“No,” she says, voice low and dangerous. “But I’m not going to bullshit you, either.” She points to Embermane. “He just took on half of Acheryx and lived. You’re not on his level. I’m not.”
I turn away from her, hating the bitter truth of her words. Embermane’s almost in striking distance, now. Close enough that I can see how beat up he is. He hasn’t had time to heal, apparently, because his eye’s still missing and half of his face is painted red with gore. One of his arms is still shriveled and black and now most of his robe is gone, revealing a blackened and bleeding body that looks like it’s been used as a crash test dummy.
But even beat to hell, he positively radiates power, and if his injuries have slowed him, I can’t tell. Helplessness batters at me. It feels like we’re back on the Citadel with the odds stacked so far against us that we’re stuck in a game we were never meant to win.
The thought ticks something in my brain.
We survived the Citadel because we cheated the system. Because Astra got us out. We didn’t play by the rules, and we survived.
How can we use that now?
A cobalt beam of pure energy impacts the shields, aimed directly for us. Wick cries out and scrambles away as we duck away from the explosion of light. The beam is terrifying, consuming light that looks like it’d scour flesh from bone.
“Astra,” I say urgently as Jacinta shouts orders down to the crew. “The trick you pulled with Dusk. Where you… Reprogrammed her powers?”
Her face tightens. “That’s not a great explanation, but it’ll do for now.”
“Can you do it again?”
She looks to me, trying to puzzle what I’m thinking. “Yes…? Sam, what are you thinking?”
“I don’t know. Just… Give me a second.”
“We may not have that long,” Syl says. She prowls back and forth, claws out, quivering with frustration. I can sympathize. She’s used to taking the right to the enemy, getting up close and personal. The opposite of a fight like this.
“Just… Be ready, everyone. Dusk, can you hit him with your shadow fuckery?”
“Maybe,” she says, arms crossed tight below her breasts. “But he’s durable. You have no idea. I mean, look at him,” she says as he fires another beam into the balloon. It tears into the shields, and when I squint I can almost see them eroding. “He’s at less than half power, I’d estimate, and he’s still not even at close range. I could stab him a dozen times, if I can get through his shield, and it wouldn’t kill him.”
“Like hit points,” Mika muses. “The stronger you are, the tougher. It manifests in a gruesome way in Lifestream, but the concept is the same.”
“Incoming!” Jacinta shouts. “Prepare for a boarding party!”
We scramble to the edge. Embermane’s close now, less than a hundred feet away. Without warning, he stops, from breaking the sound barrier to completely still in a heartbeat.
Mereta, however, keeps going.
Embermane pulls his good arm, the arm that tows the cartoon woman, around in a wide arc. Mereta’s inertia and Embermane’s mighty throw sends her at us like a boulder thrown from a ballista. She hurtles toward the captain’s deck with enough force to tear through the ship and continue on.
We only have seconds. My mind races. We can’t fight Mereta and Ajax and whoever else she’s got tucked inside herself and Embermane at the same time.
They can get through the shield. But energy can’t…
“Mika, light them up!” I shout, voice ragged.
Battle instinct honed over weeks of near-death shit engage immediately, and she doesn’t hesitate. Her hands shoot forward and she pours a torrent of liquid death over Mereta. By the look on her face, I can tell she doesn’t think it’ll kill them. After all, her cartoon frame was barely affected by the flames back at the estate.
Luckily, I’m not trying to kill them.
Not directly, anyway.
As Embermane releases his grip on Mereta’s lasso, flame pours over her body, engulfing the ball. It licks and closes around her, hissing and grasping, turning her into a morning star of flame.
“Sam, what–” Astra shouts, falling backward as the ball of fiery death hurtles for us.
And impacts the shield.
Magical flame hits magical resistance.
Mereta and her passengers bounce off the shield.
For a moment, no one moves. Even Embermane gapes as guildmates that should have torn into the ship are repelled by the energy shield.
I peer over the edge and the others follow close behind.
