Beneath the Dragoneye Moons

Elaine opened her eyes and looked around, her skills scanning the place.

They were in an old prop plane, equipped in their normal clothes and a parachute. Four crates of supplies were along the wall, along with some rope and carabiners. There was no pilot, the plane flying itself.

“Black Crow take it all, the fairies again?” She swore, then spotted a familiar face. “Ariane! It’s great to see you again! Cat, is that you? Oh, who am I kidding, of course it’s you! Well, better here with friends. Hello, you look new, what’s your name?” Elaine asked the fourth person. Cat and Ariane gave each other a friendly nod.

“Hi… I’m Julietta.” The last member said.

“This is Wepwawet, do you copy?” A voice echoed in everyone’s ears.

“Copy Wepwawet, can you explain what’s going on for us?” Cat immediately replied.

“Well! We’re on the game show ‘Two Week Battle Royale.’ There are a hundred teams of four people landing on the island. The goal is to kill everyone else, and be the last team standing. Great entertainment for everyone back home watching. Smile for the camera and say cheese!”

None of us looked at the camera. Cat shot it.

“Oh come on!” Wepwawet complained. “That’s not how we do this! I’m your guide! Your eye in the sky! I can gift you weapons, blessings, supplies, but only if people out there, watching this, cough up the dough! Shooting the camera just pisses them off, and more importantly, kills the feed. No feed, no footage. No footage, no fans. No fans, no money, no supplies. It’s basic economics!”

“Press ganged into another army, great.”

“Listen, you got to jump out of the plane in the next two minutes. There’s a storm circling the island that the game show hosts control. They’ll constantly contract it to force all of you together. If you’re in the storm, you’ll get constantly hurt until you’re killed.”

Elaine started laughing at that.

“I don’t think that’ll be a problem for us.” She said. “How actively are these other people going to try and kill us? Uh, copy?”

Wepwawet hesitated.

“Um. I’d love to tell you they’re all hardened killers on death row… but the hosts ran out of those a decade ago, so now they’re mostly grabbing people from various dimensions to play. The game only ends when there’s one team left, either from fighting, dying to the storm, or in one memorable case where everyone went to the center and refused to fight, starvation from no supplies being dropped in. No interest, no viewers, no money, no supplies… although things did get very exciting near the end.”

“Joy.” Cat said dryly. Ariane flashed her fangs.

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“Worthy prey.” She said, “We need to get organized and have a plan before we drop in.”

“Julietta, what can you do?” Elaine asked the girl.

“I’m a shapeshifter.” She explained. “Anything I touch, I get a full look of their complete biology. I can then mix and match biology freely. I do need biomass, although I’m currently bulked up.”

Ariane looked on with interest.

“Even blood?” She asked. Julietta scooted away from the thirsty vampire. One who’d just had a ‘whatever blood you want’ dispenser dropped in her lap.

“No?” Julietta lied. Badly.

Elaine held out her hand.

“I’ve got some unusual biology.” She said. “Best design I could come up with. It’s not the entire thing, but if you’re mixing and matching, you could get some inspiration. Can’t hurt.”

Julietta took Elaine’s hand, and her eyes went huge. Her skin rippled as rainbow scales briefly flickered on, before getting absorbed back into her skin.

“We should go.” Cat said. “Jump off people other people do. Let’s get the initiative, and not get shot at on our way down.”

“Agreed” Ariane said.

“Wewa, is there a camera on us now?” Elaine asked urgently. “And what’s the best style of clothing that’ll get the most viewers?”

Wewa quickly affirmed and explained the best recent styles.

“But you only have what you brou- oh.” He was cut off as Elaine’s clothes flickered and changed with a pop.

“Hammerspace!” Elaine posed. “If the three of you need anything, let’s sort it out once we’ve landed. Should I take the supplies so we don’t need to jump with them?”

“Yes.” Cat said.

“Elaine… what are you planning?” Ariane asked.

“You’ll see. No time to talk. Super Squad, let’s go!”

Elaine ran to the open ramp and jumped out of the plane.

Without a parachute.

There was only a distant voice, carried by the wind.

“The things I do to get back home… ugh.”

Cat facepalmed and put on her parachute. Ariane slung hers over her back, but Julietta started to grow a pair of massive wings. At a glance from the other two she shrugged.

“Rather have my own wings out, then for my parachute to fail and have the lines tangle me up.”

Cat held out her hands, and the other two women grabbed them.

“On three. One, two, three, jump!”

The three women jumped out of the plane, popping their parachutes a moment later.

“Aim for that field.” Ariane pointed. Cat shaded her eyes, looking at Elaine.

“What is she doing?”

Elaine was soaring through the sky, enjoying the wind in her hair and the shouted curses directed her way.

“Your turn!” She swooped down on another group of four jumping out of the plane. An archer with a green hood and a wooden mask, two people with starry capes, and a slime were jumping together. With a cheeky wink she teleported their supplies into her hammer space.

It would be just as easy to teleport their parachutes into her hammerspace, and let them hurtle to the ground, but Elaine had sworn otherwise. Self defense, of herself or her patients only.

The healer paused a moment between groups, a pair of golden wings around her ankles the only indicator of how she was flying.

“Hello everyone back home!” She waved to the flying camera. “We’ve got four more lootboxes right here to crack open, thanks to our sponsor, Mango Media! Who’s ready for another midair unboxing?”

A rattle of machinegun fire interrupted Elaine’s speech, and she pouted as the bullets bounced off.

“No! Bad… bad guy!”

One of the other teams had taken a shot at Elaine, and in a blur joined by a supersonic boom, his parachute vanished.

The camera watched all the way down, censor bars flashing up to hide the gore. Elaine threw her hands up in despair.

“Why do they even bother with blood sport if they’re going to censor them!?” She complained. The brightly colored, glowing, floating Classer gasped in shock as a sniper round went through her hazel hair.

“My HAIR! You BASTARD!” She screamed, before flying off in the direction of the shot.

Ariane, Cat, and Julietta landed on a field. Cat rolled her ankle and hissed, but it popped back into shape a moment later.

“Down!” Ariane shouted, before catching a bullet out of the air. Cat returned fire with her guns, turning the nearby forest into splinters.

“Did I get them?” She asked. Both Ariane and Julietta sniffed the air.

“Blood, lots of it. Yeah, you got them.” The shapeshifter said. Her ears twitched.

“Oh great.” She said. Elaine landed next to them.

Julietta started to twist and turn up, transforming into a 20 foot behemoth.

“Incoming.” She said.