Chaos Theory Cosmic Lovely

by Penelope Fletcher

  Kali eyed the last seat, waiting on the sidewalk next to Blue. “I can sit on your lap.” Blue lifted her by the hips and set her on the back of the open topped FloVe. Her butt slid into the curved seat, but she gripped his shoulders and refused to let go. “So you don’t want me to sit on you. Standard, but get on. There’s room for you if you sit on the floor by my legs.”

  “The craft is at maximum capacity,” he said calmly. “With my added weight the decreased velocity means the Crimzon would overtake us long before you reached the ship.” He glanced behind and frowned. “I’ll run behind, and keep the Host back as long as I can. I’m connected to Lara telepathically to keep the mind shield we erected against the Novan in tact. She’ll know I’m still alive.”

  “Still alive? Get on here.”

  Blue ignored her, choosing to focus on the task of delegating. “Lara, when you reach the ship don’t wait. I’ll find my way home.”

  “I hear you.” She flicked switches, and brought the engine to life with a dull roar.

  Blue fixed his attention on Igor, holding the Hybrid’s gaze to impress the importance of the responsibility he gave. “Protect them.”

  “With my life,” Igor swore.

  Kali jumped from reason to panic. “This is not happening.”

  Blue pressed his fingers to her temple. “Sleep.”

  Her eyes closed, and she went limp.

  “Fully loaded,” Igor barked, gently strapping an unconscious Kali into the four-point harness on her seat.

  Host broke through the rubble, and clambered down the hill Igor and Blue had created.

  Blue planted his feet and reached out a hand. His power gathered to form a force field at the base of the hill to buy more time.

  Tendrils of Crimzon seeped through the man-sized hole left by the Host.

  “Go now,” he commanded, backing away from the zombie-like humans flowing through the hole like ants, scrabbling at the energy barrier in confusion.

  Lara kept her eyes on the navigation panel, threw the FloVe into gear, and punched it.

  “Someone follows,” Kenshin said, watching Blue’s solitary form shrink and become lost to view. A blast of purple light flew past his head. “And they are hostile.”

  Max plucked Madeleine off her seat and pushed her head down, covering her small body with his own.

  Igor lunged for Christabella and strong-armed her over the seat. A laser bullet scorched the back of Lara’s chair, passing through the space she’d been. He pushed her down between his legs. “Stay,” he ordered.

  Blasts of purple zipped past their heads, the frequency suggesting more than one attacker, and Igor squinted as he tried to focus on the craft pursuing them. They moved at incredible speed, and everything was a blur.

  Lara manoeuvred the bulky FloVe, her eyes glued to the NavSat that showed the road as straight lines and the skyscrapers as solid blocks. She could navigate using her natural hand-eye coordination, but her reaction time wasn’t that great, and she had no plans to be scraped off the side of a building. She took a hard left and cursed when the hover pad grazed the curb, dousing them in a shower of sparks and smoke.

  If the hover pads scraped the ground for too long they would short out, and the lack of power on one side would send them into a lop-sided rotation.

  They skimmed a bump in the road. Everyone jolted, was airborne, then crashed hard. The air was knocked out of them as they bounced back into their seats, dazed and winded.

  “What are you doing?” Max yelled.

  “That was not on me,” Lara spat, punching buttons on the lit up panel to boost the craft’s anti-gravitational cushioning. “Sluggish thrusters can’t keep up.”

  Laser bullets whizzed past her head. Another glanced her cheek, scorching her skin. Crying out, her eyes left the NavSat as she instinctively ducked.

  She swerved wildly.

  Everyone shunted dangerously to the right then left.

  Lara’s gaze shot back to the navigation screen and she careened to left to avoid ploughing into a solid wall. She twisted the wheel hard to avoid from rolling over, her arm sockets on fire from the strain as the craft fought to tip. She held it steady, and even muttered a thank you to the Cosmic Virgin when the craft righted itself.

  Easing her death-grip on the direction controls, Lara relaxed her shoulders, trying not to lock up. “Ken, you have the most precise control. Use your telekinesis to deflect the shots as best you can. Igor, my bag.”

