Chapter 19.3: The Virtue of Courage

“Holy shit!” Penny yelled, diving out of the earthen hailstorm.

Rolling, she got back to her feet and grabbed at her gun, ignoring the snow stuck to her coat. Not far from her, Skixx began to move beneath the layers of dirt and snow. From what Minkus could tell, both Penny and Skixx were shaken but alright.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Penny rasped. “What in Grenth’s ass is that?”

Minkus followed Penny’s gaze to the center of the settling plume, where what appeared to be an enormous, sectional pylon, rose high into the air, swaying to the sound of the ice shards cracking and falling from its sides. Its girth had to be twice Minkus’ height, all the way to the very top, where the writhing tower ended in four prongs, three coming to pointed ends and one cracked in half. Suddenly the pylon lurched, bending forward and spreading the prongs to give them all view into a deep and icy gullet. A gargling roar rolled out of the gaping maw, spattering them all in a pasty fluid.

Without pause, the creature slammed itself into the ground, carving a yard-deep rut in the earth where Skixx had lain just seconds before. With another guttural howl, it heaved itself back to full height and resumed its serpentine gyration.

“It’s a wurm!” Yissa yelped.

Only then did Minkus recognize the form, like a giant, armored serpent with a spiked hole in place of a head. He’d seen a handful over his years in Metrica, but the jungle variety were notably different than this icy thing.

“Whatever it is, it's pissed,” Penny called back at Yissa.

As Minkus reached for his focus, Ventyr called from behind him, “Penny, Minkus, buy me a moment.” The sylvari lifted his staff overhead and began to chant something. Clouds congealed in the sky, swirling slowly into a moving mass above them all. Whatever Ventyr was doing, it was taking time.

Skixx scrambled up the path carved out of the snow and away from the massive creature as Penny trudged back toward it. “Biggie,” she called, taking another step, “I sure as hell better not be doing this alone.” His sword now in hand as well, Minkus felt a swell of magic as light danced along the edges of his vision; a teleportation was brewing inside him.

As he released the light, something struck his back at speed. “Big Brother,” Jinkke screamed, suddenly wrapped around him. “It’s—” Her words fell off for only the instant the siblings were gone from the physical world. And then they were back. “—not safe!”

The two slammed hard into the jagged shell of the monster, thrown off by the sudden addition of Jinkke’s mass and trajectory. They bounced off the beast and across the snow, and Minkus strained to keep his blade as far as possible from his sister, who still clung to him by some miracle. The two slid to a stop in a mound of snow.

“Jinkke?” Minkus groaned, shaking his head to make the spinning stop. “Jinkke, are you alright?” he asked again, scrambling to get her in sight. Snow slid in wads off his head and back. “Jinkke!”

She gasped, suddenly sucking in air. Her hands burst from the snow, flailing for a moment before grabbing his shoulders. “What— where— Minkus, what just—“ Eyes wide, her words devolved into a scream as Minkus noticed the rapidly growing shadow around them. He gripped the focus still in his hand and leapt atop his sister as the wurm’s closed maw slammed into him, driving the two asura into the ground and blowing out another shower of earth and snow around them.

Minkus opened his eyes, unaware he’d even closed them, and found himself staring into the still wide eyes of his sister. There was the faintest glow of blue reflected in them, though it faded as he exhaled. “Big Brother?” Jinkke asked. Her voice quivered. “What just happened?”

“I—” He fumbled for words, now aware that the two of them were at the bottom of a crater, several feet below the surface of the snow. He rose to his knees. Hands still wrapped tightly around his weapons, he heard the sound of falling pebbles and a loud grinding somewhere beside them, but the wurm was gone. It should have been a crushing weight atop him, but it wasn’t, it just wasn’t. The more of the situation he took in, the less it made sense.

“How in the Alchemy did we survive? The force with which that thing— Minkus,” Jinkke interrupted herself looking to her side, “it’s still here!”

He followed her gaze just beyond the lip of the crater, where the beast writhed, slowly seeming to gather itself. Minkus wasn’t sure how it got there, but he assumed his mild dizziness, which often accompanied heavy magic expulsion, had something to do with it.

“Big Brother,” Jinkke began, still eyeing the wurm. “I highly recommend—”

Minkus cut her short, scooping her up and out of the hole and climbing out closely behind her. Penny was just a few steps ahead of them now, her pistol trained on the creature and loosing round after round into its stony hide.

