Iron Prince: A Progression Sci-Fi Epic (Warformed: Stormweaver Book 1)

by Bryce O'Connor

  He wasn’t an S-Rank yet, and still the move was unlike anything Rei had ever witnessed.

  “Incredible,” Aria whisper breathlessly from his right, giving voice to his silent amazement. “His Device has to have crap Defense with armor like that, and yet he can still mount a total guard despite lacking footing. Incredible…”

  Rei was about to agree, eager to share his own wonder, when Ivanov started her assault again.

  In a dizzying series of jetting leaps the Lancer shoved off the wall, then off the body of an empty escape pod, then off another hunk of hull. This trio of directional shifts took barely a second, but just the same the red lines of Lennon’s helmet never lost her as she moved. Her attack came in a flash and was promptly deflected, but this hardly mattered when she bounced away again in another blinding line.

  In 5 seconds she had attacked four times, then twice that in 10. Ivanov was nothing more than a streak of silvery steel, ricocheting again and again and again off the wreckage and wall her opponent still had his back to. It was like watching trailing lightning that flashed purple here and there, matched with black and red when one of the chain-swords snapped into position to slash away a cutting strike.

  “Does she have a plan?” It was Viv’s turn to voice her thoughts, peering with her NOED live in her eyes into the exchange. “I get that he’s dangerous, but this doesn’t seem to be working…”

  “It’s probably all she can do,” Catcher answered before Rei could, leaning forward on her other side. “The size of her weapon… She can’t be used to having someone with a reach advantage on her, even among other Lancers. Plus, Lennon’s chain-swords are just as versatile in proximity as they are at range. He’s quick, but the nature of those weapons means a delay between strike and impact.” He slashed a hand in front of him in emphasis. “They trail. So Ivanov has adapted.”

  “She’s got Speed herself, so if she can attack and get out of the way in time to avoid getting caught…” Viv nodded catching on as Ivanov continued to blur about the wedge of the field she’d effectively trapped Lennon in. “I get it. Makes sense. But still…”

  “It doesn’t seem to be working,” Rei repeated, finishing for her in agreement.

  It was true. As impressive a feat as the Lancer’s blistering assault was, it was obvious she was having a hard time getting through Lennon’s active defense. She cut and she stabbed and she thrust at him with every pass, but not one blow broke his guard, not one attack wasn’t rebuked in a snap of black and red.

  On the other hand, Lennon seemed to have spent the entirety of the match on his back foot. Not once had he done anything more than take Ivanov’s aggression, accepting it as those red lines followed her movements like a trio of angry eyes. Was it possible the girl’s tactics had boxed him in a corner?

  No. No, definitely not. Rei had only caught one or two of the Lasher’s fights in the previous collegiate season, but even those fleeting experiences were enough to tell him there was more going on. Christopher Lennon was waiting, he knew. He was waiting, but not in the way most Users waited, seeking the moment of mistake, the chance their opponents would give them to break the stalemate. Lennon was more than that. His legend alone dictated this.

  Slowly, Rei smiled.

  “What?” Aria asked him, having apparently caught the expression in the corner of her vision. “What? Did you figure something out?”

  Rei nodded. “Yeah. And you’re gonna like it.”

  “What? Why?”

  “’Cause it’s a lesson we already know.”

  And then, like the words were the key to the flood, the Lasher turned the tides of the battle with a single snap of one wrist.

  It was the fact that Ivanov was leaping away from him when the chain-swords started to move that had Rei knowing he was right. She’d just bounced off the wall in the direction of another chunk of debris, glancing off this to the heavy shape of what might have been a torn ship wing, then off a painted plate of solid steel. From there she lanced right at Lennon once more…

  And found herself streaking towards the broad point of the chain-swords as it rushed at her.

  There were screams from the crowd as Ivanov fell for the trap. She managed to recover, but barely, slashing the segmented Device aside but ruining her attack in the same go. She landed in half a crouch by Lennon, unable to strike before shoving off again to keep from getting slashed at. She bounced off the wing again, then another pod, then at the young man once more…

  And found herself on the business end of the other set of chains, this time.