  With a grunt, Igor reached for the oblong pack Lara had been hauling around. He unzipped it, and his brows lifted. He pulled out the bulky laser rifle and his face became cartoonish with glee. He snagged a fully charged Blue Matter canister, and loaded the weapon, letting the cylinder slide into the hilt of the weapon. It let off a high-pitched trill as the power bar rose through the ammunition indicator.

  “Give me one,” Christabella demanded, her hand darting into the bag.

  Igor gave her a short look that made her stay where she was, but didn’t stop her from arming herself.

  As he stood, his clothes were tugged by the wind; fluttering hard against his body. It was a strong reminder of the dangerous speeds they travelled. He twisted; keeping Christabella well covered and returned fire. The detonation of the Blue Matter rounds sounded like mini explosions. The chamber at the top of the gun slid back and forth, the glass vial going from clear to blue, empty to filled. His hulking shoulders jerked with each shot, and his body rocked into the recoil of the weapon.

  A laser round nailed his shoulder, but Igor shrugged it off with a roar, and kept shooting.

  He narrowed his eyes when several shots that would have been direct hits veered drastically in another direction when they neared the blurred craft.

  “They are not Host,” he yelled. “Hybrids deflect my shots.”

  “It’s what I’m doing,” Kenshin panted, focused on keeping the purple slashes of burning light from hitting their FloVe. A cold sweat broke out on his forehead as he fought to keep his mind clear to sense the energy bullets drawing nearer, and redirect their paths. Igor had already been hit because he had been sloppy, and he had no plans for it to happen again. What if one of the females or the child was hurt? “It is logical they do the same,” Kenshin finished, breathless.

  Igor thumbed a yellow button and switched to the secondary firing mode. He pumped the gun and fired.

  A dazzling orb of plasma was jettisoned into the air. As it soared towards the enemy vessel, jagged bolts of electricity crackled between the blue globe and the surrounding buildings.

  It bloated rather than shrank the further away it travelled.

  “Why have you stopped firing?” Lara shouted. When she spotted the sparking plasma sphere, she paled. “Not Edna. Igor don’t use the plasma grenades. They’re extremely volatile.”

  Igor grunted in disgust. He wagged an open palm at the glowing orb. “Useless MainLander junk. It does nothing.”

  The plasma ball missed the enemy FloVe and gently drifted to the ground.

  Lara twisted in her seat, and glared balefully. “Watch what you call junk you Cold bast–”

  The street erupted like a volcano. Massive chunks of concrete and earth were hurled into the air like cannonballs and smashed into the surrounding buildings with meteoric force.

  Debris rained down on the road.

  Lara used evasive manoeuvres, rocking the craft violently from side to side.

  “Maddie puked,” Max groaned. “It’s in my mouth. It tastes bad.”

  Shaken, Igor switched Edna back to primary firing mode.

  The laser blasts from the enemy stopped. Telepathic punches rippled through the air.

  Igor threw up a barrier, but the sudden expansion of metal focus cost him. He swayed on his feet. When the FloVe turned abruptly, sending him onto one foot, he threw his weight forward not wanting to fall out the craft. He crouched in front of Christabella and wobbled unsteadily. She fisted a hand in his snood to stop him keeling over, and in the other hand she clut
ched a rifle. “I’m standard,” he muttered, trying to reassure her. “My skill at defensive weaving is no good. I must catch my breath.”

  Pulsations of energy ricocheted across the space, but with Igor’s shield in place had no affect.

  Lara’s jaw tightened, but she sucked up her pride and did what needed to be done. “Max, front and centre. You pilot.”

  “Me? I thought that wouldn’t happen in this galaxy?”

  “On the laws of science, I swear, promise to my Omicron or no, I will slit your throat ear to ear if you don’t shut up and get over here.”

  Gritting his teeth, Max finished wiping Maddie-puke off his chin and climbed over the seats. He and Lara carefully traded places. He took in the damage to the hovercraft and what measures she had taken to counteract them. He punched buttons and flicked switches to adjust the craft to his preferred flight specifications.

