by Adrian P
Audi sighed and pocketed his monocular. He took his communicator and put his lips near the microphone. “Captain Raisa,” he said. “Are you still alive?”
“Barely,” a woman spoke through the communicator. “You’re not kidding when you tell us they’re war veterans.”
“These people don’t have the full support of their fleet. When they do, they have so much more arsenals of weapons to fear,” he replied. “I can’t believe you’re struggling against this small incursion force.”
“Any advice then, Bandana Boy? You’ve fought them before,” she replied. “Princess Victoria told our general to rely on your guidance in fighting these Brotherhood.”
“I don’t know,” the boy replied. “From what little I’ve eavesdropped, the Brotherhood was at centuries of tribalism and warfare with each other before they were unified by a figure.”
“A figure?”
Audi took a breath. “They called him The Great Liberator.”
Silence.
“The Great Liberator led his tribe to victory, and called this united people ‘Cypriot Brotherhood’.”
“So while The Crowned Confederacy remained at peace for centuries, they have been fighting a constant war?” the captain asked. “We’re highly outmatched in terms of military tradition.”
Audi glanced at the distance, watching explosions and gunfire wrecking the city’s remains. “That’s why stopping Konstantin from delivering his superweapon is paramount,” he said. “The Brotherhood’s only weakness is their inferior technology. Take that away, and The Crowned Confederacy has no chance of winning against their true invasion.”
“Understood,” Captain Raisa replied. “We’ll keep on the offensive, but we need you here to keep them busy behind the line. When are you coming?”
“In seconds,” the boy tightened his gloves and activated its ioniser function. “Intensify the attack, and make them think you’re aiming for a head-on, brute force collision.”
“Will do,” she replied. “Captain Raisa out.”
She hung up.
Now. Audi stepped to the building’s edge and turned his wrist launchers on. With all their soldiers focused on the frontline, the rear should be relatively unguarded. He frowned. But Konstantin doesn’t need much guarding. His Bionika superpower can silence an entire army if he wants to.
The boy jumped off the ledge.
He aimed his wrist at a building and fired. A spear-tipped rope launched out of a small cavity in the wrist launcher and screamed towards the wall, jamming the spear tip in. A rotor within pulled the rope and yanked the boy forward, launching him to the air. As he neared himself towards the wall, Audi fired another rope from his other wrist onto another building, changing the directions of his aerial manoeuvre. He took a roundabout path, away from Brotherhood’s line-of-sight, encircling the battlefield. After five minutes, he reached the flank of Brotherhood’s territory and landed on the ground.
The boy stood in a street filled with rubbles and abandoned cars. He pulled his pistol out and disengaged its safety, dashing towards a building and somersaulted through its window.
I should be safe observing their truck formation from this building; I have clear view.
He walked towards a darkened corner with wide windows.
Konstantin should be near one of the trucks, and that truck must be where the superweapon is stored—
“I knew you’d be here.”
The boy flinched and turned. A man in blue armoured suit thrusted towards him with speed and put his knee forward. Before the boy can dodge, the man hit his stomach and flung him out of the window into the air.
Who the hell?
He stretched his arm and fired his wrist launcher blind. The left rope missed, but the right one hit something, and the boy powered up its rotor and pulled himself to the right. His angle of flight was too flat, and gravity pulled the boy down faster than he moved horizontally. Damnit! He landed on the ground with a roll.
After several rolls, he stopped on his stomach and picked himself up with two hands. He took out his pistol and combat knife, looking at the building he was in. The bastard’s gone. He clicked his tongue.
“Sending you as a flying package huh? I didn’t expect him to mean it literally.”
The boy turned. He tightened his grip on his weapons and gritted his teeth.
A man stood relaxed with both his hands stuck into his coat’s pockets, looking at the boy with a face in-between a smile and a frown.
“Konstantin,” the boy aimed at him.
“Greetings, bandana boy,” Konstantin grinned. “Are you trying to kill me? Someone without a Bionika like you, trying to take on an Alpha-class?”
