The weather feels strange.
Kind of a sickening feeling, like staring at a rotting carcass, something that makes you nauseous.
As the men adapt to the weather change, morning comes with a shift change, reliving those on watch.
"How long ago was last contact with Rage team?" Olive asked as he watched the storm smother the camp with wind and rain.
"About four hours now sir, looks like the storm is blocking all signals."
"Great. Not that they would be of much use now."
With air cover no longer available, pillar camp was now on their own.
Overnight, they did a count on their supplies only to discover they have enough ammunition to last one more engagement. The rest buried in the mud or flooded from the rain.
Huddling around the last standing tent, the soldiers did their best to create makeshift fortifications around it.
Inside the tent lied a few soldiers who were injured in the previous engagements, along with the elf they 'rescued' from within the pillar world.
"Man, she sure knows how to sleep."
"I wonder if its something that only exists in this world."
"What do you mean?"
"Maybe its an unknown condition that causes deep sleep?"
"Hmm. That might be a possibility. But what kind of person in deep sleep would toss and turn so much?"
"I dunno..."
As the soldiers tried to talk the time away, the old officer returned with majority of the lookouts, to the Olives surprise.
"What's up old man?"
"The storm is getting worse." He replied after ordering the lookouts to spread out. "I estimate it's about to reach category four hurricane strength, possibly category five."
"That bad huh?"
"Yes, and I believe that our tents were rated to withstand cat four hurricane winds at the most."
Both men turned to look at the medical tent, flapping and shaking against the rain and wind.
"It's holding up just fine." Olive remarked. "We just have to believe in our equipment. It has yet to fail us."
"We also need to make a plan in case it does fail us now." The old officer countered.
"And what kind of plan would that be? I can't exactly tell the injured to move into the rain just in case the tent falls." Olive shot back. "Have the men reinforce the tent even more. Some of the engineers have already started repurposing the debris around us to fortify its walls."
"Is that not a plan?"
"... Go help them out."
"Aye sir."
Laughing to himself, the old officer went around the area and pulling soldiers with him to help the engineers.
Watching him scurry off, Olive cursed under his breath and stared off into the distance.
"One more day. Just one more day." He muttered as he stroked his rifle.
—
Sometime after midnight.
The old officers prediction was correct, the storm has grown more intense.
Loud shaking and the sound of the tent slapping against its fortifications filled the night with noise.
Based on his internal clock, Olive estimated that it was somewhere between 0300 and 0500.
And that sinking feeling has returned. The feeling of being watched.
Racking a round in his rifle, startling the soldiers around him causing them to follow suit, Olive made his way to the artillery men.
They were all huddled in a group, making a shield from the rain as they did their best to clean and maintain a couple mortar tubes they had recovered.
"What's your status on the mortars?"
"We recovered four tubes in total. Two infantry, two heavy. The infantry ones are ready for use and we have managed to get one heavy mortar ready. Still cleaning out and recalibrating the last one."
"Are we able to get some flares in the air?"
"What kind of flares sir? Starlight rounds?"
"Yup."
"We got a couple short range starlight rounds. Along with a sunlight rounds for the heavy mortar."
"Perfect. Get them ready and wait for my signal."
"Yes sir."
Leaving them to do their things, Olive made his way to the outskirts of the medical tent and stared into the darkness.
Deep in his mind, he felt that he was staring into the eyes of countless hostiles scattered through the curtain of rain.
Behind him was probably half of the recon team, all alert and ready, who followed him after hearing his safety going off.
The limited light coming from the tents lanterns made it hard to see, but all of them were waiting for his orders.
"!"
A sudden feeling of bloodlust, or something close to it, went down Olives spine as he signaled for everyone to get into position.
Everyone dispersed into the makeshift fortifications around them, mostly consisting of mud piles giving some sort of cover.
Behind everyone, but still within sight, was the artillery men with three mortars ready for action.
The roar of wind and rain bit into everyone and obscured vision, but they stayed focus. It was not the worse environment they have fought in, but it was close.
Olive knelt near the front of the formation, where he then made a signal to the artillery observer.
"Fire starlight rounds!" He shouted in a whisper.
A few seconds later, dull THUMPS rang out, causing everyone to close their eyes and brace.
*ping*
Low explosions drowned out by the rain echoed, followed by low level light illuminating the whole area.
What the light revealed shocked everyone.
Large silhouettes filled their sights.
What could only be described as bears flinched at the sudden light, causing them to stand in place.
Bears by themselves wouldn't shock the soldiers, but these bears looked as if they were made of water.
The staring contest between them lasted a few seconds before Olive took the first shot, followed closely by everyone else.
The bullets flew through the air hitting the bears everywhere; head, shoulders, center mass.
But other than staggering slightly in response, they started moving forwards, towards them.
Seeing their powerful rounds do basically nothing, some soldiers fired off grenades, to some effect.
As they landed and exploded amongst the bears, a few of them were dispersed into water from the shockwaves, only to slowly reform back into their original forms.
"Fire one volley of airburst!" Olive ordered, "Then fall back to second line!"
*BANG*
A momentary stillness of air and water engulfed the water bears, as the shockwaves pushed against the wind, rain, and water bears. Halting them in their tracks.
*ping*
Another series of starlight shells illuminate the night with weak light, allowing the soldiers to keep an eye on their mystical opponents.
"WHERE ARE THE ELVES?" One soldier yelled out as he observed the surroundings the best he can.
"In the back, where else?" Another remarked. "You always keep spellcasters to the back of the battlefield."
"Spellcasters? How do you know?"
"How else? Where do you think these water bears come from?"
"A force of nature?"
"The fu-" In the middle of his retort, he realized that it could be a force of nature since it was a different world.
Soon they shut up as they set themselves up on the second defensive line, accompanied by more men, who woke up and armed themselves from the commotion.
"Conserve ammo! Single shot or short bursts only!" Olive yelled as more men lined up around him.
"How do we kill them sir!"
"WORKING ON IT! AIM FOR LEGS! SLOW THEM DOWN!"
The fighting goes on through the night, the water bears slowly approaching the last tent with all the soldiers now fighting to repel them.
"It seems that they are using the rain to rebuild themselves, it's weird how they aren't affected from the wind." Olive observes as he reloads his rifle, steaming from firing so many rounds.
Brainstorming ways to stop the water bears from making contact with them, Olive doesn't notice a figure emerge from the tent, with a very annoyed look on her face.
Ignoring all the warnings and shouts from the soldiers shooting around her, she makes her way to the front and starts speaking in a weird tongue.
When Olive finally realizes that the elf girl is now in front of her, she completes her chant and readies herself in a throwing motion.
Olive ran up to the elf and was about to drag her back before she yelled something that everyone could understand.
"SCREW OFF! YOU'RE BEING A PAIN IN THE A**!!!"
And threw something that looked like a wind blade towards the bear and the outskirts of the entire camp.
As everyone watched, the blade eradicated the bears everyone was having difficulty repelling, then reaching for the storm above them before cleaving through them.
The entire camp stunned in awe at her actions, couldn't help but watch as she nodded like a job well done, then returned to the tent and went back to sleep.
"What just happened?" x Everyone