  Lara clambered into the back with Igor. Her hair flew all about her face in the high-speed winds. “I can’t protect us and hold the shield with Blue.”

  “He is the Omicron. He can hold the weave by himself.” Igor winced as another attack battered his shielding. “I can’t hold this. If they figure that out and target my mind we are finished. I am completely open.”

  Lara weighed the probability of Blue being able to fight his way from the hot zone and keep the web of telepathic energy in tact. If any Hybrid managed to get a mental plea for help to the Creator the chances of escape from the quadrant lessened drastically. “Ending up mentally fried won’t improve our chances,” she muttered.

  Igor was doing his best to keep the attackers from breaching their minds, but his telepathic skill lay in the offensive, not the defensive, like hers. His mind was exposed to the enemy, and they could gain information on everything he’d seen, heard, and felt.

  A disaster.

  In comparison to the rest of them, Kenshin was weak in telepathic skill, and his mind was already taxed from using telekinesis to deflect the laser blasts.

  Christabella peeked over the edge of the hovercraft and stared at those in pursuit. “I can totally do this,” she muttered. “Stars, it’s less than five hundred yards.” She stood, effortlessly sliding into a ready pose. Christabella took aim, adjusted for the wind and squeezed the trigger.

  Igor peered through her expertly braced legs, and his eyebrows rose. She was competent. Surprised by the impulse, his gaze travelled up her shapely legs to the curve of her ass. He blinked, discomforted by how his body tightened then glared at Lara when she muttered something about males needing castration.

  Christabella noted the enemy Hybrids were only deflecting shots aimed directly at them. Whilst peppering them with shots to keep them distracted every third shot, she sent to the side of their FloVe. A vulnerable spot she knew about because she dated a solar-hot mechanic once.

  Lara spared the girl an amazed look, one that became a wide grin when Christabella’s steady shots chipped away at the hovercraft’s hull and nailed the engine.

  Christabella fist pumped when the enemy engine sparked and caught fire.

  The hovercraft whiplashed round then ping-ponged between the buildings. It crashed into a skyscraper, exploding in a pulsation of bright light that sent vibrations through the air. The glass on the high-rises shattered and cascaded down. The inferno swept though the narrow street, all that metal acting like a super conductor for the blast.

  Christabella squealed and dived to hide under Igor. Proud she’d done her part, but terrified in trying to help she’d killed them all.

  “Incoming,” Lara yelled.

  Giving Blue a mental nudge as warning, Lara withdrew her presence from the webbing keeping the Creator out. She pushed her power into shielding the FloVe as the purple-tinted conflagration rushed past their ship and consumed them whole.

  24.

  Blue sprinted the length of the deserted street, the impact of his heavy footfalls on the blacktop were hell on his knees. His breath came in heavy pants, and he admitted in the future it would be prudent to improve his cardiovascular performance.

  He should have been more careful with his FloBi. How he longed for the machine he’d taken for granted.

  Stopping in a dark alley, he leaned against the wall and caught his breath. Every vehicle he tried to boost was either broken or too out in the open. Host were all over him the nanosecond he came close to securing transport.

  He could hear them canvassing the streets.

  The Symbiont were for the most part Human in intelligence, and the aptitude of the original mind would determine their reasoning abilities. Blue was certain he could out smart them. His worry was the Crimzon. No matter how smart he was, that smoke would billow through the city streets and devour his flesh until he was a pile of clothes unless he got out of the blast radius.

  He was connected to Lara through the shield they’d weaved to keep the Hive learning of the raid, and she moved further away at a decent speed.

  He was relieved his people were safe.

  Was it too much to hope that Zeke, Valiant, Push, and Creighton would make it back to the rendezvous point soon too?

  Blue felt the blip in mental shielding from his attacker a split nanosecond before he jerked to the side and deflected the blow to the back of his head.

  He spun and lashed out with his foot, clipping the Hybrid who’d snuck up on him on the forearm she raised defensively. The girl launched a complicated series of punches and kicks at her turncoat Omicron, a style Blue struggled to anticipate, but gleaned the fundamentals of within eight strike stances and four defensive poses.