It’s only been a few seconds, but the plummeting figures of Mereta, Ajax, and someone in black armor already dwindle below us. Wisps of flame still lick the Obsidians, clinging to their clothes as they fall toward the distant city. Their screams of terror float upward, sweet music to my ears.
I have to resist the urge to wave goodbye.
“Sam!” Mika laughs and hugs me from behind. “You goddamned genius. That was evil.”
Jacinta laughs. “I’m starting to see why Obsidian is after you. You’re dangerous.”
“Not done yet!” Syl calls, ducking as another beam of energy slams into the shield in front of our faces. This time, Embermane doesn’t relent, pouring more and more into us.
“Is it my imagination, or does that look weaker?” Mika clings to me.
“It’s at approximately thirty seven percent strength,” Astra says. We look to her, faces blank. “What? I can measure it visually.”
“Jacinta, we need more time!” To figure out something. Anything.
The ship tilts as Graham spins the wheel below. His huge arms bulge as The Ezio veers broadside.
“Firing!” Jacinta booms, tapping a series of tattoos at her elbows.
Cannons deafen us. Balls of purple flame explode outward, peppering the air around Embermane with a series of concussions that buffet him. For a moment, it almost looks like it’s too much for him… His shielding ignites bright white and he cuts off his attack as his body spins away. One shot hits him full on, spinning him like a top in the air.
“Got the asshole!” Jacinta cheers.
“Come on,” I whisper. “Come on…”
It’s not enough. Embermane recovers, teeth bared in a rictus grin. His eye lights with blue incandescence as he considers us. “You know, I’ve come to a decision,” he bellows, and even over the concussive blasts of the cannons we can hear him like he’s standing on the deck with us. “Avalon and Kara wanted you alive, Sam Warner. But you’ve been too much trouble.” He swoops sideways, deftly avoiding a violet explosion. His movement’s much quicker now that he’s not firing on us. “I’m just going to kill you right now.”
“Like to see you try, fucker,” I murmur. “Astra. Get one of your magic pills ready.”
“What are you thinking, Sam?” she asks.
“Not sure yet.” I flash them a confident grin. “We’ll get out of this like we always do.”
“Last minute fuckery?” Mika asks.
“Deus ex machina?” Astra winks.
“Our wits,” Syl says firmly.
“You people are crazy,” Dusk growls.
“I hope you are, too, because you’re part of this,” I say.
“Uh, whatever you’re going to do,” Jacinta says, voice hitching, “better get to it.”
I turn, and at first I don’t spot Embermane. “Where…” There. He’s above us now, good arm thrown back. And in his hand is something enormous, ten times bigger than his body.
An axe.
Made entirely of blue lightning, it forms slowly as he stares down at us, his one eye wild with rage. Bolts of energy crackle from his body and tear themselves apart before absorbing into his new weapon, and each time, it grows.
“Super Saiyan,” Mika whispers. “No way we can survive that.”
“How long until he finishes it, Dusk?” I ask, trying to stay calm and failing.
For once, she’s not snide. “I… I have no idea. I’ve never seen an
attack like that before. I mean, I’ve heard of them… Ultimate powers only unlocked at level 40, but I’ve never seen one used.” Her glassy eyes blink and she shakes her head. “Not very long.”
“Sam.” Astra holds a finger up. A silver bubble the size of a marble balances on her finger. “Done.”
“What do we do with it?” Syl asks.
“Working on it!” I brace my hands on the deck and extend my gift. If I can pull him close, disrupt his spell somehow, maybe…
I can barely see Embermane at this point. His magic is larger than the airship, a giant, crackling weapon poised to fall on us like an executioner’s blade. The skin on my arms raises like I’m standing near a lightning strike. I don’t know how long it takes for him to finish the summoning, but I’ve got a bad feeling it’s close.
I push my gift further, dancing along channels of power that lance outward from Embermane’s body. Then further, closing in on the mage.
I run into his shield. It stops my probe cold, turning my mind aside like oil separating from water. I growl, pushing harder, pouring so much of myself into the gift that the old, familiar spike of pain erupts in my brain despite the fact that I’m doing nothing more than probing. Blood erupts from my nose, coating my lips, and along with the burning energy building in the air, I almost fall.
