Rei chuckled weakly. “Thanks… for the approval.”
A little more. Just a little more.
“Sure,” Grant answered, his face growing serious again. “Let’s end this now, though.”
“Yeah,” Rei gasped. “Let’s.”
And there it was. The moment, the blink in which his words confirmed for Grant what the larger cadet wanted to hear. For less than a breath he relaxed ever so slightly, the match already done in his mind.
That was when Rei lunged.
Despite his injuries—despite the pain and all his limitations—he still had enough speed left in him to get to where he needed to be. He didn’t leap for Grant himself, of course. The Mauler’s axe was still embedded in his side, preventing Rei from clearing the 4 or 5 feet that separated them. He didn’t need to get that far, though. He only needed a foot or two. Just the distance from his left hand—still gripping the haft—to Grant’s nearer the end. He made it, too. In a song of searing torment as he jerked his whole body up the length of the blade, he made it, catching the Mauler’s right wrist in a grip through which he fed every ounce of strength left to him. Grant started back in surprise, but—instinctively unwilling to let go of the axe as he was, only end up pulling them both a little away from the wall.
It gave Rei the second he needed to voice the vocal command.
“Type Shift,” he wheezed, not looking away from Grant’s dark eyes. “Mode: Saber.”
And with those words, Shido changed.
CHAPTER 58
The transformation was different than the whirling formation of metal and vysetrium that accompanied a standard call. Rather, the adjustments happened in an echoed, rippling wave along the Device’s surface that drew first up Rei’s limbs towards his heart, then back again. Electromagnetic energy released in shivering arcs of white lightning over his arms and legs as molecules of carbonized steel readjusted. Blue light flickered through the roll of the change. The claws protruding from Rei’s knuckles retracted, absorbed into the CAD as it pulsed inward. When the wave came down again, the reclaimed materials reformed, adapted to fit his Ability’s new call.
Rather than the close-combat weapons of a Brawler, however, in his right hand Rei was left clenching the hilt of a long, black sword, its curved blade lined with the azure glow of a pure vysetrium edge.
In his left, there was nothing, but each plated finger—still wrapped about Grant’s wrist—was suddenly tipped with a wicked talon of the same vibrant blue.
A trio of short lines of script appeared in the combat log, white rather than red, and Rei didn’t have to look at it to know what it said.
…
Ability [Type Shift] triggered.
…
CAD [Shido] has applied [Saber] Type-classification.
…
User and Device specifications adjusted.
…
Strength coursed through Rei’s body. Over the last few days the first thing he’d always noticed about the transformation as he’d trained with Catcher and Claire de Soto had foremost been his reduction in Speed. Now—immobilized as he was by the axe that was practically cutting him half in two—that hardly struck him.
All he sensed was the power.
Redoubling his grip about Grant’s arm, Rei felt the thinner plates of metal under his palm start to give under the pressure, the Mauler’s Defense values suddenly no longer adequate to meet Rei’s new peak specs of Strength and Offense. Grant’s face—originally a white sheet of shock—spasmed in pain, the protest of his compressing bones appearing enough to draw him from his confused disbelief.
Expectedly, the boy didn’t hesitate.
“OVERCLOCK!” he bellowed, and immediately ion flames of a crimson sheen bloomed into being along every line of his armor’s red vysetrium.
Too late.
SH-SHLUNK!
With twin sickening sounds of metal carving into flesh Rei brought his sword up in a flash. Before Grant could take advantage of his temporary boost of agility and power, Shido had cleaved through both of his arms just below the elbow, severing their function from his body. The Mauler screamed in agony, his grip about the haft of his axe immediately going slack. He lurched back, and even Rei’s newfound strength couldn’t keep hold of the wrist he’d been clinging to. He let go, promptly falling to his knees under the weight of the massive axe embedded in his side not a few inches from his spine. Before him Grant staggered back several steps, doubling over atop his useless arms. His screaming lessened after a few seconds, first becoming a keening hiss, then sucking, angry huffs.
