Black Market Merchant

56 and the other three hunters stopped flying for a moment to hover high above the approaching dust cloud of Twisted. All around them were dozens of Hunter clusters floating on similar Hover vehicles, all prepared to engage. Their numbers were all together close to a hundred. This wouldn’t likely be enough.

"What are we waiting for?" 56 asked looking at his three new compatriots. "We should attack before the Hoard reaches the city's line of defense."

"Shut up newbie!" Sam scoffed looking at him from under his hood. "The Hunters Clan has rules for these kinds of situations. We're going to follow them."

"That's right." Dixon replied. He then lifted the watch on his wrist and turned it on. A little blue screen appeared with the Hunters Clan badge on it. It also had a single notification.

"Wait for confirmation."

"The Hunters Clan is normally only seen a group of bounty hunters, big game enthusiasts, and thrill seekers. However, that's just not the case Well, not entirely." Dixon continued lowering his watch and leaning forward to relax his crisscrossed arms on the handles of his Hover Bike. "We hunt because it's natural for a hunting animal to do so."

56 thought this a strange thing to say for that particular moment, but looking into the eyes of Dixon, 56 knew he was wrong. Something old and strong lurked within those brown eyes. Looking at the other two he saw something similar. These people were not ordinary.

However, 56 was not one to complain either, he felt kindred feeling towards these Hunters. 56 gave a shrug and looked down at the long-barreled laser gun in his hands. "I'll take your word for it. After all, I'm only here for the ride."

"This part is always so frustrating!" Tammy whinnied. "Can that old man hurry up already and let us go. Look the first waves of the Twisted are about to reach the plasma wall."

"Give the Leader a break." Sam sighed watching the scene starting to unfold below him. "All we can do is watch."

56 looked down at the bizarre sight below. Sure enough, the smallest and fastest Twisted were getting close to the wall and charging at frightening speeds. Oddly enough there appeared to be no flying Twisted. Every mutated creature appeared to be running or crawling on the sand-strewn ground.

"Is there a reason that none of these Twisted are flying?" 56 decided to ask.

"Hmm, I'm no nerd, but for whatever reason the nuclear radiation mostly only affected land creatures and some aquatic creatures." Dixon replied squinting his eyes in thought. "It's assumed, that at the DNA level, that birds and other flying creatures were not mutated. Which is fortunate for us. Could you imagine a flesh-eating monster, the size of a car, swooping down from the sky to eat you? That would be terrifying."

"Besides, we wouldn't be able to have these nice Hover bikes if they could fly." Tammy chimed in while patting her bikes pink painted side.

"Interesting." 56 murmured. "I would love to learn more about them. There is still so much about the world these days that I don't know about. Orville, go ahead and start recording the moment we engage. I just found a fun topic to study."

"Rodger Boss!" Orville replied coming out from under 56’s arm to float alongside him.

"Let's get ready to see the show up close." Tammy said excitedly.

56 looked at her to see that she was putting on a pair of heavy looking goggles. Dixon was also doing the same. The long brass-colored tubes that covered her eyes had green tinted glass at the ends. 56 was curious as to if they were a new type of binoculars.

"You got an extra pair for me to look?" 56 asked her.

"No." Tammy replied shaking her head and her brown curly hair bounced in the wind. "Take Sam's. He is not going to be using them anyway. Right Sam?"

Sam sighed. "Fine, here. Just give them back before we attack." Sam tossed over his goggles to 56 and then went back to relaxing on his bike.

"Thank you." 56 replied and put on the goggles.

Just from glancing over them once, as he guessed, they were a new type of binoculars he hadn't seen before. Adjusting the focus to see properly, he looked down at everything below. The once tiny black dots on the ground now appeared to be right next to him! As if he were so close that he could reach out and grab them. Normally stabilizing onto what one would look at through binoculars was difficult, but these goggles had a built-in stabilizer! Technology sure had come a long way with unexpected creations.

What he saw was both amazing and terrible. Mutated creatures resembling hairless rabbits, yet four times that size, with claws the length of kitchen knives were leading the charge. Their overwhelming numbers were exceeding all thought of reason. Mixed in with them were larger darkly colored creatures. With heads grown into the shape of American Football's, hairless, long and elongated. Their front skinny legs were much longer than their hind legs, much like that of a Hyenas. The way they galloped looked bizarre, like these creatures were running atop whips rather than legs.

The amount of dust that the vast numbers of the smaller creatures leading the way kicked up made it difficult to see what might be following behind them. Looking carefully 56 could spot glimpses of large and thick creatures forms lumbering though the dust. Yet, despite the dust the Hoard Mother was nearly totally visible.

