Bender of Worlds

by Isaac Hooke

  He hewed down two robots in his path with his bright energy ax, and Sinive shot down another two while on the run.

  When he dashed under a small copse, something heavy struck Tane directly from above. He fell, and deactivated his beam hilt so as not to injure himself. When he hit the ground, he was pinned and couldn’t get up: he realized someone hidden in the branches of the tree above had fired an energy net into him.

  Beside him, Sinive was similarly pinned.

  Two robots leaped down to collect their prizes, and then the dark smears of Fingers of Ruin erupted from Tane’s core, courtesy of the Finger of Malevolence ring.

  He directed one smear into the net that held him, and the two other smears toward the robots, sending the darkness into each of them.

  I was wondering when that would kick in.

  Well, the ring did have a fifty-five percent chance to activate every two minutes, after all. Still, it hadn’t been two minutes since he’d started directing Darkness into it... he suspected some of his previous time spent Siphoning into the ring had carried over.

  The energy net fell away and Tane scrambled upright. The two robots were still on their feet, though large black cracks had opened up inside their torsos.

  He reactivated his energy ax and cut through them.

  He turned toward Sinive but she created a weak Essence Missile as he watched, and the net that held her fell away.

  She climbed to her feet and the pair continued weaving through the trees of the light copse, and when they emerged four more robots jumped them.

  Sinive created another Essence Missile—which was strong enough to melt the entire front off one of the robot’s heads—and fired her glowing pistol at another twice in rapid succession. Tane cut down the remainder with his Essence ax before they could shoot their nets.

  An energy net fired from behind a tree to his right; before he could react, Sinive unleashed two quick shots, breaking the net apart so that the pieces reflected harmlessly from his armored robe. Then she dove to the ground, rolling, and fired behind the tree twice more.

  A plasma-riddled scepter took two drunken steps from cover and then toppled lifelessly to the ground.

  So maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea to bring her along.

  Tane heard a sonic boom; a moment later a TSN transport vessel appeared. It hovered in front of the northern treeline ahead, blocking the way forward. It was starting to land. Already, Scepters were leaping down from open airlocks and bays.

  The ship couldn’t have been part of some reinforcements that had jumped in, not unless the jump specialist had been extremely lucky and somehow managed to get close to the planet. The transport had to have been waiting in orbit… yet another “arrangement” the TSN had made with the Mautauraen, no doubt.

  Tane immediately swerved westward, intending to give the new ship a wide berth.

  But then he heard another sonic boom. Another vessel appeared in the sky above the park. A black, pincer-shaped ship.

  A dweller vessel.

  It was about as big as the transports, coming in at the size of a small stadium.

  It swooped low, making a pass over both transport vessels. It fired at the hulls, obviously targeting the weaponry. Stray shots from the dweller ship also struck the TSN reinforcements emerging from the new vessel.

  The two transports returned fire, and convex portions of the dweller ship’s energy shield momentarily sparked into view around it.

  Tane continued to run west, and when he judged himself far enough away from the battle, he turned to the north and made a dash for the treeline with Sinive.

  The dweller ship continued to make flybys over the TSN vessels, ravaging them with plasma bolts and laser beams. Tane wasn’t sure if the dwellers were on his side, or simply stalling until they located him, or what…

  The original TSN transport had taken to the air to activate its shields, while the newer transport remained on the ground to finish unloading its troops.

  As Tane passed a large statue of one of the planet’s founders, that black, pincer-shaped ship suddenly pulled in front of him and Sinive and hovered there, blocking the path to the treeline. All of its weapon turrets swiveled toward him.

  “Take cover!” He dove toward the thick base of the statue. Sinive joined him. In fact, she reached it before he did.

  He landed behind the statue, his shoulder crunching somewhat painfully into the plinth. He arrived not a moment too soon: the dweller ship unleashed a series of plasma blasts toward them.

  Tane and Sinive covered their heads as fragments of stone from the monument fell all around them.

