by Ramy Vance
Alex chuckled as she thought of what might be motivating the Dark One. “You know, I never thought of that. Guess he is pretty bland.”
“All I’m saying is that these guys all say the same crap, and you don’t have to feel bad because it sounds right. The best lies have a little bit of truth in them. But you’re solid, Alex. I know that. We all do. We trust you. You don’t have to be worried that we’ll doubt you just because you have a secret conversation. Not going to happen.”
“That means a lot to me. It really does.”
Roy lit his cigar and puffed out a heavy cloud of smoke. “The Dark One. Even the name is…meh. Trust me, all these psychos are the same.”
The hangar’s double doors opened. Vardis walked into the hangar, looking around as if he were suspecting an ambush.
Roy’s idea of an ambush must have been a loose interpretation of the word because he hadn’t bothered trying to hide or come up with a plan for when Vardis arrived. “Ambush” meant “surprise,” from what it looked like.
For a moment, Vardis didn’t seem to notice Roy and Alex. Maybe there was enough crap in the room that Vardis couldn’t see them. Even though the lights were on, it wasn’t particularly bright.
Vardis floated through the air. At first, Alex thought it was to look for her and Roy, but the alien wasn’t searching for anything on the ground. Instead, he found the security cameras up in the corners of the hangar and ripped them off, then crushed the cameras to bits and flung the pieces to the ground.
“Why the hell is he getting rid of all the cameras?” Roy muttered.
Alex had been wondering the same thing. The only obvious answer was that he didn’t want anyone to know what he was up to, but that was a convoluted, ass-backward way to keep anyone from knowing he’d gone rogue. He could have just waited to attack when they had all gotten back to Middang3ard. “I have no idea what he’s up to, so what’s the plan?”
“Plan? Oh, I was going to attack him. Take him dead or alive. Dead, probably. He seems like a fighter.”
“I meant, do you have a plan for how to do that?”
“With my guns. Not a joke. I mean my actual guns.”
Alex sighed as she shook her head. “So, guns blazing?”
“I figure you will use whatever the hell kinda powers you have now, and we’ll whittle him down. Shouldn’t take too long. We saw how strong he was on the moon. We can take him.”
Alex had all but forgotten about Vardis’ display of power on the moon. It seemed like a very long time ago. Roy was right, though. Alex was a competent fighter, and Roy had decades of years of experience. Maybe even more if the memories that they’d shared were any indication of his age.
Alex was preparing to say something when she noticed Roy staring longingly at one of the exo-suits. “You don’t see the 850 series anymore,” he explained. “They were faster and stronger than anything else we’ve put out.”
“How come you don’t use them, then?”
“Neural connection is a little bit off. Fried a couple of brains. But it’s not every day you get to take one for a spin. You get started with fly-boy up there. I’ve got an idea.”
“An idea or a plan?”
Roy turned and jogged backward, shrugging. “Is there a difference?” He took off toward the exo-suit.
Alex concentrated and lifted herself into the air. She couldn’t fly like Vardis did, but she was able to lift herself, nearly doubling her jump range. It was a lot harder than Vardis made it look. “Vardis!” Alex shouted.
The alien stopped in his tracks and looked around, trying to pinpoint the place from which his name had been called. While Vardis searched for Alex, the dragonrider suppressed her emotions and thoughts to make it harder for Vardis to find her.
He used his telekinesis to throw one of the fighter jets out of the way. It looked effortless, as if it had taken a fraction of his attention. He’d thrown the jet the way someone flicks a gnat off their arm. Alex could see she was nowhere near Vardis’ level in the real world.
But that didn’t matter. Alex hadn’t been going to psychic classes for the last few months. She’d been training as a dragonrider, and a rider didn’t rely on one trick to deal with a situation.
Alex pulled out her scythe and watched Vardis floating above, still trying to find her. When Vardis passed over her, Alex flung her scythe at him, guiding it with her mind.
