The family was almost home when the feed provided by her brother showed a shadow over the old shelter.
"Shit! They found something! I knew they would… We should never have used that shelter…"
"Calm down, Butterfly. We'll be there soon. I'll call Quinn. Give me a second."
Lana looked at him with piercing eyes. "You will do no such thing."
Lana called someone else. "Kattie, I need the volume up high. Let me know when you're ready."
Lana waited a moment for Kattie to do as asked.
"Go."
"Operation Defend Utopia. I repeat, Operation Defend Utopia. Kattie, the trees will go on lockdown. Let everyone know an attack is underway, stay calm. Follow the plan. Get the non-combatants below."
"Understood. Where are you?"
"Inbound, ETA 30."
"Shit… Okay. We'll do our job."
Lana chuckled, "I know. See you soon," and she disconnected the call.
"Shalt, can we get there faster?"
"I little bit. I'm already making the calculations."
Lana nodded, "Sil, I need you to hold our daughter."
"What do you think you're doing?"
She raised an eyebrow, "defending my planet as in my job description. We'll land at the shelter and you can get some abilities. Fiza, I'll need you to take the babies below when we get that far."
Shalt looked at her, "if you're going to do it, get in position."
She kissed her husband and went into the cargo bay. Sil went to join her and Shalt told him to stay seated and buckled in. It was going to get bumpy…
The ship shuddered as the inertial dampeners engaged in a not-so nice fashion, almost rushed. Soon those seated, felt the ship get rocked. Sil unbuckled his seatbelt and was heading back to rescue his wife when she entered the cabin, looking as though nothing happened.
"I recorded it for you, Lana, if you wanted to see it?" Shalt asked.
"Well, I'd like to see where it landed considering it was just over the shelter."
Shalt nodded and played back the footage.
They all watched the screen. They were hovering over a dalki ship, an oval-like shape that was darker than night. Suddenly a long brown … something… an indistinguishable shape was hurling through the air at a speed that Sil wasn't sure he could duplicate. It hit the ship, almost dead center. There was an explosion. Then six secondary explosions. The ship then started tilting ever so slightly falling toward the ground, slowly at first. Picking up speed as it lost altitude.
It landed to the north, the unexplored land and broke in half.
Lana clenched her teeth, "why did it have to land there?"
"Shalt, scan the planet as we go in to land. I need to know how the fight is going, though I will know soon, anyway."
Shalt did as he was told and she could see more beasts on the move than she knew the planet had.
Soon, they were landing. Lana handed the baby to Fiza and the twins to Shalt.
"Caser, go get Griddlebone. Have her come with us, your babies need to go with Shalt."
Caser was off like a rocket. Lana stood outside the command post listening to the reports. It didn't take long for Sil to come back to her. Everyone was in the traveler's center waiting for orders. Kattie was also at her side waiting for further instructions.
Lana glanced at Kattie, "our ride is waiting outside. Keep everyone inside for now. It's very dangerous out there. If we need you, I'll call."
Lana heard Caser and Griddlebone heading her way. "I need you two to help clear the forest south. The beasts there aren't strong enough to hold them off. Reinforcements are on the way but they need help. Sil, come with me."
Outside the shelter, Lana saw a long tail attached to a shiny, scaly body. It had a set of wings, a pair of back legs, and was a mixture of blues. It was nothing like in the books Lana had seen as a small child. This had roots around its feet and legs like Caser and other beasts on this planet. She simply shook her head as she approached the beast.
The sky opened up in a torrential downpour and she laughed. Sil grabbed her arm, "Why are you going near that beast? We need to fight the dalki!"
Lana looked at him, confused, "she's our ride to the fight. Let's go!"
She pulled her arm out of Sil's hand and ran. This planet's version of a wyvern lowered a wing and allowed her to climb on. It looked expectantly at Sil. He looked incredulous but didn't want his wife near that thing and needed to protect her so he joined her.
Sil wanted to pull her off but as soon as he got halfway up the beast's back, it started taking off. Sil cursed and scrambled up. Lana had to raise her voice toward him due to the storm.
"There's a 4-spike near the old shelter. The people are underground, safe but we need to act before they are found. At this time, all the 1-spikes are dealt with except those south of our shelter. There are about 15 2-spikes, 3 3-spikes remaining and 1 4-spike."
"How," Sil had to yell now that they were flying, "they have large forces?"
"The beasts are defending the planet. It's the deal I have with them. They want me out here for observation but I don't want the beasts getting hurt. The most powerful beasts are underground far from here. I don't think they can get here in time. It may be us and this wyvern."
Sil leaned into her ear, "and they call me that c-word…" and chuckled.
It didn't take long to find the offending forces. The wyvern had already shot lightning. The dalki laughed.
"Shit! I can't use my soul weapon! It's too close." Lana noted how close the dalki were to the shelter and wasn't happy.
"Wasn't this supposed to be observation? Why are we going lower?" Sil demanded.
"The beasts are too far out. This is on us."
Sil's face turned to business, protect his wife. He wasn't going to let the same thing happen again.
As they got close to the ground, Lana said, "distract the 4-spike. I got the others," then hit the button, activating her sword.
Sil looked at her like she was crazy for thinking he'd let her out of his sight but she ran off to the first 3-spike she saw, jumped, swung her sword and headed to the next before the head even dropped to the floor. Sil smiled and raced to the 4-spike.
Sil was able to get water, earth, metal, wind, ice, and stat swap from those in the shelter. "Your people have terrible abilities!" he shouted at his wife.
Lana smirked, "my travelers are on other planets normally… You are lucky you had anything to COP…" she swung her sword hard because a dalki arm came toward her for a punch as she leapt toward it. Its arm went flying, "Y." She finished the word.
"I need…" Sil jumped as the 4-spike swung its tail at him, "to have more people," he sent out a spear of ice as thick as a tree straight for the head, "in your shelter!"
Lana had taken the arm and was swinging her sword over her head to bring it down on the head of the dalki. Her speed was greater and it didn't stand a chance.
Lana then moved toward the last 3-spike. The 4-spike dodged Sil's ice spear but the spear hit the dalki's shoulder.
"Yes! Hit me again!" dalki yelled.
Lana chuckled as she heard the sound behind her. She threw out some roots on the last 3-spike and held it fast, "Our shelter is …" she jumped up high, landed on the dalki's shoulder, and rammed the sword down through the top of its head, "peaceful!"
She noticed the line down the center of her sword showing it was blooded was almost empty. "Are you still playing with the big lizard, My Love?"
Sil went to gather another ice spear and got hit in the side by a massive dalki fist.
"Hey! Ugly!" Lana yelled as she pulled her sword out of the corpse in front of her. "If you hit my husband like that one more time, I'll kill you myself!"
The dalki swung his tail at Sil once more while sneering Lana's direction. Sil jumped over the tail once more and punched it in the head with a spear of ice coming out of his fist. The distracted dalki was unable to dodge and suddenly no longer drew breath.
Lana smirked at her husband, "glad I was here to assist you!"
Sil chuckled, "you didn't even need me, did you?"
She giggled, "my beautiful, hot husband, standing in the rain all wet?"
He looked downcast, "we can't. You just gave birth."
She smiled, "I know… The battle is almost done. Let's get back to the shelter. Then our fiend can return to her home."
Sil nodded, "you would have a dragon to ride as a mount."
"It's a wyvern…" she chuckled.
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This story has been re-written as an original story called Feisty Fae. I took my experience from this writing to make the story better. The new version is Romance/Fantasy Adventure. I hope you enjoy it.