  Yep, definitely not on my side.

  “What the hell is going on?” Sinive shouted. “They can’t make up their minds. First they’re here to save you. And then they’re here to kill you!”

  “Seems to happen a lot with me,” Tane said, crouching lower.

  Ordinarily, operators were supposed to pause when firing a ship’s lasers or plasmas to let them recharge. But the current attack didn’t let up. The aliens kept firing their plasma throwers, though at the cost of reduced intensity. But those were weapons designed to penetrate a starship’s hull: even without pausing to recharge, at the lowest intensity level each impact was still powerful enough to cause significant damage to the monument. Eventually the plasma bolts would bore through entirely, and the shielding and armor worn by Tane and Sinive would offer little protection.

  As the relentless bombardment continued, it became obvious the dwellers didn’t want to give them any possible chance of fleeing: he and Sinive were thoroughly pinned.

  The monument was quickly crumbling around them. Tane and Sinive would be exposed in moments.

  “We’re going to have to make a run for it!” Sinive said.

  Tane nodded grimly. He knew neither of them would be able to outrun the ship’s targeting AI. But they had to try.

  Only a small portion of the shattered plinth remained intact above them. In the next two seconds or so, that portion would be gone. If they wanted to make a run for it, now was the time.

  Tane steeled himself...

  34

  Tane was on the verge of telling Sinive to run when the attack seemed to let up. Or at least, the plinth stopped disintegrating; Tane could still hear muted impacts: it sounded like plasma throwers striking water instead of stone. He tentatively peered past the edge of the monument’s base and saw the plasma bolts and lasers striking the empty air, dispersing in a spherical half-dome pattern.

  Someone had created a protective shield of the Essence.

  He glanced over his shoulder. Lyra was standing behind him, her features contorted in concentration. She still had her Chrysalium staff in hand, along with the beam hilt, which was currently inactive. She must have decided to drain Gia of stamina after all. It was the only way she would have had the energy for this.

  “To the treeline!” Lyra said. “Quickly! I can’t hold Deflect forever!”

  Tane and Sinive rose from cover and ran. Lyra followed directly behind them, bringing the protective half-dome with her. Tane slowed to match the Volur’s pace, as he didn’t want to risk dashing out from underneath the cover of the dome. Lyra moved with difficulty, however: it seemed a struggle for her to stay on her feet. Obviously maintaining that Deflect work was taking a lot out of her.

  The alien plasma bolts continued to impact as the pincer-shaped ship and its turrets rotated to follow their passage.

  The trio approached another founder’s statue, the last between their current location and the treeline.

  “Can’t… hold it…” Lyra said.

  “We’re almost there!” Tane said. The northern treeline was just thirty meters away.

  “Can’t,” Lyra said. “Rest… at the statue.”

  Tane ducked behind the statue along with Lyra and Sinive.

  Lyra released the Deflect work immediately after taking cover, and the statue bore the brunt of the attacks. Stone fragments rained down on Tane and the others
; some of the smaller pieces lodged in their hair.

  This statue seemed to be made of sturdier material than the previous, and Tane estimated they had about sixty seconds before the cover it provided became useless.

  “I thought you were leaving?” Tane told Lyra above the sound of smashing stone.

  Lyra was breathing extremely hard. Her features were the palest he’d seen so far, and she was slick with sweat. The sight made him aware of his own perspiration: he was literarily drenched underneath his armor. He wiped strands of sweat-soaked hair from his forehead.

  “I did say I was leaving, didn’t I?” Lyra told him.

  “You did,” Tane agreed.

  “That was before aliens decided to intervene,” Lyra said. “It was obvious you needed me.”

  “What about Gall?” Tane said. “Nebb? Gia? You let the TSN capture them?”

  “No,” Lyra said. “A small TSN force attacked us immediately after you left. I dispatched them easily. Another force came, but when the aliens arrived, the TSN lost interest in us entirely. By then, the hacked delivery droids Jed sent in to retrieve us arrived. I borrowed some stamina from Gia, and let the machines take her and the others: the robots are carrying them out of the park faster than I ever could. When they left, I came to your aid.”