“Go, Jinkke,” Minkus instructed simply.

“Big Brother, what are you doing?” she demanded, reaching for his arm. “You’re coming too.”

“No.” He pulled his arm away. “I can help. You get up the hill to Ventyr. He’s good. He’ll keep you safe.” And before her still reaching hand could make contact again, Minkus let the light overtake him, and the scene before him flashed from the fearful expression of his sister to the bullet-riddled shell of wurm now rising from the ground.

Before the light had even dissipated, Minkus had driven his blade into the flesh between two of the wurm’s armored segments. Two more quick stabs and he bounced away, sidestepping another of the creature’s whiplike slams into the earth. His year of sword training with Royston was coming right back to him.

Penny’s shots quieted a moment, and Minkus looked up the hill to see her reloading. As she did, the wurm rose, taking advantage of the opportunity. At its zenith, it reared back, undulating as it drew something up through its cylindrical body. It threw its maw forward, launching a boulder the size of a small table at Penny.

“Shit!” the woman yelled, diving aside as the projectile struck earth where she’d stood. The huge stone moved so fast it actually bounced, right up the hill at Jinkke and Yissa, both with backs turned to the fighting as they retreated to Ventyr.

The world slowed as Minkus watched. There wasn’t the proper light in him to teleport again so quickly, and he knew he’d never cast a reflection wall that far away. The boulder hit ground again and rolled up the hill, not slowing a lick.

Minkus let the thoughts go, and courage flooded him, flitting away just as quickly. He felt suddenly weaker, vulnerable, but up the rise he recognized a faint blue glow coating Jinkke’s body, head to toe. She seemed to stand taller. In fact the same was true of Yissa. And Ventyr. Even Penny and Skixx. No one else seemed to notice it, but they were all suddenly aglow with magic. For only an instant, he marveled, forgetting the danger his sister was in, but it was short-lived. The rock struck.

Like a thunderclap it hit Jinkke and cracked in two. Minkus blinked stupidly.

The two pieces split and rolled totteringly past Jinkke on either side, one of them then striking Yissa and shattering again. The remaining chunks of uneven rubble bounced off in random directions, some ricocheting off Ventyr. With each strike not only was the rock demolished, but the blue glow exploded off the person struck, blowing snow and dirt harmlessly across the landscape behind them. He watched as each of them assessed their own bodies in wonder. They were safe, and no one could understand it.

Jinkke looked up from herself. “Minkus!” she yelled, pointing frantically. Time snapped back to its usual pace, but that didn't change the weird sense of fragility Minkus felt. He turned.

The wurm recoiled again, lashing out with more of its length than necessary to catch Minkus in its whipping motion. He dropped to the snow, but not fast enough to evade the underside of that jagged carapace. It caught his back and dragged him along its course, bouncing and grinding him across the earth beneath it. Whatever defense he’d given to the others, he no longer had it for himself. He felt every gash, every rip, every tear beneath the monster gliding across the earth’s surface.

The living roller lifted off the ground once more, rising up and releasing Minkus, who slid to a stop in yet another pile of snow. He groaned again, rolling onto his chest to try getting up off the ground. He could feel the healing magic already beginning to flow and tend to his new needs, but that didn’t stop the pain of having been the wheat in a mill.

The beast suddenly bellowed, but it sounded like the cries of pain, not attack. Minkus looked up to see it twisting and crying, small arcs of electricity dancing along its surface where Penny pelted the monster with electrocution slugs. “Carrot-stick,” she called back up the hill, “it doesn’t like electricity. How about another one of those light shows from the other night?”

Before Minkus fully understood, a single, dark cloud formed overhead and the clap of thunder echoed off the boulders around them. Lightning forked from the cloud, merging into a single bolt that cut the sky in the same second it struck the wurm. The creature bellowed again, tottered, and dropped, giving Minkus just enough time to roll aside as its great body slammed into the snowy ground, a felled tree writhing at Minkus’ side.

“Biggie!” Penny yelled, quickly tossing something across the field to him. He dropped his weapons and stretched to grab the object from the air. It had a burning wick, and he nodded, scrambling to his feet.

A few steps around the long, contorting shape, and Minkus was before the monster’s open gullet, tossing the bomb into the darkness. He leapt aside, rolling into a small patch of boulders as the device exploded. It was little more than a pop inside that massive body, but when the wurm went limp, Minkus knew it was over, and he let his head fall into the snow.