-BEN-

  "I don't think you get it, boy," the Captain said, a sneer on his face. "You're not home anymore. This is my house, and you have no authority here."

  He snapped his fingers and the ceiling cracked open. Three dark figures dropped into the room. Ben got a good look at them as they drew to their full heights. They had brown fur and canine facial features. All three bared their fangs at him.

  Great, Ben thought. Terriers. Ben had expected the Captain to protect himself in some way, but he had not expected Terriers.

  The Captain seemed to read his expression and laughed. "You seem shocked, boy. But I told you my work was dangerous. I need to have the best guards. Are you reconsidering now? Will you be a good boy and go back to your ship?"

  Ben chuckled. "Good boy. That's funny, considering…" He gestured at the Terriers. Two of them growled, but the other one looked amused.

  Ben had only ever met one Terrier, and that meeting had ended with a fight that nearly took his life.

  Terriers were dogs. That was the simple truth. Thousands of years ago, a powerful mage had a terrible idea. He decided to conduct mana experimentation on Earth animals to see if he could create a new super species.

  His experimentation had resulted in many failures, but he found particular success with dogs. The canine experiments ended in the creation of a sentient, hyper-intelligent bipedal race of dogs. They called themselves Canis Superioris, and they decided they hated humans.

  Their creation sparked a great war which ended when humanity drove Canis Superioris to the far reaches of the galaxy. Since then, the canines wandered about in packs, though there were rumors they still operated like a collective.

  One of the more prominent canine packs was the Terriers. They were super strong, and had heightened senses. These physical advantages enabled them to offer themselves out as bodyguards and mercenaries. They usually charged exorbitant fees.

  Ben examined the three Terriers in front of him. They were dressed in black sleeveless tactical gear. The exposed parts of their body were covered in coarse brown fur, and they were each armed to the teeth with assault blasters and an assortment of weapons strapped to their belts.

  To Ben, the plentitude of weapons meant one thing. These Terriers didn’t have any special magic. Mana reinforcement was likely the extent of their abilities.

  That boded well for him.

  Ben wanted to end this fight quickly. He activated his reflector shield. It was a technique that relied on him circulating his mana in a particular way in order to reflect blaster bolts and similar projectiles.

  Normally, that action went unnoticed by opponents who weren’t very mana sensitive.

  But Ben was up against Terriers.

  The Terrier closest to him was a ferocious looking dogman with a scar running through his left eye. He cocked its head to the side when Ben activated his reflector shield. The dogman’s ears twitched, then he smiled and spoke.

  Ben expected a gravelly tone, so was surprised when the dogman spoke with a silky voice.

  "A reflector shield," the Terrier said. "Fancy. That has to be draining a lot of energy though. I wonder how long you can keep it up."

  The dogman tossed his rifle to the ground and signalled to the others to do the same. They obeyed.

  ‘So that one's the leader,’ Ben noted.

  The Freighter’s Captain stood up, looking cross. "What are you doing?!" He yelled at the Terrier with the scar. "I paid you money to do work. Shoot him!"

  The Terrier turned on him and spoke with the same silky finesse. "With all due respect, Captain, I suggest you shut up. You paid me money to do my work. Let me do it. I'm not so stupid as to shoot at a reflector shield. Sit down."

  The dogman laid a large clawed hand on the Captain and pushed him into his seat. The Captain flushed. He clenched his fist, and his whole body began to shake. The vibrations grew more and more violent until he split into two: a pink Worrick and a blue-brown one.

  The pink Worrick leapt at the Terrier but the blue-brown one caught him and held him down. "This is my ship!" the pink Worrick screamed. "I am the Captain here! Do you hear me?! Nincompoop! Imbecile!"

  The Terrier ignored the stream of insults coming from the pink Worrick, and turned his attention back to Ben. He reached down and pulled out a pair of knives from straps on his thighs. The two others did the same.

  "Cousin," the leader said, looking at Ben. "I can call you that, right? Seeing as we're both Earthlings. My name is Daygar. The two behind me are Fiyg and Fayg. Twins. I don't think you'll live long enough to know which is which."

  "On the contrary," Ben retorted. "I don't think they will live long enough for me to care."

  Daygar roared with laughter.

  "Oh, I think you'll be fun to play with," the dogman said. "What is your name, Cousin?"

  "Ben Wilson," Ben said. "But again, You won’t live long enough to care."

  Stolen story; please report.

  Ben opened his interface. "Gladiator mode," he whispered. The air around his arms shimmered as the new mode loaded.

  A golden shortsword fell into his right hand and a matching round shield into his left. The shield came up to his shoulder, and was etched with the visage of a roaring lion: a homage to Fen.

  Ben tested the balance of the weapons. They felt good, but there was something off. He could feel the Vector Force pulsing through the shield, but not in the sword. The sword was essentially powerless.

  That was a problem Ben might be able to fix with a recombination, but he would have to figure that out later. He fell into his ready stance, and Daygar grinned maniacally.

  "I am so jealous of you and your magic," Daygar said. "I’m sure you know that only a few Terriers are able to use magic. I wasn’t so lucky. It looks so cool. And it will make it all the sweeter when I tear your body apart."

  Daygar rushed at Ben. Fiyg and Fayg followed behind him.

  Ben turned the face of the shield towards them. He had given his interface mental schematics for how he wanted the shield to behave with Vector Force. He wasn’t sure if those orders had been followed, considering the failure to combine the sword with the Vector Force. He took a chance.

  "Reverberate," he whispered. The shield vibrated and a large concussive wave burst from its surface.