  Tane glanced at his overhead map. Sure enough, the indicators showed that G’allanthamas, Gia and Nebb were moving away fast to the southwest. None of the red dots representing the TSN troops followed them—all the members of the star navy seemed to be concentrating on the new, alien threat.

  As the plinth wore down, the plasma thrower began to fire past the shattered edges, and on either side of the huddling trio the ground was chewed up.

  “Lyra, we could use another work of Deflect right about now…” Tane said.

  The Volur just lay there, panting.

  “Lyra…”

  “I can’t make another,” Lyra said. “I’m sorry. I’m through.”

  Tane gritted his teeth in frustration.

  So close.

  Then again, reaching the treeline was no guarantee of protection. The dweller ship could probably shoot through wood just as easily as thick stone, maybe even more so. But at least there were more places to take cover in that forest than out here.

  The plinth continued to degrade, so that Tane and the others were forced to crouch ever lower.

  “Can we link?” Tane said. “Or maybe take my stamina… it’s our only hope.”

  Lyra nodded weakly. “Your stamina.” She reached for his hand, but then Tane was distracted by a rip in spacetime beside him.

  That rip enlarged and a man-sized distortion tunnel appeared.

  Sinive swung her pistol toward it as a dark-skinned Mancer stepped through. His hands were raised in surrender.

  “Wait!” Tane told Sinive.

  The tunnel closed behind the surrendering Mancer.

  “Get down!” Tane told the newcomer.

  But the Mancer didn’t listen. Tane thought he would be shot down by the aliens, but instead the bolts were stopped by a Deflect half-dome, obviously created by the Mancer. Tane was surprised by the man’s power in the Essence: Mancers were supposed to be an order of magnitude weaker than Volurs. But then Tane spotted a silver armband attached over the glowing robe, an armband similar to the one Sinive had once possessed. Tane wondered what the Chrysalium content of that accessory was.

  Must cost a fortune.

  He ran a quick ID on the man.

  Name: Chancery Smith

  Race: Human

  Level: 12

  Class: Mancer, 1st Essence Battalion, 1st Brigade, 3rd Division, Thorran Marine Corps, Thorran Star Navy

  Weaponry: None

  Shielding: Energy. (45/45)

  Base Armor rating: 50

  Total armor rating (including shielding): 95

  “I want to help,” the Mancer said, not breaking his gaze from the dweller ship overhead.

  “Then do so!” Tane told him.

  The man extended his Deflect shield around Tane and the others, and the incoming bolts became muted. The man slumped slightly, obviously weakened by the act.

  “Let’s go!” Tane started to rise, but the man preempted him. The Mancer crumpled behind the plinth, dropping the Essence shield.

  “What’s wrong?” Tane asked him.

  The Mancer shook his head. “I thought I could do it. I can’t. I’m not strong enough. Not even with this armband. Too… tired.”

  “Then give it to me,” Sinive said.

  “Can you create Deflect?” the man asked her.

  She shook her head.

  “Then there is no point,” the Mancer said.

  Lyra turned toward him. "You."

  "I," the man agreed.

  “You know him?” Tane asked.

  "Yes,” Lyra answered. “He boarded with me for a time during my captivity. He’s a drunkard."

  "Not anymore," the Mancer said.

  Sinive glanced at Tane. “We should kill him. We can’t trust him.”

  Tane shook his head. “He’s only tried to help me, so far.”

  “Don’t worry,” Lyra told Sinive as she crouched lower under the bombardment. “He’ll be dead along with the rest of us. And very soon at this rate.”

  “You can create Deflect?” the Mancer asked Lyra. “Here, take my armband.”

  “Won’t help,” Lyra said. “Like you, I’m too tired to step into the Essence through it.”

  “Then drain me if you think it will help,” the Mancer said.

