I should go home, he thought. It was the sensible thing to do. If he went into another major battle as he was now, he would die. Alone. No one would even know what had happened.
He wasn’t even sure anymore why he was doing this. Was it all for sentiment, for a demented and now dead dragon? The next dragon that hatched from the egg wouldn’t know him, wouldn’t remember him. It wouldn’t be thankful. It might be kinder to leave it here. Without a mage to bond with it, would never hatch.
“What if they’re already dead? Say perhaps if we found some that had fallen off a cliff and they were already dead? It would be wrong to let them go to waste…”
Desacus’s words ran through his head once again. “That stupid dragon was obsessed with trying human,” he said to himself with a chuckle. He packed his waterskin away and stood up. Then he continued walking south, too stubborn to give up.
The ground began to slope gently upward, and he wondered if he would ever reach his destination. It would be somewhat ironic if he had miscalculated his directions and wound up walking past it. That never happened in stories.
“The hero gets lost and wanders around until he dies of exhaustion,” he muttered. “That sounds about right.” He was starting to wish they would shoot at him again. At least then he had been sure he was doing something they didn’t approve of—like, say, heading in the proper direction.
As he neared the top of the gentle slope, a vague sense of danger told him to stop. Once he crested it, he would be in view of the enemy. He needed to be ready for the consequences.
Using some of his precious aythar, he cast a spell to temporarily banish his weariness. The consequences of that would be felt later, but he needed to be clear headed. If he was dead, it wouldn’t matter how tired he was. Gripping his staff firmly in his right hand, he tucked the specialized rune channel rod through his belt where he could reach it quickly.
He removed a handful of other small objects from his pack and arranged them in small open pouches around his waist where he could get at them if needed. Then, taking a deep breath, he started walking once more.
As the land revealed itself to him on the other side, he saw a wide squat building a half mile in the distance. It was plain and ugly, composed of red brick and surrounded with more of those odd wire fences that Karen’s world seemed so fond of. If he had seen it in Lothion, he would have been amazed, for it was gigantic for a building of his world, but in this one he had grown used to the vast size of their constructions. It stood perhaps forty or fifty feet in height, which was not so much, but its length and width were too great for him to easily estimate.
Almost as an afterthought, he tilted his head to one side, letting a bullet whiz past his right ear. His attention was now wholly focused on the array of soldiers and tortuses stretched out across the field in front of him, between him and his goal.
They were arrayed in lines. The military androids carried rifles and an assortment of other weapons he didn’t recognize. The tortuses he was well acquainted with. All in all, it looked like they were taking him very seriously.
“They really don’t like visitors,” he observed. Then he began walking down the slope to meet them.
Chapter 52
It was immediately apparent that simply dodging and shielding himself now and then wasn’t going to be sufficient to keep him alive. There were simply too many soldiers shooting at him, and the tortuses were rotating their time firing with those odd spinning machine guns of theirs.
Within less than ten yards, he was forced to hunker down behind another earthen shield, and that wasn’t good enough. Being forced to stay in one spot made him vulnerable to the tortus’s high-velocity weapon, and it was powerful enough to destroy his earth defense, the shield behind it, and still have plenty of power left to blow a hole through him.
Before that could happen, he activated the Fool’s Tesseract. “Stur maen, eilen kon, sadeen lin, rextalyet stur, amyrtus!” The command he used was highly specific. The enchantment brought only two faces of the Fool’s Tesseract to life—one face that was normal, in that it allowed only matter coming into it, while the second face was inverted, sending that same matter immediately back outward.
Above, below, and behind, he was still exposed to the open air, but in front of him, the side facing the enemy, the two translation panes met to form a corner that pointed in the direction he was now walking. Incoming fire that struck the normal translation pane passed through the interior dimension before exiting back out the other face at a ninety-degree angle. As a result, some of the weapons fire from the soldiers on his left was sent back at the soldiers on his right.
The soldiers on the left were lucky, since nothing was being sent back in their direction.
He managed fifty yards in that manner, while the enemy ranks were thrown into chaos as the right side of their line was subjected to a withering amount of firepower, thanks to their friends on the left. If Matthew could have aimed it precisely, they would have been decimated, but he had to rely on luck, as the angles of the incoming fire were varied.