Then—as the Mauler raised his head again with teeth bared at Rei—something not unlike the savage growl of a wounded animal.
“WARD!”
Rei, in answer, grinned at the boy. With his left hand he held in place the body of the axe, pressing it into him so it wouldn’t slip and send him into immediate FDA from blood loss.
With the right, he brought up Shido to point the length of the sword at Grant’s face.
“Bring it,” he wheezed through his smile.
To his credit, the Mauler did exactly that.
With a ripping lunge forward Grant closed the gap between them in a blink, ignoring his useless arms in favor of launching a spinning kick at the side of Rei’s head. The red fire along his leg rippled in the air, and if Rei hadn’t whipped Shido back to brace the flat of the sword blade against his shoulder he knew he would have been done for. As it was he barely managed to accept the tremendous force of the blow thanks to his new Strength, angling the sword so that the Mauler’s steel boot screamed up its length to go wide over his head. Grant was hardly done, though, and despite his left leg still being midair he leapt up with his right to land the better half of a drop-kick in Rei’s chest.
Kneeling as he was already, Rei was thrown back onto his ass, screaming as the impact jarred the massive blade of the axe he was having a hard enough time of holding onto as it was. A fresh wave of agony washed up from where the metal still held firm in his side, almost causing him to drop the weapon, but he pushed through it.
Pain. Pain he could handle.
Grant had managed to roll to his feet again, and his next attack came as a reckless knee straight at Rei’s face. Seeing his chance, Rei slashed with Shido rather than trying to block, catching the Mauler in the exposed thigh of his leading leg. Already seeming to have lost all reason to rage, pain, and the boost of his Overclock, Grant didn’t seem to notice as he lost this third limb, carrying through so that the steel of his knee ended up connecting with Rei’s nose regardless. Reactive shielding could only do so much—this Saber form boasted no higher Defense than Shido’s standard Brawler mode—and Rei’s head snapped back from the impact, his vision going black for a second. Sheer willpower was all that kept him holding onto the axe in that moment, kept him from slipping and bleeding out, but he managed it, thinking he was lucky not to have been limited by a broken neck by the blow. He made out the sound of a body falling into a heavy heap at his side, could hear Grant’s snarling curses while sight returned as a myriad collection of dancing, flashing stars.
Wham!
What felt like a steel-clad foot caught him in the temple in an explosion of light and pain. The power of the blow was almost negligible compared to the knee Rei had just taken to the face, but with no way to brace for it he fell sideways. He managed to keep from splitting himself open further only by giving up his hold on the axe and catching the ground with his left hand, feeling the talons there carve small divots into the floor. The weapon started to slip out of his side, but Rei allowed the bracing elbow to collapse, bringing himself halfway down until the haft rested against the hexagonal paneling, pressing the blade up and back in for him. The choice had his ribs screaming in protest, with more red text flashing in the combat log, but Rei ignored it all. For one thing, all he had to do was survive, no matter what it took.
For another he was still being rained down on with kicks that wou
ld rightfully have seen any normal man drilled into the floor.
Grant had lost both arms and his right leg, and yet still hadn’t given up. He lay now on his side to Rei’s right, where he’d collapsed, and was slamming his foot down again and again and again towards head and neck and shoulder—basically any part of Rei he could reach. Ion flames still washed across the Mauler’s body—noticeably absent where his function had been severed—and he looked demented behind the sheet of black hair that now plastered his face. Stuck as he was, all Rei could do was bring Shido up again to block the worst of the kicks, accepting a sound four or five of them before finding his chance and slashing outward, catching Grant’s one still-useful leg below the knee. Shido’s blue-black blade bit deep into steel and flesh, but didn’t sever the limb, and the Mauler only snarled louder when he wrenched himself free to attack again, foot now flopping with every strike. Another two blows and Rei struck again, then again, his hacks awkward given his mere 2 days of training with the sword and his unfortunate position half-fallen against the floor.
