by Unknown
Since the translation panes only worked in one direction, they alowed him complete freedom to fire or throw things outward; he just had to do so blindly. These weapons were enchanted for just that purpose. As they landed wel beyond his pyramid they discharged, sending a storm of
electrical arcs in every direction.
While the translation panes protected him, he stil felt a strange jolt through the ground, like a mild buzzing. Note to self: if you aren’t careful, you could still electrocute yourself.
After a few seconds, he stood up and took a hasty look around. Most of the tortuses were stil, though a few were shaking in a strange way the reminded him of a seizure. Two of those farthest away were stil active. He remedied that by pointing his lightning rod at them and giving them a more personal shock.
For the moment, he had won.
He deactivated the Fool’s Tesseract and headed for the building. A few of the military androids were stil around, lurking behind the cover of the building or pretending to be inactive by laying stil on the ground, but it wasn’t enough to require the tesseract. He walked on, dodging when necessary and making certain that those brave enough to shoot once didn’t manage to do so twice.
The question now was where to go? Presumably the egg was being kept in the facility, maybe in a deep underground level similar to the place he had found Karen. But what if they had moved it? He would feel pretty damn stupid if he had gone through al of that, including losing his hand, only to find that they had moved the egg somewhere he couldn’t find it.
Without Gary, there was no way he could locate it again. Correction—even with Gary, he wouldn’t be able to find it again. The machine had
told him that he could no longer scavenge the network for information. An entire world was a large place, and this one was uniquely hostile. This was his only chance.
Even if they’re just machines, they’re intelligent, Matthew reasoned. If it isn’t here, I’ll just keep coming back and blowing things up until they come to the intelligent decision that it would be better to just give back the egg. With his current bravado, he could almost believe that, but deep down he knew he wouldn’t have the strength for it. Once he left, he was never coming back.
The main entrance of the building was a pair of what had until recently been a beautiful set of glass doors. Now they were shattered and in ruins. I should tell someone so they can fix them, thought Matt wryly. Glancing around at the burnt and torn lawn, covered in broken, smoking, and in some cases burning machines, he decided not to bother. They’ve got bigger problems to worry about. He suppressed what would probably have been a semi-hysterical giggle. The stress was definitely getting to him.
He was just starting up the steps to the entrance when he felt it. It was Desacus’s aythar, bright and strong. Matt was so glad to see it that he almost hesitated when his extra sense warned him of danger. Almost.
Directing his power downward against the ground, he leapt skyward. It was the only option to avoid the massive blast of power that obliterated the entrance, the steps, and what little had remained of the once-proud doors.
He sailed thirty feet into the air, and as he reached his apogee, he decided that he had probably overreacted. Adrenaline was funny like that.
Now he had to manage a considerable fal. He was also a convenient target, since he couldn’t dodge while in the air.
Sure enough, his precognition warned him he was about to be blasted. Without enough time to get the words out to activate the staff, he
created a shield instead: double layered, with a soft cushiony exterior and a hard, inner layer. If he survived the blast, it would do double duty by breaking his fal.
The shield held, barely, but the force of it ripped away the outer layer and sent him hurtling to the side at dangerous speed. When he finaly struck the ground, the jarring impact rattled him so hard he was almost rendered senseless. His vision returned a second later and he found himself sprawled against a dead tortus. His shield was gone—he had lost it during his momentary blackout—but nothing seemed broken.
He felt as though he were swimming, though. Maybe a concussion, he realized. In the distance, he could see his dragon’s aythar, so bright it had extended the range of his magesight, like a lighthouse on a dark sea. It was approaching.
He needed to protect himself. The staff was his first thought, but it was gone; he had lost it in the fal. Struggling to his feet, he looked around for it, but his eyes weren’t cooperating. Everything was blurry, and his balance felt off.
Several thoughts ran through his jumbled mind at once. First, he might be about to die at the hand, or claw, of his own dragon. Second,
dragons couldn’t use their aythar, not directly. Only a mage bonded to the dragon could do that. Third, he was supposed to be the only mage left in this world. Fourth, Annie had been a beautiful dog. It had realy bothered him seeing her kiled.
My thoughts are disordered. Not a good thing, considering his current situation. He reached for his enchanted shield stones, but then changed his mind. They were excelent protection, but another blast like the last would knock him unconscious with that sort of rigid shield. It might even kil him.
The itching in his left hand was driving him mad, and it was accompanied now by an aching throb. Glancing at, it he could see it was red and swolen. I’m going to regret that choice, he thought idly. Then he realized he had lost track of his priorities. His enemy was fifty feet away, studying him.
His vision cleared, and he saw the dark metal of one of the special ANSIS androids. It leveled a searing blast of flame and heat at him, which he only narrowly avoided by dodging sideways. He stumbled and almost fel as he did.
“Nice to meet you,” he announced in English.
A dragonling was on the android’s shoulder, its long slender tailed wrapped firmly around the throat of the machine to hold it securely in position.
“You speak English,” observed the machine. “What are you? She’Har, or something else? Where is Karen?”
