SSS Rank: Strongest Beast Master-Chapter 262: Grey Wilderness

Jonah hadn't expected the moon to have a bad smell Somehow, in all his imaginings of what this final battle would look like, he had never considered that Sterling's corruption would have a scent. But it did.

It made him want to throw up. Or maybe that was just the aftereffects of using his brain as a psychic radio tower.

"How many?" Ariana asked, scanning the gathered survivors

Vanessa was doing a headcount, checking faces against the roster they had started with. Her face got more serious with each name she crossed off.

"Twenty pilots," she said finally. "Fifteen ships still working fine, though I use the term loosely. Most of them can barely limp, let alone fly."

Twenty. Out of the forty-three they had started with back at Haven. Out of the thousands who had once filled the Academy's halls with hope and stupid jokes and dreams of what came after the war.

The math was always getting worse.

Jonah looked at the survivors gathered around him. Some he recognized. Chen, the engineer who had modified her ship's weapons systems with nothing but spare parts and stubbornness. Marcus, the former street fighter from the Undercroft who'd bonded with his ship by sheer force of will. Others were just faces, scared and young and trying very hard not to look like they were about to break.

They all looked at him the same way. Like he had answers. Like he was supposed to know what to do next.

He hated it.

"Alright," he said, because someone had to say something. "First things first. Anyone injured who can't walk?"

Three hands went up. No, four. A young woman in the back was trying to hide the way she was favoring her left side, but Jonah could see the blood soaking through her flight suit.

"Vanessa, can you..."

"Already on it." She was moving before he finished, medical supplies appearing from somewhere. Vanessa always had supplies. It was one of her many talents.

A scavenger drone skittered at the edge of their perimeter. Ariana's sword flashed, and it died in two pieces that sparked and twitched before going still.

"They're testing us," she said. "Trying to figure out our defenses. The real attack will come soon."

"How soon?"

"Minutes. Maybe less."

Great. Fantastic. Exactly what they needed.

Jonah closed his eyes, reaching for that connection to his Progeny. They were there, always there, patient and deadly and ready. But they were also just three beings against an entire corrupted moon.

He needed more.

His mind touched the edge of something vast. The bond with Haven, stretched thin across the distance but still holding. Through it, he could feel Warden, the ancient AI maintaining the station in their absence. And beyond that, the flawed Weavers they'd left behind, slowly healing in their new partnerships with the living ships.

All that power. All that potential. And none of it here when he needed it.

"Jonah." Vanessa appeared at his elbow, her hands stained with someone else's blood. "We need to move. This position is indefensible. Too exposed. No cover."

"Move where? We're miles from the Nexus."

"Doesn't matter. Staying here means dying here." She pulled up a holographic map on her datapad. The lunar surface spread out before them, all twisted metal forests and corrupted valleys. "There. Two klicks northeast. Some kind of structure. Could be ruins from before Sterling infected this place. Could be nothing. But it's better than open ground."

Jonah studied the map. She was right. She was usually right. It was annoying how often she was right.

"Everyone!" He raised his voice, pulling the attention of the scattered survivors. "We're moving out. Northeast. Two klicks. Stay together. Watch each other's backs. If you see something move, kill it first and ask questions never."

A few nervous laughs at that. Good. Humor meant they hadn't given up yet.

They started moving, a ragged column of wounded soldiers and damaged ships limping through an alien landscape. The functional vessels provided air cover, circling overhead like protective birds. The pilots on foot moved in tight groups, weapons ready, eyes scanning every shadow.

Jonah walked near the front with Vanessa and Ariana. His Progeny ranged ahead, scouting for threats. Through their eyes, he saw the corrupted forest in all its terrible detail.

The trees weren't trees. Up close, they looked more like nerves. Black metal cables woven through organic tissue that pulsed with that sick green light. Roots that moved on their own, questing through the lunar dust like worms.