On that third slash, Shido cut clean, and Grant finally screamed as his body appeared to at last register the pain.
The Mauler rolled over onto his back, spasming and jerking, all four limbs now largely limp as he writhed. The fires danced and shimmered across his form, giving him the look of body in the process of immolation. Rei tried twice to lean back over, to gain enough reach to cut at Grant’s neck or head and make a clean end of it, but couldn’t manage it. The earlier damage to his chest had sapped the strength from his left arm, still bracing him against the ground, leaving him with no ability to do anything but watch while Grant thrashed.
Then, at long last, the Mauler’s flailing subsided. The fire of is Overclock still burned, but it had only been 20 or 30 seconds since the massive cadet had triggered the Ability. It would be the simulated blood loss that got him first, that drained away his life long before those flames would die out.
Sure enough, after another 10 seconds or so, Grant’s eye’s rolled to the back of his head, and he went still. Rei suffered a few moments of ringing silence, hardly believing it.
Then the Arena spoke.
“Fatal Damage Accrued. Winner: Reidon Ward.”
As soon as the announcement was made, the field began to fade way. The moment it did, sound returned to the world in a single deafening boom. As Rei felt himself start to drop—the pain in his ribs subsiding despite Grant’s axe still being wedged between them—he managed to look around over his shoulder in time to see the pillars that had been at his back dematerialize in a flickering wash of fading light.
What he saw made his heart thud so hard in his chest it hurt.
Sarah Takeshi’s distant attempt to commentate was being drowned out by the cacophony of nearly every single student in the stadium on their feet, hands coming together or waving above their heads as they cheered. Even what scattered second and third years had elected to show up for this final round of their underclassmen’s matches were standing, with not a few whistles and shouts come from those cadets in particular. It only took Rei a few seconds to locate his friends, Aria’s red hair a beacon to him even under her cap. Catcher looked to be cheering the hardest of all—leaping up and down and punching the air with both hands—while the two girls appeared to be hugging and crying on each other’s shoulders, simultaneously dancing and shaking. He felt a pang of guilt, seeing this. He’d hated lying to them for the last 2 days, but it had hardly been his choice to make.
Hopefully they would understand better, now…
He reached the cool black steel of the projection plating, then, and like a breaking spell the exhaustion took over. Rei sagged. Dropping Shido’s sword, he forced himself to twist around again and shove with both hands at the body of the axe in his side. The removal of it was painless, now that the fight was done, but the weapon would weigh no less until it was recalled. After several seconds of struggling he managed it, and the heavy clang of the massive blade hitting the floor was like music to his ears.
Then Rei, too, was on the ground, falling back only half-voluntarily to lie starring up at the closed roof of the Arena high, high above them.
“I won…”
He hadn’t meant to say the words aloud, but the realization was too much to bear in silence. It swept away Captain Takeshi’s second attempt to congratulate him, leaving his mind reeling.
“Yeah, you did…” a voice rasped from his right. “Wonder how long you’ll be rubbing that in for…”
Rei only barely managed to lift his chin to his chest and look to where Logan Grant still lay beside him, head by his feet. The Mauler wasn’t moving, his eyes closed and the back of his sweat-soaked hair resting against the floor as his breathing came heavy, the picture of a User trying to catch his wind after an intense fight.
Despite this, he still seemed willing enough to speak.
“Ward… What the hell was that Ability?”
Rei looked at the boy for a little while, still not hearing Takeshi’s enthusiastic congratulations as the applause from the stands finally started to die.
Eventually, he brought his own head down again to rest once more against the coolness of the steel.
“You know about as much as I do,” he answered. “What you saw… I don’t have anything more to go on than that.”
“It wasn’t Arsenal Shift.” It was a statement, not a question. “The change… Too complete. You got stronger… A lot stronger. Like you called a totally different Device…”
Rei nodded against the ground. “Yeah… It’s an entire overhaul.”
