Ceress heard a distant echoing boom, close to where they were headed. Rotating a ring on her flight goggles to adjust the focus, she focused on the road down below, towards the source of the sound. She didn't have to look hard — there were a number of horses and dismounted Humans, clustered next to a coach that was stopped sideways just off the road.

  “Soot, there!” she pointed, and issued a mental command at the same time. The draconoid Que'ren changed direction, and adjusted her glide angle to pass over the group.

  They were perhaps a kilometer away, angling down at the road. Ceress started to unhook herself from Soot's harness — it looked like the day's festivities had already started.

  The scene became clearer as they approached — Ceress figured she had less than a minute to come up with a plan for the mess in progress. She sighed. What had that fuzzy fool gotten himself into this time?

  Narrating to herself, she evaluated the upcoming battlefield, performing a tactical analysis as she'd been taught.

  Let's see — a baker's dozen or so thugs standing among their horses. Weapons are primarily crossbows — hunting, not military issue. Several spears, not quite at the ready. Only two swords, still in scabbards. Armor is all patchwork leather and some chain. No shields anywhere.

  Overall equipment being minimal; this is likely low-rent thuggery. We'll assume they have two big-ticket items or Talents, one held in reserve. If they could afford three they'd be showing off with better weaponry.

  The rabble is hanging back in a loose cluster, not actively taking cover, and not in formation. The leader will be the one out in front, waving a sword around and yelling. He'll have a number two somewhere… ah, there! Standing just in front of the thugs, crossbow at the ready. Number two is far enough in front to show he's superior, but ready to duck back into the safety of the group at a hint of trouble.

  Okay, so we've got a loose organization, probably fear driven, but economically motivated. Typical bandits. So that means low training levels, poor communication discipline, flimsy morale, and near-zero trust.

  The lead guy has that sword, and his armor isn't piecemeal, with no ranged weapon visible. That means the boss will have a surprise ready, suitable for both keeping challengers in line and dealing with ranged attackers; probably a Talent. The trusted minion will have a surprise as well, could be gear or a Talent. The rabble won't have combat Talents, or else they wouldn't be rabble.

  The pack of thugs won't risk hitting the leader, or the high value target they're here for. They've not quite circled the wagon Novek's behind, so they're scared of exposing themselves. So he's probably taught them a few lessons already. Speaking of the furry moron, he's got something cradled in his arms. Ten to one it's a kid — he'd have put down anything else to keep his arms free, and he's got a soft spot for kids. Probably a ransom play, then.

  Perfect. They won't fire crossbows at him unless he threatens them. So let's silence the leader and keep him from threatening his minions into action, and intimidate the rest. Big showy entrance, low chaos — they need to be anxious so they run or walk away, but not too scared so they start fighting wildly. Air Drop it was, then.

  “Soot! Air Drop!” she shouted into the wind, sending the mental command to the Ber at the same time. Soot only knew a few hundred commands, so it was good to keep it simple to avoid confusion. Hekkan, on the other hand; Ceress was fairly certain Hekkan understood almost everything she said, even as a Ber — he just didn't care. Hekkan, you lazy thing. If you're staying up here, hop off now. Neither were Awakened, but Ceress's Skill ensured basic understanding by any Ber — you couldn't be a Ber Commander if you couldn't command.

  The Fel'nix did not move from his customary spot where he lay comfortably draped around the nape of Ceress's neck, but did yawn in acknowledgment. Ceress's protruding head and neck bones were fleshy enough to not bother him, and the radiant heat was clearly too cozy to abandon. She reached up and made sure her fluffy orange stole was securely in place; this landing would be a bit rough, and she didn't want to drop the felinid and ruin her entrance. Suit yourself, she thought at him, and got back a mild feeling of interest.

  Okay, they were in position above, it was time to do the thing. She took a deep breath, centered herself, and envisioned her landing.

  Soot, rear dive, hover flank, scary! She sent a picture of what she wanted along with the words. Rearward low approach at speed, retreat out of crossbow range, intimidate from the air.

  Soot's response came back as a feeling of both exhilaration and acknowledgment. The draconoid swept her left wing out and up, a dark stone wall of thin, stubbled flesh suddenly interposing itself between them and the view of the horizon. The glide became a rapid curving descent before leveling out, and they streaked forward on a final approach towards the bandit leader.

  Almost time… almost… now!

  Ceress let go of the loop attached to Soot's harness and stepped out of the stirrup as they swept overhead — far too fast for the assembled lackeys to react. Soot might be three times Ceress's size, but her wings were nearly silent in a glide — and she was far too disciplined to roar during a stealth approach. Ceress drew her legs back, tensed and ready to absorb the impact of landing — hit or miss. Her blue and orange scales came alight with a deep red sheen — this type of maneuver was exactly what her race had been engineered to perform.

  As soon as her foot left the thick treated leather, she ignited her toe-claws, and they flickered and flared immediately with an intense blue glow. This was the second part of the engineered capability; the blue indicated her claws were primed and ready to do their job — and their job was to cut through anything. Her ancestors had been engineered to break ship hulls into workable scrap, be they in orbital shipyards, or in a combat engagement.

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  The steel alloy half-plate worn by the bandit leader held up admirably for a split second as one foot impacted his shoulder, the other his upper back. But even if the armor hadn't split instantly, the sheer force of hundreds of kilos impacting at speed, drove him violently to the ground. She unflexed the muscles that kept the claws ignited as she steadied herself, one arm on the ground, and stood to her full, nearly three meter height. Her body continued to emit the dark red sheen, a threatening shimmer that those familiar with Ber would recognize as a mass effect Skill.

  “Hello, Novek. I got your signal—” she managed to get out before the second in command — the sharpshooter — shot her.