The scythe hit Vardis in the shoulder, and the blade stuck in his skin. He screamed as he ripped the blade out of his arm and tossed it down to the ground. Then he stretched out his hands and pushed back every vehicle in front of him.
The rider dove behind a moving helicopter. It had become apparent Vardis had no idea where she was. He was flailing, but by knocking over so much crap, he had given her an unintentional advantage.
Alex slid into the helicopter closest to her and propped open its sliding door, then scanned through her inventory. There were more weapons than her scythe loaded into her dragon anchor. The scythe was the easiest for her to use, but Alex had trained with every weapon she owned.
The gravity disruption grenades would work well with an ice grenade. Alex thought about her pistol but realized she wasn’t a good enough shot.
She poked her head out of the helicopter and saw Vardis floating above, still searching for her. She tossed the gravity disruption grenade on the ground and watched as it rolled toward Vardis. When it was under him, she remotely detonated it.
A small gravity well opened, pulling Vardis out of the air so quickly that he didn’t have a chance to react. As he fought to get away from the well, Alex tossed the ice grenade at him and detonated it.
A blast of ice shot out and flash-froze the alien where he stood.
Alex leaped out from her cover and raced toward Vardis. On the way, she scooped up her scythe and jumped over an overturned tank. Vardis wouldn’t see this coming. Even if he did, Alex knew how fast she was. She’d get there before the alien even had a chance.
She leaped over another tank, landing in front of him. The alien’s eyes went wide as Alex brought her scythe down on the side of his neck. Then she pulled back her bionic arm and let loose a punch that would put a hole in a concrete wall.
The ice around Vardis began to crack and small sheets fell off. Then he flew into the hangar’s wall.
Alex knew that wasn’t going to be enough to take out the alien. Now that the attack had started, she wasn’t going to be able to let up. She ran after him, then flung herself through the air and landed on top of him. She cupped her hands together and brought down a double fist on his chest. Even through the ice, she could see his eyes widen in pain. Then she grabbed her scythe, ready to take off Vardis’ head.
The ice around the alien’s body shattered as a psychic shockwave knocked Alex off the alien.
She hit the floor and skidded into a fighter jet. As she got to her feet, she could see Vardis doing the same. They glared at each other from across the hangar. This was going to be it—their last stand.
Chapter Three
Vardis raised his hand to attack the dragonrider. Before he could do anything, Roy barreled into him from the side, and the alien careened into the side of a tank.
Roy was wearing the exo-suit, a tight-fitting mechanical spine that went up to the back of his neck. The exo-suit also connected to the arms, wired to the tips of Roy’s fingers and extending down his legs to his ankles. “You thought you guys were going to finish without me?” He chuckled.
Alex moved to take advantage of Vardis’ surprise, heading for the tank the alien had crashed into.
He was already back on his feet, and he whipped his hands in front of him, sending the tank toward Alex.
Alex punched it with her bionic hand, slowing it down but not enough to keep from being flung back.
Roy leaped to help Alex. He hit the tank with his feet and pushed hard, which launched the tank back at Vardis.
The alien dodged to the right and scampered across the floor on all fours before ju
mping at Alex, who had just gotten to her feet. He tackled her, and the two went rolling across the cement. Vardis raised his hand, a psychic blast forming in his palm.
Before Vardis could bring down his fist, Alex punched him in the face with her bionic arm. The force of the attack knocked him off, and he hit the ground and rolled behind the tank he’d thrown. He raised the tank and ripped it in two, then sent half the tank at Alex and the other half at Roy.
Roy managed to get out of the way, and his half smashed into a jet fighter behind him, crumpling the jet’s steel skin.
Alex also dodged her half of the tank but reached out and threw it back at Vardis, who floated into the air above Alex and Roy. “Do you think that is enough to stop me? You lack conviction! If you cannot do what needs to be done, how do you think you will end this?” the alien screeched.
The manic frenzy was back in Vardis’ voice. Whatever was going on in his head was getting worse. Alex waved for Roy to follow her as the alien started cackling madly. “Sounds like he’s losing his mind,” Alex remarked.