“I’ve defeated your admiral, that baldy waxed egg for a head,” the boy replied. “What makes you think I don’t have a plan or two to take you down?”
Konstantin laughed. “Do you really think you’ve taken him down? Defeated him?”
Audi frowned.
“The Patriot of War’s flaw is his overwhelming mercy. He cares for his enemies as he cares for his own soldiers,” Konstantin continued. “He must’ve held back considerably when he fought you.”
“What?”
Konstantin nodded. “But I am not The Patriot of War,” he pulled his hands out and turned his palms upwards. “If you’ve come here to kill me, then I’ll make sure you’re very dead before you can do it.”
His Eyes Were Crimson Red.
Konstantin pulled branches of lightning into his hands, forming two balls of electricity. He clapped his hands, fusing the balls into a bigger one.
Oh crap. Audi aimed forward as Konstantin pulled the electric ball back.
Like a pitcher, Konstantin threw the electric ball forward, launching it at the speed of a bullet.
With a sleight of hand, the boy fired at the edges of the ball. The bullets scraped the edge, pulling the ball away and dispersed it at a distant sky.
“Interesting,” Konstantin absorbed more electricity from the ground, blanketing his arms like a gauntlet. “You used the positive charge of the bullets, resulting from the railgun mechanism, and dragged the electrons away. You’re smart, I have to give you that.”
The boy stepped back.
Konstantin spread his arms and fingers, launching thousands of lightning branches from the ground into the air. Suddenly, the ground vibrated. Metal beams and scraps from the surroundings levitated into the sky surrounding Konstantin, forming a wall of metals. He pointed at Audi, when suddenly the metals flew towards him.
“Damn it—!” Audi dashed away.
Within a blink, Audi predicted the trajectories of steel beams and metal scraps launching towards him. With a deft feet movement, the boy dodged every metal. One beam jammed down next to him. A scrap almost hit his side. He jumped behind the beam and shielded himself from the death rain. The boy aimed at Konstantin and fired.
Konstantin grinned. He stopped the bullets mid-air and slammed them to the ground.
I’m an idiot. The boy clicked his tongue. Of course he can do that. These Bionika wielders tend to have ways to negate bullets.
“You can’t win, Bandana Boy, this battle is pointless,” Konstantin said. “Pull back the Crowned Confederacy troops, and we can end the bloodshed now.”
“End the bloodshed?” Audi reloaded his pistol. “What a way with words for someone who massacred millions. There are too many lives lost for our fight to stop.”
“Lives lost? I thought you only want the medicine from me?”
The boy flinched.
“I’m willing to let you go and give you the cure, but end this madness.”
“Madness, eh?” the boy frowned. “And your mass-murdering hurricane isn’t one?”
“The death of this city’s populace is justified through a reason you Tyrant slaves will never understand, or rather, would never be willing to understand,” Konstantin replied. “Had reason still works with you, this bloodshed won’t be necessary.”
“I’ve had m
y fair share of blood in my hands, but even I cannot think of a reason so great that millions of deaths are so easily justified,” the boy said. “Giving the Brotherhood this power is something I will never allow.”
Konstantin laughed. “The Brotherhood isn’t so weak that they need my Celestial Anvil to win against The Crowned Confederacy.”
Celestial Anvil?
“It is partly a message to all of humanity, of how insignificant we all truly are,” he pulled electricity from the ground and covered himself with it. “A message to all the arrogant bastards who dare quantifying our lives with money.”
The metals around shook.
Konstantin levitated to the air with sparks of electricity spitting in all directions. He pulled metals from the surroundings and covered his immediate vicinity, encapsulating himself in a sphere of metal scraps. Steel beams bent. Iron cogs conjoined. Sparks enveloped the metals as they compressed themselves into a gigantic humanoid shape with two massive legs and mace-like arms. Audi’s eyes opened wide, as a windshield from a car flew and slammed into the metal giant’s torso, unveiling Konstantin’s face within.
A steel giant.