Matthew felt slightly more confident now that the battle had shifted to conversation. With every second that passed, his balance was improving.
He hoped. “I’m a nutjob,” he answered proudly, then adding, “A completely human nutjob. What are you? Are you Karen’s mother?”
It stared at him briefly, its face incapable of expression, while it wondered if his mind had been damaged. Finaly, it answered, “We are many things. Karen’s creator is among them. Give her to us and we wil let you leave unharmed.”
The demand didn’t sit wel with him. “I have a counterproposal. Give me back my dragon, and I’l let you leave here unharmed.”
“Your proposal is rejected,” responded the machine. “You wil not leave here alive.”
“On the contrary,” he replied, “I can leave whenever I like, but I hold the upper hand. I’ve survived everything you could throw at me, and destroyed your army in the process. The only reason I remain is to give you the opportunity to surrender my dragon to me.”
Briefly, it considered his words, then decided they were merely a bluff. Rather than answer, it would annihilate him while he was off-guard.
He felt the impending attack an instant before it came. It would be a wide blast of raw power, too broad for him to dodge and too powerful for him to shield against. However it had managed it, the machine was a mage of some sort, and it was using the vast power provided by the dragon.
Matthew had spent his late childhood sparring with his sister on many afternoons. They had fought with their power in much the same way that many normal siblings wrestled. While he had always been slightly stronger, he had learned early on that simple strength was not the most important thing when fighting with magic.
A true wizard’s strength was imagination.
As the machine was beginning its attack, he ripped the ground from beneath it, puling upward. The android fel backward and the blast went
tearing through the air above his head. Even as it fel, he was steppin
g backward and tossing a few of his enchanted metal spheres in its direction.
Lightning erupted from them. He hoped it would be a quick end to the fight.
“Hope in one hand and shit in the other,” his father had once said. “See which one fills up faster.” Supposedly it was a saying from his grandfather, but in any case, it was certainly true today. The thing he fought shielded itself, and stood up from the torn ground, unharmed.
Running sideways, he only just avoided its massive return blast.
They fought that way for a minute that lasted an eternity, and as eternity dragged on, Matthew could see he had several problems… and a few advantages. In the technical sense, he was a stronger wizard than his opponent. He could discern that with his magesight. The machine was roughly as powerful as Karen had been. Matthew was also much more skiled.
In a fair fight, he would have already won.
But they were fighting in a world starved for aythar, and while his reserves were limited, its were not. It could draw nigh inexhaustible power from the dragon, while he was growing steadily weaker.
Because of that, it did everything as powerfuly as possible. Its shields were as strong as it could make. The blasts it hurled at him were intense and broad, making them difficult to dodge. If he had met the thing while at his best, he might have been able to overwhelm it, break its shield, and destroy it before the dragon enabled it to wear him down. But it was too late for that.
He had been fighting for most of the day, and he had run through his normal reserves several times over, replenishing them with aythar stored in his iron spheres. While he had enough power to fight, he was a hundred miles from being anywhere near his best. His fatigue would have broken him already if he hadn’t bolstered himself artificialy with a spel earlier, and that was beginning to wear thin.
He had a solution, though, and he lifted it from his pouch: a flat, triangular piece of metal, covered in runes. In appearance, it looked similar to some of the odd throwing weapons that Cyhan’s people used, but it was far deadlier.
Its function, when activated, would produce a triangular translation pane, three feet wide on each side. If thrown and then activated, it would pass through anything in its way—metal, shields, nothing could deter its path; it would slice through anything that existed. It was quite literaly a blade that cut through reality itself.
He had used a spel to do something similar once before, when he and Gram had fought the dark god, Chel’strathek. At that time, he had
constructed the spel on the spot, but it had taken him several minutes. The enchanted weapon he held was much better since it could be used in an instant.
The problem was also that it could cut through anything, including the immortality enchantment that had made the dark god invulnerable—an
enchantment very similar to the one that sustained the dragon around his enemy’s neck.
If his attack hit the dragon, it would destroy it. Permanently. The fact that the resulting release of nearly a ful Celior of aythar would also destroy him and everything else for miles around didn’t even enter into the equation for him. He wanted his dragon back.
Another warning, and another near miss. His body couldn’t keep this up for much longer, but he stil wouldn’t use the weapon. His opponent’s attacks were growing more erratic, and he thought he knew why.
It was beginning to experience burnout.
It was a problem that in the past had mainly happened to channelers —humans using the power of the shining gods. The power they used was
far greater than their human forms could handle, and it eventualy kiled them. Mages rarely encountered that problem since they exhausted
themselves before reaching that point. The dragon made it entirely possible, though, and the machine was using its power profligately.
If he could hold out long enough, the machine might kil itself, or at least render itself unable to use power. With that newfound hope, he dodged again.
And fel when his foot came down on something that roled beneath it.
The edge of the blast clipped him, and only the enchanted leathers he wore kept it from ripping his side apart. It spun him around and he fel, bleeding from his shoulder and thigh. The smooth metal of the Fool’s Tesseract lay in front of him. He had tripped over it.