Syl is there. Arms like iron band me, hold me up. “Thanks,” I manage, only half aware.
The other half’s pushing. Pushing. My gift skips along the hard lines of Embermane’s shield, panes of energy that coat his body like a second skin. I zip along its surface, turned aside over and over, searching for a way in.
The axe is the size of a building and still growing. Cerulean light burns in his eye and socket and even his mouth when he opens it to laugh. It’s uncontrolled and terrifying, like he’s burning himself out to kill us in the process.
Frantic, I push harder. Search. He could kill us now if he wanted. We’d never survive a hit from that monstrosity. But he’s not satisfied and pours more and more power into it.
Its blade eclipses the moon.
My mind runs along his chest, up his neck, and then…
There. His eye. Energy erupts from his eye socket, pouring out with far more ferocity than anywhere else. And at that spot, his shield’s disrupted. Intact, but weak. In fact, I can feel its frayed edges like torn cloth, can grasp its torn fibers and…
Pull them.
“Sam! Sam!” I realize distantly that Mika’s been screaming my name. Astra, too.
“Found… Weak spot!” I manage, blood bubbling from my cracked lips. “Astra… Get it ready!”
“It is, but how–”
“Dusk! Shadow… spear…” God, I’m tired. Speaking is too much. Too hard. I grit my teeth, hold tight to the threads of weakness in Embermane’s shield. “Poison arrow…”
Astra’s eyes widen as she realizes. “Dusk, do as he says. Make a shadow spear. Hold it here a moment.”
Dusk pauses an instant, face twisted and skeptical, before her eyes dark to Embermane’s summoning. “Fuck it,” she hisses. Her fingers twist, and a shaft of darkness raises from the deck.
Astra presses the blob of silver to its tip. It melts, coating the spear’s smoking blade.
“Hurry!” Wick screams from somewhere.
The blade starts to fall.
“Eye!” I shout. “Socket!”
Dusk’s mouth twists as she throws her hand upward.
A lance of shadow flicks through the air.
The axe lowers, twenty feet from the balloon.
I take the edges of Embermane’s shield and I pull.
It doesn’t break.
Ten feet. Bits of lightning shatter against the Ezio’s shielding.
Shadow darts upward, so close. So close.
I cry out as I yank with every fiber of my being. Only Syl’s arms keep me from falling to the deck as I tear and rend.
Five feet.
The shield tears open.
One foot.
Dusk’s lance of shadow slices into a crackling socket.
Embermane screams.
The effect is instant. The axe doesn’t explode into a million sparks, doesn’t shatter and dissipate.
It simply ceases to exist.
Embermane’s lights die. The energy coruscating from his hands disappears. The magic sizzling from his eyes and dancing from his body extinguish like someone’s flicked a switch.
He falls.
And he screams. And screams. And screams.
Dusk’s spear isn’t enough to kill him. But Astra’s essence has robbed him of his power, and so he watches us with his remaining eye as he passes us, throat raw as he shrieks.
As his face twists as if to ask: How?
Syl lowers me to the deck.
I’m not sure how long I’m out. I know I’ve overdone it. My brain feels torn, ripped apart. I’ve lost too much blood. I’ve been using my power almost nonstop since the fight at the Estate, and now I’m burned out inside. Am I dying? You’d think, after everything we’ve been through, that I shouldn’t have to ask.
I think I am.
Saved us, though. Saved the girls.
I pass out again. It’s not for long. Something shakes me.
“Sam, Sam, wake up,” Mika sobs. “Oh, Jesus, Sam… Don’t… Wake up. We can save you if you’ll just wake the fuck up and–”
“Let me,” Astra says. I can’t open my eyes, but her voice is calm. Assured.
A tube pushes into my mouth, then down my throat. It’s thin, no bigger than a straw. I’m too exhausted to even gag. I lay in Syl’s arms, unable to even wonder what she’s up to.
Something trickles from the tube and down my throat. I swallow reflexively, once. It’s all I can manage.
My eyes snap open.
Healing potion.