“And another trick.”
Rei stiffened, but only for a moment.
“Tricks have their place,” he answered, echoing Valera Dent’s words to him from months ago.
There was brief silence before Grant responded.
“Yeah… Yeah, I suppose you’ve proven that much to me, at the very least.”
The words, for some reason, felt like a gift, like the Mauler was releasing Rei of some weight he hadn’t known he was carrying. Guilt, maybe? Or doubt? Whatever it was, even this tiny sliver of approval from the boy who’d been his greatest critic felt liberating, somehow.
Of course, Grant had to open his mouth again and ruin it.
“I still think you’re a dick, though.”
Rei snorted. “And I still think you’re an ass.”
“Fair enough,” came the quiet answer.
For a little longer they stayed like that, allowing themselves the refreshing comfort of the plating beneath their bodies. Still Rei droned out the buzz of lingering applause and what sounded like an excited play-by-play rehash by Takeshi of the end of the fight. Rather, he focused on the single surreal reality, the single fact that trembled across his thoughts, so incredible it was hardly to be accepted.
He’d won. He’d won, and no one would be able to say he hadn’t earned it, this time.
He was going to Sectionals.
“Ward… Can I ask you a question?”
Grant’s request came low and hesitant, like a man very much unsure of the path he was walking. It surprised Rei, requiring a moment before he could give a tentative answer.
“… Sure?” he said slowly.
“You and Vi—You and Arada… You’re not… You’re not a thing, right?”
Rei couldn’t help it, then.
He opened his eyes, accepted the brightness of the Arena lights and the lingering echoes of his name being cheered, and laughed.
CHAPTER 59
Late November - A Few Days Later
Sol System – Earth – Sector 10
“With humanity’s expansion into the stars came with it an explosion of industry and invention. A new age of Renaissance in its own right, what had once been the simple hopes of asteroid mining and the like turned—over the course of a single century—into more than half a million businesses devoted to everything from terraforming, to atmosphere-stripping, to intra
-system transportation. No one desiring work couldn’t find it, so long as they were willing to look. The concept of poverty faded, with those still in need suddenly being seen to by philanthropists and benefactors across every planet of every system.
After all, what else is one to do when one abruptly finds themselves in possession of more money than the entire GDP of some of the largest countries that had existed in the old world…”
- A History of the Collective
Gilbert France, M.S., Ph.D.
Distributed by Central Command, Earth
Doctor Kamiya Hiroto was sitting at his desk, his back to the neon cityscape of a moonlit Tokyo through the great window behind him, when Abigail Smith—steward of the family estate—came rushing into the room with such fervor the hinged double doors slammed into the walls on either side of them as she entered. The young woman seemed not to notice, just as she hadn’t appeared to notice the fact that she’d not traded her shoes for the slippers provided for workers and visitors in the genkan, the entrance of the building some hundred floors below. It mattered little, though.
For once, Hiroto didn’t notice either.
“Doctor!” Abigail half-hissed, half-gasped, waving a small pad she was carrying in her right hand about. “I have something you need to see!”
“I am already watching it, Abigail,” Hiroto said without looking up from the smart-glass panel that made up the top of his desk.
Indeed, as his steward hurried around to stand beside him, he replayed the recording for the fifteenth time since it had been sent to him by the Kamiya Corporation’s information department. It was strange, watching the footage. For the first few years after he’d given the order to set a few of the company’s servers to scour the feeds for him, Hiroto had felt some shame at the fact. He may well have been president of the conglomerate, but it had still felt wrong to repurpose even that minuscule fraction of their bandwidth towards a personal want—no, a personal need. Then, though, time had passed, time had healed, and it had to have been more than a decade since he’d thought of that order, since he’d given up on his search. Had it ever crossed his mind he might well have rescinded it on principle, eager to wipe even that small stain from a proud record.
Iron Prince: A Progression Sci-Fi Epic (Warformed: Stormweaver Book 1) Page 100