Had his talent made him dodge in that direction so he would find it? That was a question he could ponder later. Grabbing it, he levered himself up and activated it. “Talto maen , eilen kon , sadeen lin , amyrtus !” Matthew was wrapped in comforting darkness as the six translation panes sprang into existence around him, protecting him from the outside world.
It was hard to catch his breath. He was breathing hard and everything hurt, but he could finaly relax. Maybe his foe would finish burning itself out while trying to blast him inside his perfect defense. The Fool’s Tesseract was seven feet long on each side, big enough to stretch out and take a nap in if necessary.
Not that he would be that foolish. Slowly, he got to his feet and began an inventory of his injuries. Thigh muscle, torn and bleeding, shoulder
dislocated, bruises everywhere, and I’m definitely concussed . It was surely time to retreat.
Instead he fingered his triangular weapon with his left hand. The cool metal felt good against its fevered flesh. If he could find a way to separate the dragon from his enemy, he could kil it.
Then the android appeared inside the tesseract, standing a foot from his nose. It had teleported, to the interior of his defense.
Cold dread gripped his heart. His death was only inches away, smeling of oil and cool metal. A metal arm rose, too quick to avoid, and
smashed into his chest with bone breaking force. He was faling.
Lifting his arm as he fel, he activated the weapon without throwing it. The translation pane sliced his hand into several pieces—and neatly bisected the android, as wel as the staff that maintained the Fool’s Tesseract.
Suddenly there was sunlight again, blinding him. The tesseract had been destroyed, but he hardly cared. Matthew was struggling to breathe.
Bleeding, that’s easy, but breathing is a bitch. Something was broken in his chest, and his ruined hand was pumping blood out onto the ground rapidly. He managed to seal the artery and stop the bleeding just before the sun went dark and he lapsed gratefuly into unconsciousness.
Chapter 53
Someone was staring down at him. He could see a face with a halo of golden hair around it. The sun made it seem as though it was glowing.
“Are you awake?” came a voice that was beautifuly resonant and melodic. It was a man’s voice.
“Not sure,” he mumbled. Matthew’s throat was dry and he sounded hoarse. “This is probably a dream.”
“This isn’t a dream,” said the man. “You have to shift back home, before they find you.”
He tried a joke. “They already found me, several times.” Then he asked, “Who are you?”
“It’s me, Gary. I forgot, you wouldn’t recognize me in this body.”
“But you’re human,” protested Matt. Definitely a dream.
Gary patted his chest. “No, stil a machine. This is a civilian android. It belonged to one of the researchers at the Whittington lab.”
Something else occurred to him. “I sent you back to my world. How can you be here?”
The android shook its head. “You send a piece of me back. The rest of me was stil here, in hiding. ANSIS controls everything now. I only
managed to steal this body during the confusion when you destroyed my late-wife’s prototype. The entire system went into a kind of shock after that, but it won’t last long.
“They’l begin combing the area soon. ANSIS has already noticed my deception. You need to go home quickly.”
Matt wanted to laugh, but it hurt too much to try. “Look at me. If I shift back, I’l just drown in the ocean or die in some deserted wilderness. I can’t move. Besides, I’ve already made up my mind. I came for my dragon, and I’m not leaving without it
.”
“Such stubbornness,” observed the android. “Who did you inherit that from, I wonder?”
Matt grinned at him through bloodstained teeth. “I got a double helping of stubborn on both sides. I come by it honestly.”
Gary bent down and lifted something from the ground, holding it up so Matthew could see it without turning his head. “This is what you wanted, is it not?”
It was a dragon egg.
Relief flooded through Matthew. He hadn’t destroyed it. Kiling the machine-mage, the one bonded to it, had caused the newly hatched dragon to die. The enchantment had reverted back to the egg state, awaiting a new bond.
“Yes.”
Gary placed the egg in Matthew’s stil-good right hand. “Now shift back. You’ve accomplished what you intended.”
“Come with me.”
Gary gave him a sad look. “There’s no point. This body won’t last. In a week, the batteries wil be depleted. They don’t put RTG’s in civilian androids.”
“It wil last longer than I wil if I shift back alone,” argued Matthew.
“You have a point,” Gary agreed. “Very wel, bring me along.” Kneeling, he took Matthew’s hand in one of his and held the egg in his free
hand. “Let’s go.”
They did.
It wasn’t easy. Planeshifting wasn’t particularly draining, but it took focus and concentration, things Matthew was in short supply of currently.
After several minutes and a few false starts, he finaly managed it.
For once, they didn’t arrive over the ocean, and Matt found himself lying on a bed of soft grass. But his peace was instantly broken when Gary lifted him up and moved him several feet over, and then began slapping and brushing at his side. He screamed in agony, but the android refused to listen.
When it was over, Gary explained, “There was an anthil beneath you.”
Matt glared at him, “Sadist. You enjoyed that!” He knew it wasn’t true, but he hurt too badly to say otherwise. Then he passed out once more.
