as they tangled tongues. She didn’t even register any alarm when he began to feel the unarmoured underside of her breasts, or her butt. She was absolutely ready to get on her knees and-

She felt a flash of heat as something struck Hanzo’s back, snapping her out of her love-struck stupor. Hanzo howled in rage and pain, letting go of her and spinning around, “who dares-”

“Get. The fuck. Away. From. My. Sister. You. Goddamn. Creep,” Estella snarled, her eyes wide open and her expression stuck in sheer unbridled rage, Galowye drawn and absolutely lit up with mana. “Taking advantage of her exhaustion with magical charisma, how fucking dare you.”

Natalia stepped back in panic. Was that what just happened?! Was Hanzo just… Taking advantage of her?! She felt so violated. And how didn’t she even think to be cautious around him? Kitsune were tricksters and could be malicious, of course she should’ve been on her guard, but she wasn’t - was it because he was influencing her mind?

“What she said, pal,” Anja also said as she stepped up alongside Estella, organic blades forming, “surrender or get the fuck lost before we gut you like a fish.”

Hanzo seemed to recognise Galowye immediately, and stepped away from all three of them, “you’re an Arcane Knight, too?! Damn it, what the hell is an Arcane Knight doing on Earth?! This… This isn’t over!” And with that, he disappeared in a flash of light.

Natalia was still processing all of this as her sisters rushed to her, both of them hugging her. She could hear the LUV coming back up the beach, and the spaceship landing close by. “What… What just…”

“He was trying to seduce you with supernatural charisma - a trait common amongst a lot of magically powerful nonhuman beings, like dragons or kitsune,” Estella explained. “I’m so glad we got here in time, Gartho alerted us the moment he showed up. Are you okay, Sis?”

“I… I think so? The most he did was just kiss me and grope me a bit… I just feel kinda dirty and violated, now,” Natalia groaned, feeling exhausted again.

“Come on, let’s get you to the ship,” Tharen said as he stopped the LUV by them. The vehicle itself returned to its capsule inside Natalia, as he and her sisters began to help her over to the boarding ramp.

“I tried to warn you, Natalia, as did Gartho,” NIA said. “But it seems your mental exhaustion from recovering from the shock caused the charisma to make you ignore us.”

“Wait, what? I barely even heard either of you at the time… Oh, God, what was he doing to my head?” Natalia thought to herself. This was getting more mortifying the more she thought about it.

❖

The Sisters and the two aliens were gathered in the living room, Natalia resting on the couch. They had tipped off the cops so the government could deal with the corpse on the beach. Right now, they had bigger concerns to discuss.

Estella was absolutely fuming and pacing around the room, and Natalia really couldn’t blame her. “This Emperor is drawing in too much shit into our town. First the Namorrodor, then the evil witch (and she might not even be alone), the big beast we left dead on the beach, and now a freaking fox yokai. What the hell is a yokai even doing in Australia, anyway?! Oh, and he tried to magically seduce Nat and probably was planning to rape her as well!”

“Estella, calm down,” Gartho sighed, standing in front of the TV.

“Like hell I will!”

Anja also looked like she was stewing on her anger as well, but she was doing a better job of handling it, standing off to Natalia’s left. “I get why she’s livid, I wanted to hang that damn fox by his entrails myself.”

“Settle down, all of you,” Galowye said sternly. “I understand why you’re angry, but losing our tempers is not going to help whatsoever. But yes, Estella is correct. We’re dealing with multiple threats at once, and we can’t be everywhere.”

“We can detect threats across town, and keep an eye out on patrols, but we’re only like five people,” Tharen frowned, also sitting on the couch. “We need more allies.”

Natalia was just too tired to really be actively upset right now. Sure, she’ll likely freak the hell out about it in the morning, but right now, she just raised a hand. “Question. Why aren’t we working with the government on this? Tharen, you said you and Gartho would look into that.”

“Ah, yes, about that… I wish we could dedicate more time to establishing formal channels of communication with them, but between supervising your training, keeping an eye out for threats and other duties, between the two of us I’m afraid we simply haven’t had much time to do so,” Gartho clicked his mandibles in frustration. “If the Librarians were here they’d be able to handle it, but we’re soldiers, not diplomats. It’ll take us time to figure out if the government can be trusted.”

“Yeah, no two ways about it, I’m afraid,” Tharen nodded with a frown. “It’d be great if we could work with ‘em, but their policies on the paranormal is kind of a question mark.”

At this point Estella had calmed down a little, thankfully. “Considering this country has severe problems with stuff like keeping asylum seekers in offshore detention camps for cruelty’s sake, yeah, I’m fine with waiting for confirmation on whether or not we’d be fucked over if we cooperate with the government. I love Australia, but man we can be ass-backwards in some ways.”

“Nat killed the Taniwha, so that just leaves the three remaining external problems,” Anja noted, arms crossed as she leaned against a wall. “We’ve also got two potential allies - Arika, the good witch who might be constantly high as a kite, and Logos, our new griffin friend from Gaia. Problem is, we have no way to contact either of them. Logos said he’d check in with us at some point, hopefully sooner rather than later…”

“And Arika will probably show up if that evil witch appears again,” Estella nodded, but immediately sighed, “not great, but it’s the best we can work with for now.”

“I just wanna go to bed,” Natalia groaned, relaxing against the backrest of the couch. “I just killed a huge monster and nearly got seduced by a yokai, I’m exhausted.”

“Speaking of him, if any of us encounters that fox spirit, an automatic alert will be sent out,” Gartho said. “We have his signature, but he’s likely hiding it. I am not taking chances with him. All three of you need to start training to resist magical charisma effects, especially you, Natalia. The simulator has functionality that will allow you to do so.”

“Yeah. Next time, I wanna be ready, so I can kick that jerkface in the dick,” Natalia nodded. “But first, sleep.”

“Going to bed early for once, Nat?” Estella smirked.

“Oh, shut up, Es,” said Natalia with a slight chuckle. Honestly, an early night’s sleep was something she could really do with right about now.

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