  “It won’t,” Lyra said. “You’re already too weary to be of much use to me.”

  “What about me?” Sinive said. “I’m not weary.”

  “No,” Tane said.

  “But—” Sinive tried.

  “She’s not draining you,” Tane interrupted.

  The plasma assault from the vessel continued unabated, and the monument became smaller and smaller.

  “Chancery,” Tane said. “Can you create a tunnel to take us out of here?”

  “Call me Chase,” the man replied. “And no, that’s not my specialty. There are no jumpers with the stamina left. I was sent here by the last to protect you.”

  “You should have given that last jumper your armband,” Sinive scoffed. “Seeing as you’re useless with it.”

  Tane and the others only had a few moments until the plinth disintegrated entirely under the bombardment, leaving them all exposed.

  “I’ll try to draw them away,” the Mancer said. “I think I can create a small Deflect shield around myself. It won’t last long, but it will be enough to distract them.”

  Tane was about to tell the man to stop, because what the Mancer proposed could lead only to his demise, but Chase was already on his feet. He ran out into the open.

  Tane heard an immense crash, and the scrape of metal against metal.

  The dweller ship stopped firing.

  Instead, the dark, pincer-shaped ship moved overhead, careening at an odd angle.

  Tane understood what had happened a moment later when the dweller vessel had flown past entirely: smashed into the hull behind it was the airborne TSN transport. Its nose was crumpled, as was much of its fore section.

  In moments, both crashed into the park behind Tane. The combined vessels skidded across the ground, tearing away the grass, leaving a broad, long runnel carved into the dirt.

  Dwellers began to stream out of the lead vessel before it had even come to a halt. Some wore environmental suits. Others were sheathed in the dark spheres of Protective Environment, indicating they were Amaranth.

  “Let’s go!” Tane said.

  He scrambled to his feet and ran right past the stunned Chase. Sinive and Lyra were on his heels, and Chase soon followed. Tane didn’t trust the Mancer, but the man had proved himself to be courageous at the very least, and at this point Tane could use all the help he could get. Once the alien threat subsided, Tane would probably have to kill the man, but he’d deal with that when the
time came. For now they were all on the same side.

  Tane glanced over his shoulder. From their positions of cover, Mancers and scepters were unleashing hell at the emerging aliens. The dwellers meanwhile returned fire; those in the environmental suits unleashed energy launchers, while the Amaranth released black smears of unreality.

  He spotted a big dweller at the fore of the Amaranth cluster. Sheathed in a dark sphere like the rest, in one tentacle it carried a pole-ax made of Dark energy, and in another two it wielded an energy launcher. The tentacle immediately beside the pole-ax ended in a short stump.

  It was the same huge dweller that had attacked him on Remus. He was sure of it. The alien whose faction had intervened when other Amaranth had been holding Tane and his companions hostage. The one whose tentacle Sinive had severed with her armband-sourced Essence Missile, saving Tane.

  Because of its size, he realized it had to be a Graaz’dhen. That, combined with its ability to create a sphere and wield the Dark equivalent of a beam hilt, made the dweller a Graaz’dhen Amaranth, most dangerous of all aliens.

  He ID’d the creature:

  Name: S’Wraathar

  Race: Dweller

  Level: 22

  Class: Graaz’dhen Amaranth

  Weaponry:

  W’aspice Energy Launcher

  C’havar Beam Hilt

  Shielding: 75/75

  Base Armor rating: 0

  Total armor rating (including shielding): 75

  This was the first time he’d ever received a name when ID’ing a dweller, which told him the alien wanted Tane to know it.

  The alien extended its free tentacles toward Tane, as if pointing at him, and it shrieked loudly. Then S’Wraathar released several smears of unreality—Fingers of Ruin—and at the same time turned its energy launcher toward him.

  Other Amaranth with S’Wraathar also launched black smears toward Tane. That none of the dwellers were wrapping invisible hands around Tane to hold him in place told him he was too far away for that particular work to influence him.