“The Brotherhood will destroy the tyranny your Empire imposed upon humanity, and with it, every corrupted pillars it’s built upon!”
Konstantin’s steel giant stood straight and slammed its fists on the ground, sending tremors to the surroundings. Audi turned back and dashed away.
I didn’t know he could do that! Audi ran with all his strength. There goes my plan to incapacitate him from behind. I need heavy support!
He pulled his communicator. “Big man!” the boy shouted to the microphone.
“I’m a bit busy here,” Bryant’s voice alternated between words and heavy breath. “I’ve just beaten one Russia walker with the help of our Troopers. Whatsup?”
“It’s Ursa, you deaf bug!” the boy replied as he paced up. “I need heavy support! Konstantin’s power is more versatile than I thought!”
“How so?”
“He used his power to create a giant battlesuit made of scrap metals and is chasing after me—“
The Steel Giant jumped onto the air, aiming its feet towards Audi.
The feet slammed onto the ground, and Audi barely dodged it.
The boy rolled on the ground, but picked himself up within a second, then resumed his run. “And it’s agile as hell! I can’t fight against this thing alone!”
“R…roger that! I’ll be there soon!”
“Soon is not soon enough! This thing—“
The Steel Giant punched the ground behind Audi, pounding him up towards the air.
The boy fell back first on the ground and groaned. He winced and opened his eyes, witnessing a towering giant leaning down towards him. Metal creaks echoed, followed by thousands of electric crackles.
“It’s over, Bandana Boy, there’s no escape,” Konstantin’s voice echoed from the gaps between metal joints. “I offered you a chance to escape with your medicine, but you didn’t take it. Instead, you pathetically tries to be a hero, protecting your wretched world from a force you can never fully understand.”
The Steel Giant lifted one arm, aiming its fist towards the boy.
“Dosvedanya—”
The Steel Giant slammed sideways in abrupt.
A powerful force hit Konstantin, crashing him on the ground as his steel giant’s armour collapsed. As metals fell gradually like leaves in autumn, Konstantin unveiled himself; lying helpless among the wreckages.
Audi flipped backwards and stepped away, grabbing his pistol and aiming it forward. Is it the big man? Who is—?
A man in Brotherhood greatcoat stood next to he wreckage. His suit sported silver insignia plastered on his shoulder pads. As he walked towards the wreckage, he glanced at the boy, clicking his tongue before averting his sight to Konstantin.
Konstantin climbed out of the wreckage with electric sparks all over his body.
“What the hell are you doing, Gryaznov?” he spoke in Russian as he gritted his teeth. “I was about to kill him—!”
“Nobody kills him but I,” Sasha replied. “Are you trying to ruin my only chance of vengeance? For Petrov’s death?”
“You’re insane!” Konstantin shouted as branches of thunder shot out of his body. “Your petty revenge costed us the only chance to get rid of this Bandana! He’s our greatest enemy, you idiot!”
“Petty, you say?” Sasha frowned. “You’ve never had a son, Simonovsky. You’ve never had the chance to lose the person you love the most.”
Konstantin flinched.
“The Bandana Boy will die slowly between my fingers, between my palms,” he glared at Audi. “So long as you stand between me and my reason for existence, I shall be treating you as an enemy.”
“Then enemy we shall be!” Konstantin pulled back his arm and flail it forward, shooting a massive branch of thunder towards Sasha.
His Eyes Were Crimson Red.
Sasha spread his arms and punched the thunder, deflecting the trajectory onto the ground.
What the hell was that? Audi’s eyes opened wide. Did he just…punch the electricity?
“I’m not done with you, Bandana Boy,” Sasha spoke English in a thick Russian accent. “We’ll be heading to Kotabaru City’s observatory. Meet us there. Meet me there. I will kill you there.”
Konstantin fired more lightning towards Sasha. As the flash of electricity came, Sasha spread his ten fingers and clapped forward. The lightning dispersed away.
Sasha glanced at the boy. “Go.”
Audi turned back and dashed away.
