Tom Dowd - Burning Bright

He reached out a hand, and focusing his power, swept it through the ambient energy of astral space. It scooped into his palm and condensed as he swept it again, building more energy into his cupped hand. The energy of astral space pulled together. It was the energy given off by all living things, the power of the planet's biosphere, and as he compressed it, formed it, shaped it, it began to take on a life of its own.

He wouldn't need it long, just an hour or two, so he allowed it to form some degree of loose structure. Its weave didn't need to be tight enough to last for any real length of time. He folded the energy in on itself as a piece of astral origami sculpture. Then, barely a few heartbeats after he'd begun, the molded energy gained and retained its own form (not unlike yogurt floating weightless in space). A pair of impossibly big eyes opened in the form and blinked at him. Then it grinned, big wide, ragged, and dumb.

"Hoi," it said, almost shyly. "Are you gonna play with me?"

Behind him, Anne Ravenheart groaned. Kyle had created a watcher spirit-incredibly fast in both astral space and in the physical world, with the fighting spirit of a pit bull, and the brains to match. It was one of nearly a dozen he and Ravenheart would create before they attacked the nest.

"The plan," Ravenheart told the group who'd be participating in the raid to capture the buses, "is straightforward, and not without its risks."

The Knight Errant troopers were all garbed in assembled pieces of hard combat armor and softer body armor. All carried helmets equipped with some sort of vision-enhancing system and a tactical communication system strong enough to punch through the UCAS government jamming for a short distance at least. And they were all armed, most with Ares Alpha combat guns, a few with the newer HVAR high-velocity assault rifles, and two with Mossberg SM-CMDT combat shotguns equipped with under-barrel mini-grenade launchers.

They all also carried-trained to use it or not- the biggest knife, combat, survival, or kitchen, they could find. Kyle had suggested it, and Ravenheart quickly ordered it, both knowing that if an insect spirit got in close enough to the trooper to strike with its claws or mandibles, assault weapons would be of little use. Even in untrained hands, a physical, direct attack with a knife, or even an unarmed one, carried more emotional, mystical power than a firearm did. A firearm, though, tore into the bugs before they got too close. An undeniable advantage.

With them sat a dour Seeks-the-Moon who stared off unblinking in the direction of the power plant. Whatever magic was working in the power plant was affecting him, though he refused to admit if. Near him, and possibly a contributor to his mood, was what one of the Knight Errant troopers had dubbed "the crib"-a low-power mana barrier that kept the ten watcher spirits Kyle and Ravenheart had summoned contained and hopefully protected from the unknown capabilities of the insect spirits' senses. Inside the hemisphere of dull blue energy, the ten globs of protoplasm chased each other gleefully, more than occasionally plastering themselves flat against the barrier, only to rebound in the other direction with even more force. At Seeks-the-Moon's request, Kyle had placed a silence spell over the area to cut off the cacophony of squeals.

"Our main goal," continued Ravenheart, "is to get those buses, with the people inside them, out of that plant. There's enough room to turn them around, and even if the gates are closed, as I expect them to be, the first bus will be able to get up enough speed to tear through it.

"Six of you will actually participate in the assault. Three of you, Douglas, Quess, and Keith, will drive the buses, tagged alpha, beta, and delta, respectively, from first in line to last." Once the consensus had been reached that Ravenheart and her team would back Kyle in his attempt to rescue the bus passengers, it was quickly agreed that his best use, as a mage, would be to accompany and provide magical support for the assault. Kyle had readily agreed; he really didn't know how to drive anything bigger than a commuter car.

"We're going to come in from the south, through the boat yard that abuts it off the river." She recapped for them. "There's nothing special about the fence, just aluminum alloy; Vathoss and Douglas will use the acid strips on them. No sparks, little noise.

"By that time, I suspect," she said, "we'll have trouble."

"Excuse the interruption," Seeks-the-Moon said unexpectedly, "but I am suddenly afraid I know what they're doing." He stood up from the crate on which he'd been sitting.

"What?" Kyle asked.

Seeks-the-Moon started walking toward one of the room's few exits. They'd gathered and commenced the briefing in a small extension to the rear of the building that sat across from the power plant. It was old and derelict, probably abandoned years before, but it served. Kyle and Ravenheart followed as Moon said, "We must look."

"Vathoss!" Ravenheart gestured at the sergeant. "Begin a weapons check, and let Conner know to prep the drone." Vathoss nodded as his only reply.

The spirit led the two mages on a fairly involved path through the building they'd mapped out earlier. Squatters, at some point in the building's history, had punched holes in the walls connecting originally isolated sections. They climbed to the fourth floor, second from the top, via a rusty ladder in an elevator shaft. Reaching the warehouse space there, they crept forward, keeping to the inner wall. Halfway, Seeks-the-Moon held up his hand and the other two stopped.

"We can see from here," he said.

Kyle could clearly see the power plant's enormous, dormant tower and the top of what he took to be the generator building. Much of it, however, was dark and barely highlighted by the silver of moon in the sky.

"Do you see it?" the spirit asked quietly.

Kyle couldn't see anything with his eyes, and a quick glance at Ravenheart confirmed that she didn't either. Shifting his senses into astral space, he immediately gasped.

The power plant grounds, including all of the main facility and most of the outlying ones, were covered in a slowly building dome of green energy. The forming power drifted down over the gradually defining sides like fingers of smoke, pale and nauseating. The energy flowed from the center of the building, from deep in its bowels, Kyle felt, as it fed the burgeoning ward.

"What the…?” whispered Ravenheart.

"Do not look too long," Seeks-the-Moon said even more softly. "We don't wish to be noticed."

Kyle looked at the growing lattice of power one last time before he let his senses return exclusively to the physical world. "How long have we got?" he asked Seeks-the-Moon.

The free spirit shrugged. "Less than an hour, maybe minutes. I do not know the strength of the magic."

"Are they erecting a ward?" Ravenheart asked, almost stunned.

Kyle nodded. "A fraggin' powerful one-based on the waves coming off it. The bastards have to be using a ritual; that thing's too powerful for one magician to cast."

"Even for a queen of the insect spirits?" Seeks-me-Moon asked.

"I don't know, but I fraggin' well hope not," Kyle said. "The point is, though, that it's almost done. The ward is forming-that's the Sending we're seeing-and it's directed against the casting place itself. It'll come together in no time."

"What do we do?" Ravenheart asked, her gaze snapping back and forth between both Kyle and the spirit

"Ready or not," Kyle replied, "we attack now."

The light-amplification system in the goggles Kyle held over his eyes lit up the grounds of the power plant like daylight. The others hidden with him in the shadows near the boatyard were using low-light and thermographic systems integrated into their own helmets.