It absorbs instantly, repairing the damage done by power. My mind snaps into shape, and the steady flow of blood from my nose staunches. Capillaries, torn so wide they gushed moments ago, close like new. Strength floods my limbs and I sit up like a shot, eyes wide.
“Did we win?”
Mika, crouched in front of me, sobs out a ragged laugh. “Yeah… We’re good. You saved us.”
“We saved us,” I say, coughing the last bits of blood from my too dry mouth. I reach out, grasping for Astra’s fingers. I find them, squeezing tight. “And you saved me. How?”
Astra ducks her head, sheepish. “When I put the healing potion inside my body to hide it. Back in the alley. I kinda… Well… Snuck a bit of it. Kept it safe. Just in case.”
Mika shoves her, laughing. “And you didn’t tell us?”
“That was days ago,” I say, shaking my head in wonder. “You’ve kept it as an ace in the hole this entire time?”
“Girl needs her secrets.”
I pull her close, swallowing her giggle with a kiss. “Thank you.” I turn to Mika, pull her close for a hug. Then a kiss of her own. “Thank you,” I whisper to her fervently. I reach up, turning my head as I lace my fingers into Syl’s hair as I pull her down for one more. “Thank you.”
We stay like that for a long moment, just existing.
We did it. We survived. Again.
Somehow.
“If you start orgying on the deck I’m gonna puke,” Dusk says.
“For once, I agree with bitchy girl,” Jacinta says. As least she’s got the good grace to stand with her back to us. “Maybe you guys need a room…?”
“No, not yet,” I say, bounding up. I grip her hand. “Thank you, too. You were amazing.”
“Seriously. Definitely into pirates, now,” Mika grins.
Jacinta eyes the thick curve of Mika’s ass. “Feeling’s entirely mutual, lass.”
Astra holds her hands to her chest, taking a long breath. “That was amazing, Sam. I don’t know how you do it, how you think of things like that over and over. Save us over and over. But we’re so… We’re so lucky to have you.”
“It is why we follow him,” Syl says, grinn
ing smugly. “I have said it from the beginning. He is worthy.” Her eyes are impossibly large, and moonlight swims in them, only partially obscuring the hunger lurking in their depths.
“Boss!” Wick says, bounding onto the deck and into my arms. His furry arms wrap around my chest as he laughs. “You fuckin’ badass! You guys did it! I thought we were assfucked six ways from Sunday, but you did it. God damn!” His mouth goes a mile a minute, adrenaline draining.
I throw him onto my shoulder where he sits. “We did, Wick. We wouldn’t be standing here right now without you.”
“Yeah, we’re all amazing,” Mika says, beaming. “Next stop, mothafuckin’ Threvian home ship, bitches!”
“You people are delusional,” Dusk says.
Her words are a cold blanket over our celebration.
She stares at us like we’re the stupidest people that have ever lived. She takes a trembling step forward, fingers twitching like she wants to shadow stab all of us right there. “Do you have any idea what you’ve done? What we’ve done?”
“Killed some asshole before he could kill us?” I quip. “Dealt with a wet blanket afterward?”
Dusk’s eyes are pinched with barely controlled rage. “No. We just killed one of the most powerful people on the server. One of the leaders of Obsidian. A guild that controls more resources, more money, and more people than most corporations on old Earth.” Her mouth works. “This isn’t a victory. It’s a stay of execution.”
“We’ve survived this long,” I say hollowly. “Survived Embermane.”
“You haven’t even met Avalon,” she says, rubbing a shaking hand across her eyes. “They’re coming for us, and when they do? After all this? We won’t be able to hide in hell.”
I want to retort, to tell her to leave. To shut up.
But I don’t. Something her in her eyes and her voice stops me.
She’s terrified.
Suddenly, a ding echoes across the sky, and I level. Judging by the gasps around me and those below, everyone on the ship does. I imagine that, somewhere far below, Embermane’s body just splatted to a screaming halt.
It’s a brutal exclamation point tacked on Dusk’s words.
A minute passes where no one speaks. Where all we do is contemplate her terrible words.
Aspirant 2: A Sci-Fi Harem Adventure Page 48
