The platoon rushed into the cave system, slipping through the narrow at a dead sprint. There would be quite a few bruised shoulders and scraped skin, Jerik thought. But it was unavoidable. They were running because they were being chased. He himself stood at the entrance to the cave, chivying the others to greater speed while Nicholas remained on guard, his shield up and his sword slashing at the veritable horde of monsters that had been following them.

Jerik had seen the horde coming down the mountainside like a landslide. At first, he’d simply thought that it had been an actual landslide, a delayed reaction to the amount of gunfire, explosions, and magic that they were using. It wasn’t the first time such a thing had happened while a platoon ran through the mountains. The ecology of Menora functioned exactly like that of Earth’s. Loud booms made the mountain vibrate, which could cause landslides.

But when he’d seen that it was actually an army of monsters, he’d known, instinctively, that they wouldn’t have stood a chance. They were outnumbered nearly fifty to one. He’d screamed at them to run, grouping the front squadron around the wagons with a faint hope of protecting them. He was glad he’d made that split-second decision, or else the army of monsters would have overwhelmed them.

But now he saw that there was another serious problem. There was no way they were going to be able to bring the wagons in with them. He was confused at this. On the three previous times he’d gone through the mountains, this exact cave had been wide enough to allow even the largest of wagons to enter. But now it was barely capable of letting one man slip through. He bit his lip anxiously, then made another quick decision.

“We’re going to have to hold them off until they disperse!” He called, making sure Nick could hear him. “We can’t abandon our supplies!”

Nick leapt back from the attack of a Rare-Class Mountain Lion, then summoned his wall shield, completely cutting off the path. “Then we’ll need barricades! Fast!”

Jerik echoed the order into the cave where the platoon was currently taking shelter. “Get a move on it!”

He wrenched one of the barricades free of the cart and helped with the setup, slamming each section of their temporary barricade into place. They’d lost several pieces to the dragon attack, but there was enough to span the width of the path and more. Then, thinking quick, he had the wagons repositioned in a line in front of the entrance. He assigned himself, Morgan, Benji, and Katrina to stand atop the wagons, so that they’d have an elevated vantage point and could support the others.

“Defensive position!” He bellowed, the instant that the last barricade had been slammed into place. He heard Morgan whisper some kind of spell, enveloping them in a fiery red light. Nick disabled the wide shield, and cut down two monsters, then ran. He cleared the barricades with a single jump, then turned to slash at a monster who had followed him in the exact fashion.

“Open fire!”

At Jerik’s shouted order, the front squad began firing. Their weapons were all Rare-Class or higher, and so cut through the crowd of monsters with ease. There was virtually no way to guarantee preserving the corpses for gathering later, but that was hardly the most important thing at the moment. All that mattered was stopping them from reaching the wagons. He’d strapped Paragon to his waist, knowing that it would fire too slowly to make much of a difference. Instead, he was holding one of Benji’s backup rifles, a Superior-Class weapon named Marker.

It was a useful weapon, with a custom enchantment that smoothly pulled his aim to one side or the other, sensing that it had fired enough to kill the monster he was aiming at. Practically auto-target, and it was very useful. He’d already gone through two magazines, and there was no sign of the onslaught lessening in intensity. During the delay in which he reloaded yet again, he called for a round of grenades to be thrown. After a few seconds delay, there was a chain of small but powerful explosions all across the lines of monsters.

“Avian approaching!”

During their training, Jerik had taught them simple callouts to use when fighting against monsters, just to let others know what was going on so that the entire unit could be prepared to react quickly. That particular callout was an indicator of an airborne monster, one who couldn’t be delayed by the barricades. Jerik’s reply was instant. “Katrina!”

“On it!” She shouted back, releasing her grip on her rifle and lifting her rocket launcher. A second later, in a fiery explosion, the winged beast, a wyvern, was gone. “Keep calling ‘em out!”

After what felt like an entire hour of continuous fire, Jerik began to notice gaps in the waves of monsters attacking their position. It was a minor change at first, but a welcome one. Four in the front squad had gone down already, courtesy of the few lucky monsters that had managed to break through. They’d been pulled back by their friends, and their places had been taken within seconds.

“We don’t have enough ammo to finish this,” Megan said loudly from where she perched on her wagon. She conjured a long whip made of fire in one hand, and flicked it across the entire group of monsters. A wave of fire erupted in it’s path, knocking the monsters back. That took a huge chunk out of their numbers, he thought. “We need to get creative if we want to win this!”

“Nick!” Jerik called, even as he reached into his pouch to retrieve a placeable explosive charge. “Fall back!”

The young man looked confused, but obeyed at once, disengaging himself from the front line and running over to him. Jerik jumped down from the wagon as he drew level, and led him past all four wagons to the cave entrance. Despite the chaos of the uninterrupted gunfire, it was strangely peaceful back here behind the fighting. He pulled Nick close, and swept his hand in a line before the entrance.