  “Damn!” Catcher shouted, jumping to his feet with dozens of others as Ivanov once again only just managed to defend herself from the attack, slamming shoulder-first into the wall before scrambling to jump away and be clear of Lennon’s attack range. “How is he doing that? How is he doing that?!”

  Rei smiled, waiting as he watched the Lancer try again, then again, then again, finding herself cut off every time.

  Finally, Aria answered, coming to the understanding just as he had.

  “He’s reading her,” she groaned, like she wasn’t surprised despite the awesomeness of the situation. “That’s what he’s been doing the whole time. He’s been figuring out her patterns.”

  Exactly, Rei thought.

  Again and again and again Ivanov tried once more to regain her advantage, but even as he pressed off the wall to float gently towards the center of the stage, Lennon never let her find her edge. It was like he could see the future, reading her direction from the moment she leapt away from him, positioning one chain-sword or the other exactly where the Lancer was going to be a heartbeat later. Most of the time it was the sharpened tip she had to fend herself against, but more than once Ivanov was batted out of the air as the Lasher’s Device caught her crosswise. Each time this happened, the impressive Defensive spec Rei had suspected the girl of possessing showed itself off, because her reactive shielding flashed when the chain swept around the blocking handle of her halberd to cut at her anyway.

  Still, even that had to give eventually, and it was when Lennon’s counterattack finally broke through the shielding that the match was forced to change again.

  CLANG! WHAM!

  He caught her early, this time, slashing with both chain-swords. The heavy steel segments arched like metal whips, slamming into Ivanov as she leapt from one piece of wreckage to another. She hadn’t expected the blow, didn’t have time to bring the halberd up to defend herself. The Lasher’s Device took her full in the chest, and Rei saw silvery metal shards scattering into space as the Lancer was sent flying, her body driven hard into the massive form of a free-floating container that had just drifted into the field from beyond the wall.

  Shouts of disappointment and thrill alike resounded from the third years’ section, while the firsts and seconds only yelled in excitement, Viv and Catcher among them. They had good reason to, because not only was Ivanov extracting herself from the healthy dent she’d put in the metal siding of the container, but Lennon was finally on the move.

  For the first time all match, he truly went on the attack.

  With a slash of one chain-sword he drove the tip into the broken mess of passing fuselage, hauling hard at it to send his body careening across the debris-scattered space. Just as he reached the extent of the weapon’s length he slashed to embed the other chain into another hunk of junk, combining his momentum and heavy pull on this second anchor point to wrench free the first. In two more such movements he had closed the 15 yards or so on Ivanov.

  And all in about 3 seconds.

  Reaching the Lancer just as she finally got her feet under her—the chest of her armor a mostly-broken mess—Lennon didn’t offer her any additional reprieve. His free weapon cut in a horizontal streak, and it was only Ivanov’s atypical clawed toes that saved her likely getting slashed in two, allowing her to grip, tuck, and roll down into space off the container. The slashing chain-sword cleaved into the wall she’d just vacated
with a screech of tearing metal, and Rei had just enough time to be amused at the fact that the Arena was projecting sound in what should have been vacuum when Lennon pulled hard on his anchored point. The weapon came loose, but brought him rushing back towards the broken ship wall that had housed it, allowing him to land in a crouch.

  Then he shoved off again, and the crowd finally got the chance to witness a clean exchange between two Users possessing S-Ranked Speed, or something very near it.

  Despite the disadvantage of having only one weapon, Ivanov initially did an excellent job of defending herself as Lennon gained on her through the void. The halberd slashed left and right and up and down with blinding precision, adjusting minutely to every shift in the zero-gravity each strike made to her suspended position. Lennon’s chain-swords didn’t stop, however, and he used his externals to stabilize himself as he streaked after the girl, allowing for a constant barrage of attacks.