Roy ducked behind a tank. “Yeah, that is what it sounds like. I didn’t think he was going to be so tough. Guess now’s the time to call those reinforcements, even if it’s going to take a minute.” He pulled up his HUD. “Oh, crap, something’s blocking communication. Must be him.”
The sound of steel hitting steel broke up the conversation, and the tank the two were hiding behind pushed back against them. “I’ll try to reach Chine!” Alex shouted.
Roy rolled out from behind their cover, drew both of his plasma pistols, and fired a couple of bolts at Vardis as he ducked behind another tank.
The alien waved away the plasma blasts, sending them into the wall.
Alex was tired of being on the defensive, but she didn’t know what else to do. Vardis was much more powerful when he was using telekinesis. Then Alex remembered how erratically he had behaved when she’d taunted him in the medbay.
Now wasn’t the time to shout things to upset the alien, but there was another way. She would get into his head.
Alex didn’t know how to launch a telepathic attack. Every telepathic event so far had been her reacting to what either the Dark One or Vardis had started.
Thinking about what she didn’t know wasn’t going to get her and Roy out of this, though. Alex closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and concentrated on what she was trying to do. She needed to distract Vardis. Maybe if he thought he was somewhere else…
Alex focused on the planet she’d seen in his memory. She tried to build it up in the room. To make the vans and planes and tanks disappear. To see the mud dripping down the walls. To create a place as close to what she had seen in the alien’s mind as she could.
When she thought she had a good mental image, she focused on sending it to Vardis. She imagined a flying dagger made of the images, aimed at his head.
Vardis stopped looking around and froze as if he’d been hit with another ice grenade. He let loose a scream as he grabbed the side of his head. “Stay out of my head!”
Alex felt his retaliation. It was like her skull was splitting open, but the pain passed quickly. Was that what she had just done to Vardis?
The alien hadn’t come back with a telekinetic attack either. Alex’s theory seemed right. Vardis was a stronger psychic than Alex too, but he couldn’t use both powers at the same time. That meant he could be stopped.
Alex commed Roy. “Hey, he can’t use telepathy and telekinesis at the same time. If I distract him, maybe we can get some good shots in.”
Roy’s voice came back. “You better get distracting, then.”
As Alex was preparing to answer, the tank she was hiding behind rose into the air. The alien had found her.
Alex drew her plasma pistol and fired a few shots as she scurried to find somewhere else to hide while Vardis tore the tank apart. While she was fleeing, she imagined thousands of aliens like Vardis, all of them begging him not to kill them, their bodies broken and battered. She directed the thought toward him, again imagining a dagger hitting him in the forehead.
Vardis screamed again and dropped the shredded tank. As he clutched his forehead, he descended, then caught himself but didn’t go back up.
Roy jumped toward him, aiming a flying kick at the alien.
Vardis recovered fast enough to catch Roy in midair and fling him away. The amount of force he used was noticeably less.
Alex was preparing to double around and attack when Vardis’ riposte hit her.
The hangar disappeared.
Alex was at home in the living room. Her parents were on the couch. Their skin had been peeled back, and their eye sockets were empty. The room smelled like rotting flesh, and the smell was creeping up Alex’s nose. She screamed and took a step back.
Her parents stood and shambled toward her, growling words under their breath that made no sense, for they had no tongues. Alex knew what they were saying anyway.
You did this. You did this to us.
Alex screamed and screamed and shut her eyes tight. When she opened them, she was back in the hangar, curled in a ball on the floor. As she got back to her feet, she saw Vardis flying at her.
He landed on top of her hard and wrapped his hands around her throat, his face inches away from hers.
Alex choked as she tried to get out of Vardis’ grip. Even though she was panicking, Alex knew he had made a mistake. She reached up with her bionic arm and grabbed his neck with as much force as she could.
Vardis gasped for breath as he released her.
Alex flicked her wrist, drawing her scythe.
