[ IP ] Lava Ruins

`` Looks like the rain's stopped.'' 
 
 I peered out the window. Art was right; time to get to work. `` Alright, let's move out.'' I could hear the scraping of the stone armor as the men slowly stood. Despite the training, conditioning, and stamina spells, moving in this blasted rock suit was still a chore.. unless you popped an alacrity, but we usually only carry one each. Well, except for whoever was on point; today that's Cadr, so he's carrying three: the standard one plus one for each runner. `` Lookouts say there were fourteen today and twelve got caught in the rain. That leaves two runners to take down. Should be no problem for the eight of us.'' 
 
 The men did n't need the pep talk. They've been doing this same routine almost twice a week for the last three years: Lookouts spot a Troll raid party, Engineers spin up a Storm for a few hours, and us Mops would perform a sweep to hunt down any surviving Trolls once the rains stop. Two of us could easily take out one of them. Hell, Brass usually sends out five of us for a job like this. 
 
 Hot and muggy. That's what we used to say after a real rain, before the war. Well, we still say it now but it's hell of an understatement: this magma rain brings temps well over fifty C and fog that reduces visibility to less than twenty meters. The sea breeze will clear out the fog in a few hours but we ca n't wait for that. Have to hop on these Trolls before they can get back up. 
 
 The first nine Trolls were easy enough. The rain had burnt away more than half of the flesh and they were only able to recover enough to barely crawl. Cutting out their hearts only took a few minutes each. We used to be careful to keep it intact, for old man Gurdy to study, but he found out the heart does n't do the healing: it's the lungs. But the blood ca n't heal the Troll if it ca n't get where it's needed, so we cut out the heart. Set the rest of the carcass on fire ( if it's not already ) and that's that. Scavengers will be along later to collect anything useful. 
 
 Art stopped and looked East. `` Runner inbound; 120 meters out, coming from 0-7-0.'' It will be here in about four seconds. All five tons of it. 
 
 `` Cadr, hunker down!'' 
 
 Here we go.