Chapter 1 / Part 5
Atop a hill in the outskirts of Benteng City’s remains, a wooden cabin stood, surrounded by green-clad Armed Forces command airships. Troopers established tents and mobile centres, where field commanders convened for their war strategies.
An aircraft approached and landed, opening its exit hatch. A group of wounded soldiers emerged from within. Medical team dashed towards them and escorted everyone into the hospital tent.
Audi walked out of the aircraft, followed by Bryant. As they stepped onto the ground, Charlotte and another two women approached.
One woman strode with heavy steps. She wore a pale white exoskeleton armour with red trims on its joints. The suit was less bulky than Bryant’s, but her arm and leg units were thicker—signifying a built-in generator to amplify physical power. A frown flashed across her face as she stopped in front of the men; her eyes focused on Bryant.
Bryant grinned and waved. “Hi Chrissie.”
“Stop calling me that!” the woman yelled. “It’s Christina for you, damned gorilla!”
The two bickered while ignoring the presence of others. Bryant kept his smile wide, even while facing an increasingly sour Christina.
Charlotte skipped towards the boy. “They never stop fighting, huh?”
“Why does she hate him so much?” Audi asked.
The girl put a finger over her chin, bobbing her head side-to-side. “I might know the reason, but it’s too long to explain.”
The woman next to Charlotte stepped forward. She was the tallest of the three Petit Fantome members, but her demeanour was modest. Her exoskeleton suit was compact, but she carried multiple spare power cells on a holster hanging from her belt. She brought a large, hand-carried railgun cannon on her back, but she kept her posture straight like the cannon was weightless.
“Konstantin has escaped,” she said. “I have scouted them amidst the battle, and they’re heading south.”
Charlotte beamed a smile. “It’s nice having a sharp eye in our mercenary team, isn’t it? Rachele is—“
“Scouting is our collective responsibility, Charley,” Rachele said. “What were you doing when all this happened?”
“Well I wanted to help, but Audi told me—“
“Lucky you stayed,” the boy interrupted. “Konstantin is much more powerful than I anticipated. Had you come to fight, you would’ve all died within seconds.”
Charlotte pouted and put both hands on her hips. “Are you underestimating us?”
“I’m not, and that’s exactly the point,” Audi replied. “Konstantin belongs to the Alpha-class, which rests on the top of Brotherhood’s superpower hierarchy.”
“Alpha-class?”
The boy nodded. “Those whom the Brotherhood categorised as Alpha-class have the potential power to wipe an entire army by themselves,” he continued. “The Troopers struggled to fight the regular conscripts on their own, imagine if Konstantin and that other guy had joined the fray.”
Charlotte tilted her head. “You mean there’s more than one Alpha-class among them?”
“I don’t know his class designation, but he’s capable of deflecting Konstantin’s thunder with a…punch.”
Rachele sighed. “This is really messing my mind,” she said. “Thunder magic. Punching thunder. All these sound like something pulled out of fantasy fiction.”
“Bizarre maybe, but Bionika powers are neither magic nor fiction,” Audi replied. “You said they’re heading south?”
“Towards Kotabaru,” Rachele nodded. “I’m sure they’re going to the spaceport—“
“No,” the boy interrupted. “They’re heading for the observatory.”
Rachele paused. “How do you know?”
“The man who punched Konstantin’s thunder told me,” he said. “Don’t ask me why. They were fighting, even though both seemed intent on killing me.”
Charlotte giggled. “You must’ve done something really, really bad,” she said. “How weird is your situation? Trying to get a medicine and destroy a superweapon, with two people who shoot out thunder and can punch thunder trying to kill you.”
Audi shrugged his shoulders. “I haven’t exactly lived a normal life, have I?” he turned his sight to the cabin. “Our plan for a quick, surgical strike hasn’t exactly gone as planned, so I bet the Military Sector’s high command must have gotten anxious.”
“Speaking of which, you were expected inside,” Rachele said.
“By whom?”
Rachele paused.
