Soul Shelter

by Nathan Thompson

  “Usssss,” the second added.

  “Herrrr,” the third one sighed.

  “No,” I answered bluntly, drawing my halfblade again, and pacing slowly to the right. The horde adjusted their encirclement, obeying the Longman’s command to deal with me instead of Nova.

  “Thanks, Jas,” my friend said as she brought a hand up to work her own powers. “That’s all I need. You’re still not allowed to die.”

  Bright light washed out from her, but I couldn’t afford to turn my attention to her yet. My best friend’s survival depended on Nestor and I drawing away as many enemies as possible.

  Are you up for this, brother? I told the terrified mouse clinging to my back, the one who had grown up on a world ruined by an undead apocalypse.

  Yes-yes, the little mouse said as he slowly stopped shaking. I-help. Save-save.

  That’s the spirit, I told my tiny friend as we linked deeper awareness, giving him a subconscious picture of my intentions and how he could help. He squeaked in agreement, and as I charged the right flank of the unliving mob, he crawled up my shoulder, activating a thin shield of qi over his body.

  He leaped clear of me just as I slashed into the zombie at the very edge of the pack. This one had been thoroughly weakened by my earlier fire, with one of his arms burned to ash. He swung the other arm at me as I slashed down with my halfblade, and my weapon took off his forearm.

  “Give—” he started to say, before my next swing severed his head.

  By then, four more walking corpses had begun to encircle me, but Nestor flashed across their faces one by one. The small cuts he left didn’t do anything more than distract them, but the momentary loss of attention was all I needed. I relied on my own enhanced speed and darted around them, striking their necks and heads.

  Once again, I recalled the mountain of literature written about the walking dead, how fire and destruction of the head were the two best methods to deal with them. I had taken every one of those stories to be fiction at the time, just as I had done with the stories regarding dragons, but so far they were proving completely accurate. Every time the unliving bodies lost their head or were destroyed, they fell to the ground like un-stringed puppets, regardless of how much leftover Source energy or other power they had left inside themselves. But as soon as my four foes fell to the ground, three more swayed into range, glowing slightly as they used Source power to speed themselves up.

  I leaned back as the first undead swiped a blackened hand at me, but the second was fast enough to catch the sleeve above my free hand. He yanked hard, pulling me toward him.

  Right then, I belatedly recognized these three as the strongest former practitioners, ones already at the second stage of qi advancement. They were still slower than me, but I had no chance to escape their grip on my own. So I leaped into the air and tried to twist around my grappler, stabbing the unliving monster right in the forehead with my Sourceweapon.

  But the halfblade just clanked against the zombie’s skull, cracking it, but failing to penetrate to the brain. Another hand from a zombie behind me caught the back of my tunic, pulling me in two different directions, and probably dooming me, but for the dark, furry object flashing across my enemies’ eyes.

  The monster gripping my back let go to swipe at Nestor, and that gave me the space I needed. I channeled a drop of fire qi to activate another technique, one that coated my blade with a light tongue of red flame. I stabbed into the exact same spot as last time, and this time the enhanced flesh and Source energy gave way to my fiery attack.

  I turned to deal with the remaining pair of dead as the brain-burnt body crumpled to the ground. Nestor was darting back and forth between the two zombies, slashing at their necks one at a time, as if they were both trees and he was some sort of hop-scotch lumberjack. I charged into one monster just as he leaped off it and over my head, slashing my burning weapon into the deep cut he had already made, tearing through the monster’s spine and decapitating it. I took a split-second to confirm its end before turning to the last enemy nearby, but that one was already tumbling to the floor as well, its head converted into a makeshift torch. Nestor leaped clear of the body to land on my shoulder.

  Not-hard, he said, sounding surprised. These-weak.

  I couldn’t argue with him. For all their durability, these corpses were slower and less sentient than the undead wolves Nestor and I had faced before, and even more vulnerable to fire and cranial destruction.