  They slammed into the east wall of the field one after the other, Ivanov shoving herself out of the way to keep from getting shoulder-checked into the projection. She tried to escape by pushing off as hard as she could, but Lennon twisted and slashed, the chain-sword of his left hand wrapping about her ankle before she could pass out of range. He hauled at her, bringing her wrenching back, and Ivanov made the mistake of prioritizing the freeing of her leg by slamming the butt of her halberd at the entrapping Device, setting the chains loose.

  It didn’t much help when Lennon’s right fist—wrapped about the handle of his other weapon—slammed into the already-damaged armor of her chest to send her careening again with another scattering of shattered metal.

  “OOOOH…!” came the collected moan of hundreds of voices as Ivanov’s head struck a passing hunk of the wreckage with a painful clang. The blow, combined with the weight of the Lasher’s punch, had the Lancer taking her turn to spin wildly through space, limbs flailing as she tried to find anything that would allow her to stabilize. Lennon was on her, though, streaking after the young woman with a powerful leap off the invisible wall. He caught up in a heartbeat, both chain-swords slashing inward from either direction. They caught Ivanov mid-flip…

  And passed through her harmlessly, the form of her spinning body glitching, then pixilating out of being.

  Then—mirroring the enthusiastic roar of a surprised crowd—the real Ivanov launched into view, streaking at the Lasher’s exposed back from the other side of the very hunk of debris that had appeared to send her flailing not seconds before.

  “Oh! Now there’s a clever combination of Abilities!” Colonel Guest’s announcement—which Rei had largely been tuning out in favor of taking in the fight for himself—finally reached him. “Mirage we’ve seen several times in the last several days, but Ivanov’s ‘Cloak’ is the first on the field, I believe! Allowing her to go nearly-invisible so long as she remains still, it’s an Ability usually better suited for ambushing in Team-Battle and Wargames, but here she is wielding it masterfully in a one-on-one Duel!”

  It was a fair assessment, to be sure, but Rei thought the celebratory tone might have been premature. The Lancer had been quicker than any of them had noticed—even Christopher Lennon, it would have seemed. In a blink after the impact to her head she had triggered both Mirage and Cloak, and so fluidly that no one had been any the wiser. She must have flipped around the edge of the wreckage, then waited, invisible, for Lennon to pass her as he chased after the false projection. Against anyone else, it would have earned her the match.

  Unfortunately for Ivanov, though, she wasn’t facing anyone else.

  She reached Lennon, who’d been doing his best to spin about using his externals. Even to Rei it seemed that the boy was too slow, but something bit at him, an awareness that he knew he shared with anyone else who had studied up on the Lasher. Lennon still had a lot of tricks up his sleeve, especially now that his opponent had triggered not one, but two abilities. In a flash, Rei suddenly suspected that they were about to witness something incredible.

  An instant later, his hope was met and then some.

  Ivanov’s halberd fell, slashing down at Lennon’s exposed body before he could fully turn. The purple blade caught him between the helmet and shoulder, cutting deep, so deep.

  Too deep, in fact…

  There were yells of confusion from the stands as the Lancer’s weapon, too, passed through her opponent. Then Lennon’s body spasmed in a disruption of light, then vanished, leaving only his two chain-swords to drift, suspended, in empty space. Ivanov—her halberd making none of the contact she had expected—was left rolling forward as her momentum carried her in a clean line across the field.

  Carried her, and left her vulnerable to the streak of black and red that launched itself after her from the very hunk of broken ship she herself had planned her failed ambush from.

  Echo, was all Rei had time to think before the match came to an abrupt—and brutal—end.

  Lennon’s timing was impeccable. As he hurtled by his floating chains their handles snapped towards him, bringing themselves into his grip as though magnetically attracted to his waiting fingers. The black-and-red segments dragged along at his back like twin fiery tails of some wicked meteor. Ahead of him Ivanov slammed hard into the upper limit of the top of the wall, not far from the apex of the field. Only a blink later he was on her, with violent slashes of both arms he brought the chain-swords down at mirrored angles in a blur of razored steel.

  They caught Ivanov—the real Ivanov, this time—in each shoulder, striking with a newfound force so terrible that the segments shred into her damaged armor and all the way through skin, flesh, and bone.