  Daygar was quick and attentive. He dodged to the side, but the other two were caught in the blast, and pushed back.

  The blow wasn’t enough to make them fall, but the worst damage was to their ears. They howled in pain, dropping their knives and clutching their ears.

  Ben burst forward, dodging a slash from Daygar as he flew past him. He closed the distance between himself and the Twins and buried his blade in the chest of the one on the right.

  "Fiyg!" Ben heard Daygar cry.

  Ben kept moving. He withdrew his sword and stabbed Fiyg again and again. Then he slashed the Terrier's throat and leapt away just in time to put distance between himself and the approaching Daygar.

  Daygar caught the body of his dying comrade.

  The other twin, Fayg, stood over Daygar's shoulder, looking shocked at what had just happened.

  Too shocked, Ben thought. He studied them more closely. They all had brown fur and similar features, but upon closer inspection it was clear that Daygar was the oldest of the trio, and that by some distance.

  "That move shouldn't have been so devastating," Ben said. "You're deserters, aren’t you?" He pointed his sword at Daygar. "Particularly you. What did you do? Steal these ones from your Empire while they were still babies. Try to train them yourself?"

  Ben had heard such rumors about Terriers. One of the side effects of their creation was that they did not have the ability to create offspring naturally. Their population persisted because their best mages were constantly recreating the experiments that made them, using normal dogs.

  Because of this, all young Terriers were considered to belong to the empire. Ben had heard of cases where some older Terriers kidnapped young Terrier children from their empire, usually in an effort to have a family of some sorts.

  Daygar lay Fiyg's body on the floor and stood up.

  "Yes, I'm a deserter," he said. "But the rest of the story is wrong."

  Ben did not care to hear an explanation. He looked for the ship's Captain and found both forms of him cowering in a corner.

  "You hired the wrong people, Captain," Ben said. "You've been scammed. Just let me get to my target. And we can skip all this."

  "No," Daygar said.

  Ben turned to the dogman.

  "No no no," the Terrier repeated. "We're past that. I don't care what the Worrick says. We're fighting. And I'm killing you right here. Get ready, Fayg. Stay in my shadows. Strike when you see a chance, but don't overdo it. It's unlikely he can use that move any time soon."

  Daygar was right. It would be some time before Ben could use reverberation. He could feel the shield gathering Vector Force, but it was too slow. This new gladiator form was performing poorly. For now, Ben would have to use the weapons in the traditional fashion.

  Daygar smiled. "On second thought, stay back, Fayg. Retrieve your rifle. Fire at him the minute you sense his reflector shield drop. I'll keep him engaged till then."

  Ben had been worried about that. He could only keep up his reflector shield for about five minutes. He had dismissed it the moment the Terriers dropped their rifles. Now he put it back up.

  Fayg had already retrieved his gun and retreated to what he felt was a safe distance away from Ben.

  Daygar brandished his daggers at Ben.

  "I wonder what will fail first, your melee skills or your reflector."

  "The answer is you," Ben responded. "You will fail first."

  Daygar sneered.

  They leapt at each other, clashing with a metallic clang. Daygar lashed out with a flurry. Ben met his blows with the shield, striking out whenever he could.

  Their battle became a dance of bobs and weaves. Daygar was strong and he was becoming stronger as the battle wore on. That was one of the more terrifying characteristics of Terriers. Their strength grew in battle. Ben needed to end things quickly.

  So far Daygar had been careful to prevent Ben from getting closer to Fayg, while keeping Ben occupied. Ben would need to create his own opening.

  He took a gamble, withdrawing his shield and stepping back as Daygar swung at him. He parried the slash with his sword and then hurled the shield with all his might at the roof.

  It hit a solid fixing he had been aiming for, bounced, and struck Fayg in the head.

  The younger Terrier stumbled and dropped his rifle. Daygar turned to look.

  An opening.

  Ben slashed at Daygar, catching the Terrier in the flank. Daygar howled, fell to the floor, and rolled away.

  Ben changed his target. He launched his sword at Fayg who was still stumbling around. The sword sank into Fayg's chest and pinned him against the wall. The young Terrier looked at Ben, then at the sword, then at Daygar. His eyes closed and his head fell to his chest. Daygar howled. It was a miserable sound.

  Ben turned off his reflector shield. He sent a mental command to his sword, and it vanished from Fayg’s chest and reappeared in his hand. Fayg's body fell to the ground. Summoning the sword consumed more mana than Ben had expected, but it was sustainable.

  Daygar looked like all the life had been drained out of him. The dogman stared at Fayg’s dead body in shock.

  "You ruined it," he said. "All my goals and dreams. You just took them away."

  Ben walked over to him. The Terrier looked a far cry from the imposing figure he had been a few moments ago.

  "You told me you wanted to rip me to pieces," Ben reminded Daygar. "What would have happened to my goals and dreams then?" Ben shrugged. "You lost. That is all."

  Daygar looked at Ben with pleading eyes. Ben didn’t give him a chance to get words out. He slashed downwards and ended the Terrier’s life.

  Both of the Captain’s bodies were still cowering in the corner. Ben turned and walked towards them.

  "As you can see," Ben said when he reached them. "I'm also pretty good at my job. And I'm very willing to do it." He brandished the sword. "Get me to the VIP floor. Now."

  The Captain whimpered.

  Just then, the speaker system crackled to life and Naxisteranda's voice came through.

  "Captain! We have a problem! There's something on deck! We don't know what it is. And it's killing everyone!"