  See how many more you can take out on your own, like you did just now, and to the undead blood-wolf from our earlier battle, I advised the little mouse as I turned my gaze to the next clump of zombies, doing my best not to pay attention to the sudden storm of light erupting from where Nova was standing. You have a knack for setting this sort of monster on fire.

  Yes-Yes! the little mouse replied. Burn-burn!

  Burn-burn, I said as I nodded grimly, and Nestor and I separated to deal with the last two clumps of undead trying to encircle Nova and I. I burned my essence charm to increase my speed even further, and launched a flying kick into the lead corpse, knocking it into two more zombies and sending them all tumbling to the floor in an awkward pile.

  As I landed, the remaining upright enemy activated a technique of his own, launching forward in a surprising burst of speed and catching me by the throat.

  “Give—” he started to moan, lifting me into the air, but this time I maintained enough presence of mind to activate my grappling charm, shrug myself free of his hand, and put my burning halfblade into his eye.

  To my surprise, he still didn’t go down, meaning that this body was somehow even stronger than the ones I had noticed earlier. But I knew he had to be close to death, so I yanked my halfblade and body backwards and fired a mana bolt into the zombie’s skull. The undead practitioner shuddered once, then crumpled to the floor.

  The other three zombies were still trying to disentangle from each other when I leaped over to them and began stabbing them in the backs of their heads. They proved to be far weaker than my last enemy, as each died to one blow.

  I turned around to see Nestor finish off the last zombie by firing a flaming bolt straight up from under the monster’s opened jaw, before leaping free and looking about for more enemies.

  But all he and I both found left was the Longman looming over Nova.

  My friend, the young woman I had grown up with, the last Beacon ever created by Vessa Soulship, glowed like a miniature exploding star. Her Soulscape’s bright-white wings illuminated her half of the room, and white fire coated her robes and skin. She swung her now-blazing baton about as if she had been born holding it, slashing, thrusting, parrying whenever the Longman’s clawed hands struck out at her. Her face was a tense mask of concentration, and I knew she was spending all of her power, all of her focus, on this one foe, this mutated corpse possessed by something from beyond the night sky. Her blows were expert, precise, and executed without a shred of wasted energy. She put my entire combat experience to shame, as if she was the one who had been fighting longer than I had.

  But each time she struck, the Longman simply swayed out of the way, letting out a high-pitched giggle that echoed off the walls of the room, and because they did not fade, each new miss added another layer of insanity to everyone’s ears.

  I have to help her, part of my mind argued, even as my feet glued themselves to the floor.

  It was a stupid thought. The Longman was not slow like the spawn he created. Nova was far faster than me, especially right now as she activated spells and techniques, yet she had not landed a single blow, and each strike from the monster clearly took more and more energy from her to dodge and parry. A single lazy strike from the thing would break me in half.

  Nestor was not slow, either, the brave part of my mind argued. I looked down at the little warrior mouse next to me, the one who had just danced burning death among entire packs of shambling abominations.

  Nestor could move even faster than Nova, despite their difference in power. But he
lacked sufficient force to damage the swaying, giggling freak before us.

  But what is force? the brave madman in my mind asked.

  And to my horror, the new wisp of my mana answered.

  Force is the multiplication of mass against acceleration, my new physics mana whispered. And force applied at the proper angles, and with the proper leverage, can produce new results.

  Traitors, I whispered to every brave corner of my mind, before turning my words to Nestor. We have a way to aid Nova. Take my weapon, and leap into the palm of my hands.

  Scared-scared, the tiny thing admitted reluctantly, but he still leaped into my hands and took my sword’s handle in his mouth and paws, strong enough to hold the weapon despite his size.

  We cannot increase his size, the naive, enlightened part of my brain whispered, but we do not need to.

  The formula for force whispered its way into my mana, becoming a spell. As Nestor trembled in my paws, I cast the new spell over and over. The little mouse began to feel heavier in my palms, and the blade of my weapon began to vibrate. Through my half-closed eyes, I could see Nestor working his own arts, his little body humming with qi and essence.