  With the cracks and shrieking of shattering metal plating, the Lancer jerked once, her halberd spasming in her hand as her body was neurologically dissected into four parts.

  “Fatal Damage Accrued,” the Arena announced. “Winner: Christopher Lennon.”

  Rei and Aria left the screaming and shouting to Viv and Catcher, preferring to cover their ears just in time to spare themselves most of the apocalyptic roar of the stands as nearly every single attendee in the stadium leapt to their feet. Below them the field had already begun to fade, Lennon and Ivanov both dropping faster than usual since their fight had taken them some 20 yards into the air. As the black void of space faded away with the broken husk of the ship and scattered wreckage, the projection disk reappeared in full on the far side of the zone, and Rei realized that the colonel was obviously trying to speak over the noise.

  He dropped a hand, straining to make out if his suspicions would be confirmed.

  “What an end! What an END!” Guest was bellowing, his fervor as genuine as anyone else’s in the Arena. “An incredible play by Ivanov disrupted! Never have I seen Echo used in such a manner! Never! One of the rarest Abilities currently in the ISCM database, it allows a User to temporally replicate any other Ability triggered within a sensory range of their CAD! Not only did Christopher Lennon beat Cadet Ivanov at her own game, he did so with Abilities he likely has never had the opportunity to practice with!”

  The announcement brought with it another tidal wave of cheering just as Lennon and Ivanov touched down on the projection plating, he coming to a graceful stand and recalling his Device in a blur of black-and-red, she collapsing immediately to her knees, then face-first, still in her armor.

  “And it looks like Cadet Ivanov may have been KO’ed!” Guest continued his commentary. “Can’t blame her with a final hit like that! Unless I’m mistaken, the Lasher was employing his Invisible Hand to add some extra power behind those chains! Another atypical use of Ability, and applied to great effect!”

  “He did?!” Viv shouted as this did nothing to quell the gusto of the crowd. “You can use Invisible Hand that way?!”

  “Apparently!” Catcher called back as Rei and Aria nodded.

  It was atypical, but not unheard of. Invisible Hand—Lennon’s other Ability, along with Break Step—had to have been triggered in tandem with his Echoed
Mirage and Cloak. Those had been his real chain-swords the doppelgänger had swung—or seemed to swing, at least—since they’d broken Ivanov’s own illusion. From there he had to have kept the Ability engaged even after using it to pull the weapons back to himself, manipulating the segments mentally to layer Invisible Hand’s force into his own substantial physical strength.

  The result had been a pair of blows powerful enough to cleave clean through even the thick layers of Ivanov’s heavy armor.

  Brilliant, Rei couldn’t help but admit, not even realizing he was shaking his head in disbelief while he looked down on Christopher Lennon, who was standing impassively by while several officers tended to his opponent. Absolutely brilliant.

  “Six days of training suddenly seems like even less time all of a sudden, doesn’t it?” Aria asked him as quietly as she could in the noise.

  Rei nodded at once.

  “Seems like hardly anything,” he answered as Ivanov got helped to her feet with a resounding cheer of support and relief from the crowd.

  His eyes, though, never left the Lasher’s slight form.

  CHAPTER 42

  “Despite the extensive and rigorous selection process that goes into the assignment of a Combat Assistance Device, no exam in the world—nor intelligence or system allegedly involved in such an exam—can be absolute in its distinction of character. It is an important factor to be noted by any academic making a study of CADs that there is a very good reason the ISCM has a disciplinary team designed specifically for dealing with rogue or corrupted wielders. In the more than 200 years humankind has proven capable of mastering Devices, so too has it proven just as able of abusing them. The serial killer Holly Keeling, the famed ‘Mercury’s Butcher’, viciously murdered nearly 65 people between 2315 and 2317 before being apprehended. More recently, there is the case of Connor Galt, the major who fled his position on Sirius-12 against orders, abandoning the majority half of contingent to an assault by the archons, providing the enemy with a planetary landing point. The resulting conflict lasted months, and in total resulted in the deaths of nearly 100,000 civilian casualties alone the military estimates would not have been lost had the major held his assigned post.