Before Alex could attack, Vardis pressed both hands to Alex’s head. The air around Alex shimmered, then she felt the weight of a thousand jackhammers hit her in the forehead.
The ground beneath her skull broke apart from the sheer amount of force. It was all Alex could do to shield herself.
Roy hit Vardis from the side and knocked the alien off her. She rolled away, holding her head as blood poured from her nose.
Out of the corner of her eye, Alex saw that Roy wasn’t letting up. He had grabbed the alien and pulled him to his feet. Roy punched him in the stomach, and as Vardis doubled over, the mech rider brought his elbow down on his neck.
Vardis stumbled back, raising his hands as if begging Roy to relent.
Roy cracked his knuckles and walked toward Vardis, but grabbed the side of his head and screamed in pain.
Vardis dashed forward, jumped up, and delivered a roundhouse kick to Roy’s head, sending the rider into a pile of debris from one of Vardis’ earlier attacks.
Then the alien lashed out with his telekinesis at Alex, hitting her in the chest.
Alex tumbled across the floor as Vardis lifted a tank into the air, positioning it right over her. He brought the tank down.
Alex reached out, trying to stop the tank from crushing her.
The tank froze in midair, vibrating from the stress of the two opposing psychics.
Roy slipped behind Vardis and put the alien in a half-Nelson.
The alien lost his focus, and Alex was able to move the tank far enough to be out of danger.
As Vardis struggled to get away from Roy, Alex rushed over and punched him in the face with her bionic arm. Vardis’ body slumped, and Alex hammered the alien with another blow. His body went limp, although Roy continued to hold him up. “Finish him,” he growled.
Alex looked at Vardis, who had blood trickling from his eyes. “I think he’s finished.”
Suddenly Vardis surged up, and the lights in the hangar went black. Alex felt herself tumbling, and she could no longer tell if she was in the real world or in the manipulation the alien had cast. Either way, she had been wrong. He was only getting started.
Chapter Four
“We can end this right now, Vardis! It doesn’t have to be a fight!”
Alex was stalling. Even though she and Roy had gotten the jump on Vardis a couple of times during the fight, it was becoming obvious that he outclas
sed them. Every time Alex thought they had the alien, he tossed them off and kept going.
Chine was going to be needed for this one. Alex wasn’t sure where he was, though. Roy had mentioned earlier that everyone had been evacuated. On top of that, Vardis was doing something to block communications.
Alex was able to reach Chine through a shared dream with Vardis when she was at home, though. The distance then had been greater, and she’d been under much more stress. If she’d contacted Chine then, she’d be able to do it now.
All Alex needed was for Vardis to focus on something other than killing her for a second. It was too hard to concentrate while dodging tanks.
“We both want the same thing—the end of the Dark One. There’s no reason one of us has to die.”
Vardis’ psychic energy lashed out of his body, tearing through a helicopter at his right. “One of us isn’t going to die. Both of you are.”
The ground in front of Vardis was vibrating from the energy coming off his body.
Alex focused on Chine, searching for him and concentrating on her message. Chine! I need you! Vardis is going to kill us!
She put everything she had into it, and as she focused, her skin grew hot, just like in the dream space. Without warning, flames burst out over her skin and shot from her eyes. As suddenly as the flames had erupted, they disappeared.
Alex fell to the floor, drained. She could hardly keep her eyes open. This was the most energy she’d ever expended using the draconic fluid in her blood. It felt as if she’d used it up.
Roy stepped in front of Alex and aimed his pistols at Vardis. “You take another step this way, and you’re gonna have a hole the size of a watermelon in your head, if there’s anything left.”
Vardis cackled as he floated into the air. “If you could have killed me, human, you would have. There’s no need to lie to yourself.”
Roy chuckled as he fired at Vardis, who waved away the blasts. “That’s because I’ve been playing with a handicap. Didn’t think I was going to have to bring out the big guns.” He slammed his hands together, and the exo-suit linked his fingers. He aimed his index fingers at the alien as if they were a gun. “Bang.”