  Nova and the Longman continued to duel a few dozen feet away from us. Air whipped all about from the force of their attacks. But each strike from Nova only resulted in more giggling from the monster, and each counter-swing from the elongated giant took more and more energy from Vessa’s Beacon to deflect or dodge.

  I felt my last mote of spare mana vanish with the next casting of my new spell, but I knew it was not enough. So I pulled the battery ring from my Soulscape, which I had recently tapped full of mana, and drained it dry.

  Wait for it, I whispered into Nestor’s mind as I continued casting the spell. This will only work for one strike.

  Yes-yes, the little mouse sent back with a nod, still trembling slightly. Save-save.

  So Nova kept fighting. And I kept casting. And the Longman kept giggling.

  I finally ran out of spare mana, and began slowly walking forward, getting us closer to the fight. Nestor now felt over ten times heavier than he originally had. And the halfblade in his mouth vibrated with an audible hum.

  As Nova spun tiredly away from the undead giant, the Longman leaned forward and opened his mouth, spewing a black fog that rolled over her. Nova immediately shielded herself with her wings, and the white fire covering her concentrated over them to burn away the dark miasma.

  But as she flung her wings open to banish the last of the breath, the Longman’s hand swung down and smashed into my friend. The blow shattered her wings into shards of light and drove her into the floor. She immediately leaped to her feet, but then the undead giant grabbed her by the weapon-arm, lifting her up, and slammed her back down on the floor, pinning her baton out of the way.

  “Caaauughhht youuuu,” the thing moaned in a deep, hollow tone. “Little shipppp,”

  Now, I said to my little friend, and he leaped through the air in a humming blur.

  Nestor’s mass had increased considerably, and thanks to the nature of my physics mana, his speed had not decreased. The weapon I had given him continued to hum, the blade vibrating with an acceleration of its own. I was unsure if that factor would help, but I had wanted to do everything I could think of to give Nestor every advantage possible.

  The little mouse blurred through the air, massive sword still in his mouth, moving faster than any other combatant still in the room possibly could. The closer he came to his goal the smaller he looked in comparison to his target, and the more ridiculous his inflicting any kind of damage on the Longman seemed.

  And if not for proper application of force, that would have been completely true.

  But as Nestor spun his body to put his entire mass behind his swing, the vibrating Sourceweapon sliced into one of the many joints on the unsuspecting monster’s arm, the one currently pinning Nova’s weapon hand to the ground. To both of our happy surprise, the strike carried all the way through, completely severing the limb. Nestor went hurtling past his target, dropping my weapon and bouncing his way across the floor in a fluffy tumble of over-energized limbs.

  From what I could tell, he was fine, except for a few bruises. The Longman was a different matter.

  The undead thing looked at his wounded limb in disbelief, finally realizing he had been struck. Then his jaw hung wide open, as the monstrous puppet let out a hissing cry of pain.

  And at that moment, Nova tore the remains of his severed hand from her shoulder, raised her baton, and fired a beam of white fire into the monster’s open mouth.

  The Longman’s head lit up like a torch, and the beast backed away screaming, clearly feeling pain despite being a supposed puppet. He backed away from Nova, still burning, his head whipping about, as if he was trying to find the one responsible for his death. His gaze settled upon me, his only weaponless enemy at the moment, and his glassy eyes flashed with both hate and fire.

  “You,” the monster croaked, taking a step toward me, inexplicably deciding I was the one responsible for his death and defeat. “You interferrrrred—”

  Nova rose from the floor and fired another blast of fire, redoubling the inferno around the Longman’s skull, cutting off the creature’s voice as whatever magic powering the wretched thing finally burned out. The monster collapsed to the floor, still burning, as Nova’s fire slowly but methodically consumed his entire body.