  She leapt into the air and moved with such speed she blurred, her long braid whipping out. The double-tap she nailed him in the gut and shoulder with was executed with lethal precision and grace.

  Landing softly, she spread her arms, hands fisted.

  “Traitor,” she hissed, her eyes morphing from steely grey to blood red. She bared dainty fangs.

  “You don’t know anything,” Blue replied, his chest tight. His gaze flicked over her and his expression softened. “You’re just a child, Chloe.”

  Face darkening, she sprinted towards him, twisted, and ran up the wall. She flipped overhead and kicked him hard in the upper back.

  Blue figured getting the quarks kicked out of him by a girl half his age would have been hilarious if it didn’t hurt so much. He let his body take over and began to meet her attack with renewed confidence, learning as they fought how to counteract her offensive strikes, and mixing in some of his favourites from an alternative style.

  A roundhouse kick caught him by surprise, snapping his head to the side.

  He took a flurry of hard fists to the solar plexus.

  His eyes narrowed gravely when he adverted a punch to the groin, and he incapacitated her with a solid blow to the knee.

  The joint buckled and she screamed. Veins in her neck bulged Chloe bellowed so loud.

  She staggered away from him whimpering shrilly, manic with her pain. Leaning her shoulders against the wall, a knock away from losing, she finally sneered. Dropping her mental shields, she gathered a swell of power to broadcast his location.

  Blue smothered her mind and clipped her jaw in the same moment.

  Chloe slumped, and he caught her under the arms to help her slide to the ground. He winced. Strange, he should have issues hitting a female when logically she was dangerous, and would injure him with every opportunity presented to her.

  As he left the alley, he remembered the Crimzon.

  Blue felt an uncustomary tingle of fear when he watched the red mist creep around a corner at the other end of the street then rush forward consciously seeking flesh to devour.

  He tore down the road and gleaming metal caught the corner of his eye, had him skidding to a stop to change direction.

  Blue wasted no time throwing a blade of power to shatter the glass door in his way to get inside the building. He stared at the antique motorbikes on display on the glass podiums. Reaching the first one, a sleek
black affair with a monster exhaust, he slung a leg over the machine. He hoped it had a full tank. It took nanoseconds to work out the throttle, clutch, brake, and ignition.

  Checking the brand, he lifted his hand. The corresponding OmniLock from a peg on the wall flew into his waiting palm.

  If it was already genetically coded, it was over. Blue closed his eyes and swiped the data strip.

  The engine fired, choked, fired again then roared to life, the exhaust shuddering as its emissions echoed thunderously.

  Blue dropped his leg and twisted his wrist, revving the bike. He shot off the podium. Speeding down the ramp, the torque lifted the front tyre in a power wheelie. He tucked his head into his shoulder and accelerated as the front wheel came down. Smashing through the glass, he landed on a bounce, skidding across the asphalt.

  Host poured from the shop after him.

  He decelerated, leaned to the side, and pivoted to sweep the back tyre around. Legs tucked in, Blue gunned it. The motorcycle blast down the street and the growl of the engine echoed off the high-rise walls.

  Leaning low, he manoeuvred with ease. The bike’s speed was considerably slower than a FloBi. Blue weaved a path through the Host, kicking out when any got close to dragging him off. His clothes were torn and bloodied by the time he got past them.

  Zipping down a narrow alley, Blue let the bike lean left and shifted his weight. He cold-clocked a snarling Hybrid as he passed, really throwing his weight into it. Blue’s knuckles split on impact. The broken skin on his hand stung, but the rawness of smashing his fist into the face of another felt good.

  Blood pumping, pulse racing, Blue was beginning to understand Lara’s fondness for violence.

  He was shaky with the need to brawl, battling his primal response to stop and fight until he couldn’t stand. Apparently, when his Human fight or flight response kicked in his instinct was to fight. A little wild-eyed, Blue laughed feverishly as he sent a thanks to the Cosmic Virgin he was Hybrid, and followed the logic to run far and fast.