Sterling hadn't just built a base here. He'd infected the Moon like a disease. Turned a dead rock into something living and wrong.

"Contact left!" someone shouted.

A pack of scavenger drones burst from the tree line. Six of them. Eight. A dozen. They moved with unsettling coordination, legs skittering across the corrupted ground faster than anything that size should move.

"Defensive formation!" Ariana's voice cut through the panic. "Pilots, return fire! Ground forces, tight cluster!"

The survivors responded with the discipline of people who'd survived too many battles to freeze up now. Ships wheeled overhead, energy weapons carving through the drone swarm. Ground forces formed a circle, firing in controlled bursts.

Jonah's Progeny hit the drones from the flank. His wolf-construct tore through two of them with savage efficiency. His hawk-construct dove from above, talons shredding circuits and tearing apart the organic components.

But more were coming. The forest was waking up, recognizing them as intruders. As prey.

"Move!" Jonah shouted. "Fighting retreat! Don't stop moving!"

They ran and fought in equal measure. A desperate scramble through hostile territory where every shadow might hide death. One of the pilots went down, dragged under by a drone that got too close. Marcus killed it with his bare hands, but it was too late.

Nineteen now. The math kept getting worse.

The structure Vanessa had spotted loomed ahead. It looked ancient. Pre-corruption. A cluster of buildings that might have been a research station once, back when the Moon was just a dead rock people occasionally visited.

Now it was their only hope.

"Inside!" Ariana took point, her sword clearing a path through the drones that tried to block the entrance. "Everyone inside now!"

They poured through the doors, a flood of desperate humanity seeking shelter. The last few ships landed in what used to be a courtyard, solar sails folding as they touched down.

Jonah was the last one through. He turned, looking back at the corrupted forest. The drones had stopped pursuing. They just gathered at the edge of the clearing, watching with whatever passed for eyes in those twisted bodies.

Waiting.

"Why aren't they attacking?" Vanessa asked beside him.

"I don't know." And that scared him more than if they'd kept coming.

Inside, the structure was a maze of corridors and empty rooms. Everything was coated in lunar dust, untouched for who knew how long. The survivors spread out, securing the building, checking for threats.

Jonah found a room that might have been a command center once. Broken monitors lined one wall. A table sat in the center, covered in dust thick enough to write in.

He sat down heavily. His whole body hurt. His mind hurt worse. Using himself as a psychic beacon had cost something. He wasn't sure what yet, but he'd feel it soon enough.

Ariana appeared in the doorway. "Perimeter is secure. For now. The drones are maintaining distance."

"They're watching us."

"Yes."

"Sterling knows we're here."

"Undoubtedly."

Jonah looked at the map on Vanessa's datapad, still displaying their position relative to the Nexus. Three miles. Might as well be three hundred with the forces arrayed against them.

"We can't stay here long," he said. "This place isn't going to protect us once Sterling decides to stop playing with his food."

"Then we keep moving," Vanessa said. "Hit and run. Use the structures for cover. Make our way toward the Nexus one step at a time."

"With twenty people and fifteen damaged ships against an entire army."

"You say that like we haven't done impossible things before."

Despite everything, that almost made him smile. Almost.

Outside, the corrupted forest pulsed with that sick green light. The Nexus spire rose in the distance, pumping its poison into the void. And somewhere in that twisted tower, Sterling waited.

Jonah stood. His body protested, but he ignored it. There'd be time to rest when this was over. Time to heal. Time to figure out how to live with all the names he'd memorized and all the faces that haunted him.

But not yet.

"Get everyone fed," he said. "Check ammo. Repair what can be repaired. We move in two hours."

"Where?" Ariana asked.

Jonah pointed toward the Nexus. "Where else?"

They had come too far to stop now. Lost too much to turn back.

So they'd keep going. Keep fighting. Keep pushing forward until either Sterling fell or they did.

That's what you did when the math kept getting worse.

You changed the equation.