  My friend nearly fell to the floor as she struggled to catch her breath, panting from the exertion of combat. I heaved great gulps of air as well. Nova’s outraged scream startled me, but as I looked up I saw that she was blasting the severed hand lying near her, the only part of the monster’s body that hadn’t burned yet.

  “Freak!” she shouted. “How do you like that, you creepy, giant, doll-obsessed weirdo! Play with your puppets now, why don’t you!”

  She baked away, shaking with both fatigue and rage, still panting, and pointing her weapon back at the hall the monsters had all come from.

  “Jasper,” she said between breaths, blue eyes not looking at me. “We need to seal that hole up. Before another giggling freak decides to wander over and try to get me to play with his dolls.”

  That was fair enough. Or at least it would be, if I were not completely spent on mana, or had any knowledge at all regarding starship barricade repair.

  But then the Source energy of our kills floated up into the room, streaming into Nova, Nestor, and me. A good bit of it was qi from the zombie practitioners, but the Longman had contained great reservoirs of all three Sources. To my surprise, the power divided evenly between the three of us, probably because it had been my magic that enabled Nestor to wound the monster so severely, and it was Nestor’s strike that gave Nova the opportunity to finish it off.

  Once again, power shuddered through me, expanding the three reservoirs inside my body. The creature was even stronger than Nova, and absorbing a third of its power pushed me, once again, into the next substage of every Source, giving me a crack, wisp, and drop all at once. The increase in power also gave me a tiny bit of fuel for each of my energies, meaning I now had mana to work with once again, and allowing my wisps to recharge more quickly.

  Beyond that, I could feel some fourth, alien type of energy, float aimlessly about, finding no purchase nearby. I heard Elder Mara growl at it from within my Soulscape, and the alien power retreated, dissipating into nothingness as it backed away from me.

  What was that? I asked the dragon inside my soul.

  A false strength, the elder Sourcebeast said in my mind. One that duped untold numbers of every race, human and Sourcebeast, into becoming the slaves of those murderers who came from beyond the night sky. Rot them and the poison they offer. I praise you for helping your Beacon slay a shred of their will, young rider. You have done a righteous act, in full view of the heavens above.

  I have done so such thing, I growled in bitterness. The heavens pay no attention to the lives of good men and good women. They are blind to th
ose who truly follow their laws.

  Be that as it may, Elder Mara continued, undaunted, you have honored your ancestors’ vow, and allowed me to do so as well, in the smallest of measures. My bloodline is a little less damned today, on account of this thing’s death.

  I chose to take her word for such matters.

  While I waited for my Source energy to finish charging, I examined the ruined opening. The doors had not only been torn clean off, they had been dragged several feet away from the opening, a feat I doubted I could easily replicate.

  I sighed in frustration over Nova’s reasonable, but almost impossible, request, and began to focus my next essence crack onto developing my flesh. One brief, painful moment later, my muscles surged with newfound power, one supported by my earlier substages of bone, heart, and essence itself.

  Good, Elder Mara noted in approval. And choosing to wait until you could reinforce it with earlier substages. I didn’t even need to tell you to make that choice.

  No, I agreed, you didn’t. But the two-hundred-pound door pieces certainly did.

  She chuckled at me, and I burned the one supply of energy that had been the least touched, my essence. I used it to activate a new charm brought on by the last crack of essence, one that increased my strength several times over.

  And with that, I was able to drag the door pieces back against the frame, though it gave me no clear way how to reinsert the warped barriers into the top and bottom of the opening.

  You’ll need another power for that, young rider, Elder Mara spoke up again. One that you will quickly figure out on your own, no doubt.

  I had no idea if I was thinking more quickly than another might have in my position. I looked back to Nova, to see if she was willing to help, but she just stood guarding the door, weapon still raised.

  “I’ll guard you while you work, Jasper,” she said as Nestor scampered by her feet, still dragging my halfblade with his tiny body. “I don’t have any power that would let me fix metal, at any rate. So I’m just going to make sure another horrible thing doesn’t come down the hall and grab you while you work.”