  Novek saw the dark shape dive out of the sky behind the idiots who were all looking towards their boss, and thus him, leaving none to watch their backs.

  Amateurs.

  “Hello, Novek. I got your signal—”

  Ten out of ten on the landing. Good call taking out the main threat. She had forgotten to watch the second in command though. It looked like she'd taken a bad hit to the ribs, but she'd had her mass skill active on the landing, so he assumed she'd be tough enough to take it, he hoped.

  Novek came quickly around the side of the coach, the kit held securely in the crook of his left arm, his crossbow in his right paw. She might not need support, but he wouldn't let her stand out there alone. He aimed towards the amassed group of wanna-be bandits as he came around, to discourage any follow-up attacks from a group that was suddenly unsure of their place in the pecking order of the world of predator and prey.

  A glance at the pieces that had comprised the bandit leader removed him from further consideration. It just went to show — active defenses required activating.

  He glanced at Ceress to get an idea of how bad it was. It was bad. Bad for the unfortunate soul who brought a hunting crossbow to a Ber fight that was; the bolt hadn't even punctured her scales. Ber were so unfair.

  Novek was sure she wasn't unscathed though. If she wasn't feeling it right about now, she certainly would be later. She had gotten lucky there, and he hoped she knew it.

  Ceress flashed a grimace of pain, visible only to Novek's angle, but quickly turned it into a snarl, whipping her head around, glaring directly at the unfortunate soul who had just volunteered for demonstration duty. Poor idiot.

  “Watch and learn.” he said, looking down at the bright green eyes staring out from inky black void pressed against his left side. The instruction was unnecessary; those eyes had locked onto Ceress the moment she'd slammed down and hadn't glanced away since.

  “Alright, you pathetic sack of tripe. I'm feeling generous, so I'm going to give you another try, if you want it. But you only get one, and then it's my turn.”

  Her bright blue tail came alight, lashing side to side. She flexed her hands, and her claws came out already smoking with blue fire — ouch, that had to hurt. Showy, though. She was clearly pissed.

  The bolt must have really rattled her — good, she'd be more cautious next time. She growled at the second, well now first, in command, “Go ahead — reload and take another shot. I'll wait.”

  Smart — risky, but smart. Novek immediately got what she was doing; defusing the situation. She'd taken out the only one they'd listen to without question up front. She was betting she could either tank, or probably dodge the shot from the shaken second. Once the shooter blew his chance, Soot would likely drop behind them from where she was hovering behind, and show them had no chance to succeed without casualties. Novek could imagine what the motley group was already starting to think — the head honcho was already dead, it's not like they knew how to fence a Ber kit anyway, let's go find some unlucky merchant — and be drinking on his coin within the hour.

  Ceress's claws coming out blue were a threat — no, a promise. The problem, though, was that the little orange furball around Ceress's neck had clearly woken up after the hit.

  Hekkan, her little felinid, was languid at the best of times, but he was fiercely protective of his pack. No Ber'Duun, he was just a Ber — and not a particularly smart one, truth be told. Dumb as a rock, the adorable little hellspawn. He didn't understand the intimidation ploy was to defuse an escalation into a regional incident. Unfortunately Ceress was too angry to either notice, or calm him. Once the fight started, there'd be no stopping it.

  And while these might be bandits — criminal scum — the Humans would never tolerate a group of Ber'Duun killing a dozen of their kind. Novek was risking some retaliation himself, truth be told, but Brin were one thing — Ber were something else. It wouldn't be a day before well-armed hunting parties would be sent out, targeting any Ber, or Ber'Duun, they could find.

  Okay, let's put this fire out fast, before it spreads.

  Novek leapt forward, his long legs making the three-meter leap in a single swift half-jump, and put a bolt dead-center through the forehead of the sharpshooter, who had actually decided to reload his crossbow. Bad luck for him that he had a targeting Talent, but not a reloading one.

  Three seconds later, before the man had finished falling to the ground, Novek's crossbow was reloaded and in a loose ready position, to threaten, but not scare the startled bandits into action.

  He raised his voice, but kept it low and thundering. “Okay folks, you're all smart guys. You can't win this — not anymore. But, you don't have to go home empty-handed. I would bet there's a substantial bounty on these two. Am I right?” he gestured at the rapidly cooling corpses, “One that some enterprising bounty hunters could collect on. Maybe the local constable might forget some prior transgressions, if they played their cards right. How about it?”

  Soot landed at that exact moment behind the group, a huge, dark, fearsome beast that menaced them with the threat of fangs and claws. Her mouth was dripping molten metal and rock, which hissed and spit as it made contact with the ground, some grass bursting into flame.

  Absolutely terrifying if you had no idea that she was a huge softy; Hekkan, all five kilos of him, routinely bullied the big lizard.

  A few of the bandits lowered their weapons, and that was enough. The group had lost their leadership as well as the will to fight, and clearly did not know what to do. They mumbled quietly as they gathered their dead and wounded men, strapping them to the remaining horses. Only the dead horses were left on the field afterward. Novek didn't try to disarm them or get other concessions, he just wanted them gone. Nobody said a word on either side as the bandits gathered and left, but Novek and Ellie kept their weapons pointed at the group in case someone had second thoughts.

  Everybody not already on the ground got to live through the day — which was good, because Novek was sure at least one of his team would have died if the shooting had started in earnest. Probably him.

  Ceress still stood, faintly glowing, claws extinguished but still extended — threatening, until the last of them were nearly out of sight.

  Novek came over and lowered his crossbow, moving to stand next to her as they watched the last riders depart.

  Ceress reached out and put a hand on Novek's shoulder, visibly deflating. “Oh, Ow. Yeah, I think that broke a rib or two. I'm going to need a ride.”