Royal Guardsmen
It would take forty-five seconds to get to the Alchemical Laboratory. Maeve intended to make it in five.
She did not just run up the stairs; she leaped from railings to walls, skipping across the space like a buzzing bee. A murderous bee.
With her movements, the railings bent. Thankfully, they were made of metal, so they could handle the pressure exerted by her actions, but she left deep gouges in the walls as she used them to boost her speed to the next floor.
The entrance to the Alchemical Laboratory was in front of her, and she slowed. The space around her hand flickered, and she held a wicked, sharp knife that was curved and serrated at the back. It could slice flesh as well as cut through bones like butter.
She pushed the heavy door open, her eyes taking in every detail inside. The windows were broken, with the shards scattered around the floor, and a shape clad in dirty robes stood before the egg.
Maeve quietly walked inside, avoiding the shards of glass on the floor. She saw it was a woman with stringy brown hair tied in a knot, her head swaying side to side. She heard a wet sucking sound and saw the woman running a long black tongue over the egg, sticky saliva running down its surface, her eyes closed as if in bliss.
Okay, she had seen enough. She channeled her rage into focus, knowing she would have to be quick and clean to avoid causing excessive disruption to Rowan's transformation.
Maeve charged, crossing the lab in a blink of an eye. The Abomination must have heard her, for it turned, and Maeve saw the true spectacle.
Wrapped around the chest of the woman was a baby with a wide smile. The mouth of the baby was filled with blackened teeth, and it had been gnawing at the egg. What tied the baby to the woman was her yellow intestines, which still dripped with fluid.
This only made her pause for a small moment, but it was enough for the woman to charge at her. Maeve did not stop; she proceeded faster, driving low and tackling the woman's legs from under her. The Abomination fell on her face, which hit the ground with a wet sound.
Maeve stood up quickly, the knife no longer in her hand but buried under the ribs of the woman, straight into her heart. The blade was slanted to the side; Maeve had twisted the knife when she stabbed the Abomination, shredding the heart inside the chest.
She waved her hand, and two short axes appeared. Maeve was aware that if this was an Abomination, a blade through the heart would not kill it; only decapitation would kill these creatures.
But the series of movements had placed the egg behind her, and that was all that mattered. She stepped forward to finish the job when, like a series of still pictures, the Abomination picked itself up.
Two hands jerked and pushed its torso up; its legs rotated, and its feet turned backward. A low snarling sound emanated from its throat, and it stood, the joints of the Abomination making snapping sounds like rusted gears.
The Abomination turned to face Maeve, and her appearance was more ghastly. Her face was split open from the fall, the tear running from her forehead to the side of her lips, exposing the dull gray bones and squirming muscles underneath. What bled from her wound was yellow pus, and it was foul-smelling. One eye popped out of its socket!
The baby on her chest had its eyes rolled up, showing only the whites. It made a low whining sound. The Abomination suddenly crouched like a spider and, moving with deceptive speed like a man-sized insect, attacked.
Maeve let the two axes fall and materialized a bow and multiple arrows.
With her right hand holding the arrows, she held the bow with her left, drew, and accurately nocked an arrow, using her fingers to thumb an arrow from the pile she held in her hand. She closed one eye and let loose.
The first arrow went through the right shoulder of the crawling Abomination, the second through the bicep, and the last pinned her hand to the floor. As the Abomination opened her mouth to scream, another arrow went through her throat.
At this time, the axes Maeve dropped were just reaching the ground, and they unexpectedly faded away and reappeared in her hands, which were now visibly missing the bow. With two quick steps, she was at the Abomination, and she struck.
The first blow decapitated the head of the woman; the second sliced the baby's cranium in two, from the forehead down to the chin, and the snarling sound ended. The Abomination collapsed to the floor, body twitching and yellow blood squirting all over the ground.
The head snapped its teeth as if biting the air, the eyeballs rolling around seemingly looking for prey, but as more blood drained from the head, its movements ceased.
Total time used in the battle from start to finish: five seconds.
She waved her hand, and every weapon she used in the battle vanished. A black sack with a bucket and mop appeared.
The egg behind her shivered.
"Apologies for the noise, Master. Just taking out some trash."
It took thirty-five seconds to activate the security doors and windows in the Laboratory; she should have been done by then.
But before that, she materialized a towel and disinfectant and began cleaning the saliva on the shell.
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The situation was getting out of control fast, and Maeve detested chaos. It was after the fight that she realized the thing she had just killed was the missing cook, Katherine.
Katherine was a sweet woman, a mother of three, and her youngest son served as a guard in the manor. Breaking this news to her children would be hard. But this was the nascent horror of an Abomination; its ability to cause pain and strife was unequaled.
Maeve hoped they were not too late before this town tore itself apart, and most important to her was the well-being of her lord.
A blooming suspicion began to grow in her chest. The Third Prince Damien had been insistent on Rowan returning to his land, even though it would have been wiser for him to be closer to the top apothecaries in the capital. Maeve had given in, seeing the state of Rowan, but now she felt this was a mistake. She pushed that thought aside for the moment; there was still work to do.
Maeve held the remains in the black sack as she walked to the yard, summoning the Guardsmen. The flustered priest followed behind. In a short while, the elite combatants appeared before her, including their captain.
There were twelve of them, all fitted with the Royal Guardsmen Armour. It carried all the necessary characteristics of armor made by Dominators, including firepower, mobility, flexibility, armor protection, and shock effect.
Three of the Guardsmen appeared to be archers; a massive rapid-shooting crossbow was carried on their backs. Another three were shieldmen; they held massive metal slabs that contained harsh lines of runes, and the rest had their specialties.
The Guardsmen wore plate armor that covered every inch of skin. The armor was dark red, and it had a metal mask in the guise of a scowling man. They each had a four-foot sword attached to their hips, and their gait shook the ground.
Each of the Guardsmen was a soldier at the peak of their mortal state; each of them could wrestle a bear barehanded. Captain Titus was given a portion of the Hydra bloodline; he was a legendary state Dominator, and coupled with his armor, he was a slaughter machine. His chosen weapon was the massive Warhammer.
She threw the sack on the ground in front of the Guardsmen and said, "We have a serious problem on our hands."