The Hoard Mother's large alligator shaped head was swaying back and forth on a neck that resembled a brontosaurus. The bus sized head appeared to have two separate mouths, one atop the other, and thick stout teeth of which each looked as wide as dinner plates. Three pairs of bright red eyes stood out in great contrast to its dark green scaled skin. The Hoard Mother's head, and top portion of its body reminded him of a snakeskin, but it appeared to be very impenetrable and more like tank armor.

Strangely enough when he looked at the eight tree trunk legs of the Hoard Mother, they appeared to be covered in shimmering long brown fur. A very strange combination in contrast to the reptile like appearance. Every time it lifted one of these mind-boggling legs, a cat like paw appeared rising through the dust. Each claw looked to be nearly as long as four meters or even more in length.

The tail of the massive creature was just as crazy. Instead of one singular tail, it had three tails. Each tail was equally as long as it's neck, and like the legs, the tail was covered in the same brown shimmering fur. At the end of these tails there appeared to be a bone like tip which greatly resembled a scorpions. Each tip appeared to be eight meters long and as hard as steel.

However, these features were not what impressed him as much as what he saw clinging to the underside of the Hoard Mother. Like giant green emeralds set into an upside-down crown, were dozens of large shinny sacks. The sacks looked half sunk into its body and appeared to be pulsating slowly with luminescent fluids. As much as he tried to look at what might be inside those strange sacks, he couldn't see in them. He did have a hunch though. Eggs.

"They are about to hit the wall!" Tammy shouted excitedly.

Quickly turning to look that way, 56 was surprised by what took place. Though not as surprised by the Hoard Mothers appearance.

The creatures charged right at the blue plasma walls to apparently ram into it or try climbing over. However, that was a mistake. Every creature that hit that wall was instantly obliterated! Like bugs hitting a windshield, the Twisted creatures splattered into burning plumes.

The reason was simple because plasma is extremely hot!

Plasma is superheated matter that is so hot that the electrons are ripped away from the atoms thus forming an ionized gas. Researchers have painstakingly come up with a way to use the properties of plasma as a charged gas to confine it with magnetic fields and to heat it to temperatures hotter than the core of the sun. Then they learned to project it outward under magnetic suppression to form a "wall" of plasma, protecting the city from any kind of oncoming object or substance. The near perfect defense to repel a Hoard.

Many of the largest city's all around this war torn, apocalyptic world has deployed this method to protect their citizens. Even the blasts and shockwaves from bombs are stopped by this wall. If it didn't consume a ridiculous amount of energy and technology to maintain, then everyone would have made use of it. The projected wall also is confined to travel in one direction due to the magnetic field restrictions of the plasma technology and is still ineffective to protect from attacks from above. One of the greatest weaknesses of such a plasma wall, are the towers themselves.

The towers are what produce and absorbs the plasma. If a tower is destroyed than an entire panel of that impenetrable wall will instantly disappear. It took only seconds for the charging Twisted Hoard to realize this.

Stopping their reckless charging and organizing swiftly they swarmed towards the towers hissing, braying or growling hideously in anger. The towers loomed high and imposing above the mutated creatures scurrying below. The nearly smooth black surface of the towers leaning outward at a sharp angle made climbing difficult for them. Additionally, the entire structure was wrapped up in sharp serrated barbed wire. Effectively further hindering any chance for the creatures to climb.

Atop the towers were automated turrets and robotic defenders that were constantly shooting red laser guns down at the Twisted. In minutes large black blooded mounds of Twisted creature bodies piled up around tower bases. This didn't slow or perturb the creature’s assault, unfortunately. They just kept climbing on top and jumping upwards in an attempt to scale the towers. Only to continue being met with wires and lasers.

56 let out a drawn-out whistle as he watched. He then lifting his goggles to look at the others. "That's some crazy looking battle going on there. It's almost like we aren't needed."

"We will be deployed soon." Dixon answered confidently. "The old man is probably going to split our forces into three groups. One will go to the backside of the wall. It won't be long before the Twisted decide to try and burrow under the wall and attack the city. The second group will assist the tower defenses. While the third and largest group will go and take out the larger Twisted and Hoard Mother. That is, if we can."

"Hasn't a Hoard Mother's been beaten before?" 56 asked. He lowered his goggles again to look at the huge monster.

"It’s only happened twice before." Dixon replied. "The first time was in eastern Russia near the north China border. They had to use a nuke to take it down. That scaled skin is so thick even a tank couldn't even dint it. The second time was by the European Union, what was left of it anyway. They discovered a toxin that is enough to down and paralyze a Hoard Mother, long enough to be able to blow off its head with explosives. As it turns out, we don't have a nuke or the toxin. So, this fight is going to be rough!"