“Put up your shield here!” He explained, already moving away. “Protect the wagons!”

“That’s going to destroy my shield!” Nick objected at once, looking alarmed. “It can’t withstand an explosion like that!”

“It’s going to have to,” Jerik retorted. He was already attaching the charge to the inside of the cave entrance. He just hoped that it wasn’t powerful enough to cave the thing in. He just needed a hole big enough for the wagons. He retrieved a second charge, and put it on the other side. “Now!”

Looking extremely doubtful, Nick activated his wide barricade shield. He backed away from it, leaving it to stand on its own, then conjured another shield. Morgan, seeing what they were up to, turned away from the fight and waved her hands at both shields, infusing them with extra green lights. Jerik ran away from the entrance at a dead sprint, the detonator in his right hand. Diving behind Nick, he pressed the red button. The very air around them seemed to vibrate with a shudder. Then, almost as if it had been delayed, the burst of sound slammed into them, deafening them to all other noise in the area.

Slapping one hand to his ear to check his hearing, Jerik picked himself up off of the ground, and looked towards the entrance. It became clear at once that he’d gotten the result he’d wanted. There was now a wide black hole perhaps eight feet across, and twelve feet high. Just large enough for the wagons. Morgan and Nick seemed unscathed, though they were tapping their own ears like him.

“Get these wagons inside!” Jerik hollered. Several of the front squad had spun around at the explosion and hastened to follow his order. Two each grabbed the wagons, one in front and one in back, and rushed them towards the entrance. Jerik followed them in, slapping yet another charge down. One more should do, he thought. “Morgan, use that fire whip again and cover our escape. The rest of you, fall back!”

In groups of two or three, the front squad broke away and ran inside until it was just the command group and Nicholas. He was cutting back and forth with his sword, protecting Morgan. Katrina had lifted her rocket launcher again, but seemed to be waiting for something before firing. He trusted her enough not to question it, and threw a grenade over the barricades. Almost at once, Morgan’s long whip appeared agan.

She sent the monsters flying back at the exact moment that most of the barricades broke, sending the surprised monsters flying back. Katrina fired immediately after, her rocket sailing just over Nick’s head and catching the head of the next rush of monsters. Bits of the mountain were actually coming down now, providing a miraculous bit of natural defense. Morgan and Nick took that as their chance to disengage, and went flashing past Jerik, as did Katrina and Benji a second later.

They were all inside the cave now. Jerik waved his arms frantically, urging the platoon to go deeper. They’d already lit several torches or pulled out tek lights, and they heaved on the wagons to get them moving. Only after he judged them all to be at a safe distance did he press the detonator again. This explosion was much less violent. He cursed loudly as he saw that the cave entrance had survived the blast, and threw the detonator down.

“We need to collapse it!” He shouted, retrieving a grenade. “Stop them from following us!”

“But then how will we get out?” Nick asked from his left shoulder. “If it’s blocked off-”

“There’s an exit at the end of the final raid,” Megan interrupted him. She twisted her hands through the air to conjure a large fireball, which she threw at the entrance. That didn’t do the trick either, and now there were monsters slipping inside. Jerik cursed and lifted the rifle Benji had lent him, cutting them down. Morgan echoed his curse. “Nothing’s working!”

Without warning, the were both blinded by a flare of light. Katrina had fired a third rocket, targeting the entrance. The shudder of the explosion and the shaking of the stone around them made them both uneasy. But then, with a loud crack, a section of the roof above the entrance broke apart, causing a huge chunk of rock to slam down in front of the entrance. A monster was unlucky enough to get pinned underneath it. Then, as the shaking continued, more pieces fell, until, a minute or two later, the entrance was completely blocked off.

Jerik let out a shaky laugh and felt his knees give out, falling on his behind on the hard rocky floor. Morgan and Nick were still standing, but they looked as exhausted as he felt. The rest of the platoon gathered around, looking pale, with dust caked on their sweaty faces. They all looked in dire need of a good rest. Hauling himself to his feet, he ordered them to take out the supplies for a night’s rest, and to turn in early.

“Get plenty of rest,” he added, reinforcing the point with a stern look. “I’ll take first watch, so get to sleep soon after eating.”

He made his slow way over to the other entrance to their cave, the one leading deeper in. After the evening meal, which consisted of basic rations, several of the platoon came over to put up new barricades to offer some extra protection, then turned in for the night. Jerik stood guard, talking quietly with Jack for a few hours until they were relieved. After that, he was too tired to speak to anyone much. Benji had prepared his bedroll beside hers, and he fell asleep almost as soon as his head touched the pillow, her small warm body pressed against his and the scent of her hair filling his nose.