The enemy weren’t stupid. The left stopped firing after less than twenty seconds, so he swapped the sides, and the left got a taste of what they had been dishing out to their friends. Soon after that, the entire enemy force stopped firing altogether.
They weren’t giving up, though. Matthew immediately felt the danger above. “Slan maen, eilen kon, sadeen lin, rextalyet slan, amyrtus!” A third translation pane sprang into existence above him, protecting him from the incoming drone attacks. Their missiles and weapons fire was absorbed through the pane above and projected from the two panes that protected his front.
Matthew smiled as he kept walking. They have to be shitting themselves by now, he thought. Or they would be, if they were human. He quickly put that thought aside. Thinking of them as unfeeling machines spoiled the fun of it.
“Bree maen, eilen slan, sadeen lin, amyrtus!” he shouted, shifting the Fool’s Tesseract into a new mode. The danger was all around him now, so he had activated every face except the one below him, to enable him to continue walking.
Then he knelt slightly; even the small space at the bottom was too much, and he had to drive the boxlike sides of the Fool’s Tesseract into the ground to save his feet. Since it was still open on the side beneath him, he felt the ground shake as the terrain around him erupted in fire and fury. A missile strike, probably, but not aimed directly at me, he guessed. He couldn’t fault his enemy’s intelligence. They learned quickly. They had resorted to blowing up everything in his vicinity in an attempt to get around his strange protections.
He stayed in place until the ground was still once more, then straightened his knees and proceeded forward. After only ten feet, he was forced to stop again. How many missiles and explosives do these people have? he wondered. It seemed ridiculous that anyone would keep so much destructive firepower stockpiled. What do they do with it all when they aren’t shooting at people like me?
After several more stops and starts, he reached a point that he judged was probably the middle of the front line. With five panes, activated he could only rely on the short range of his magesight to show him the world around him, and that only went about fifty feet out at the moment. There were soldiers and other enemies around him, though, so he knew he must have reached some part of their line. “Talto maen, eilen slan, sadeen lin, amyrtus.”
He was surrounded on all sides now, as well as above and below. He had set the interior dimension small, but not small enough to trigger another fusion reaction. Matthew waited twenty seconds, and then inverted the Fool’s Tesseract. “Rextalyet, amyrtus!”
Ten seconds after that, he started to deactivate the entire thing, to take a good look around, but a flash of insight warned him not to. There were still foes present. Changing his mind, he switched it into a three-pane mode, two in front and one above. Swiveling the staff in his hand he surveyed the field, ready to protect himself should someone take a shot at him.
He quick
ly saw why deactivating it entirely would have been foolhardy. The blast he had caused had wrecked most of the military androids, but the tortuses were made of tougher stuff, and most of them were still active. They began moving and shooting as soon as they saw part of his protective enchantment go down, trying to circle him so they could fire at him from behind.
There were at least seven of them, and they were too close and moving too quickly for him to hope to protect himself by shifting his shield back and forth. Instead, he let himself fall backward so that the three sides of the Fool’s Tessaract formed a pyramid-like shape over him. Reaching into one of the pouches at his waist, he drew out a handful of his enchanted metal spheres and used his power to launch them outward.
Since the translation panes only worked in one direction, they allowed him complete freedom to fire or throw things outward; he just had to do so blindly. These weapons were enchanted for just that purpose. As they landed well beyond his pyramid they discharged, sending a storm of electrical arcs in every direction.
While the translation panes protected him, he still felt a strange jolt through the ground, like a mild buzzing. Note to self: if you aren’t careful, you could still electrocute yourself.
After a few seconds, he stood up and took a hasty look around. Most of the tortuses were still, though a few were shaking in a strange way the reminded him of a seizure. Two of those farthest away were still active. He remedied that by pointing his lightning rod at them and giving them a more personal shock.
For the moment, he had won.
He deactivated the Fool’s Tesseract and headed for the building. A few of the military androids were still around, lurking behind the cover of the building or pretending to be inactive by laying still on the ground, but it wasn’t enough to require the tesseract. He walked on, dodging when necessary and making certain that those brave enough to shoot once didn’t manage to do so twice.
The question now was where to go? Presumably the egg was being kept in the facility, maybe in a deep underground level similar to the place he had found Karen. But what if they had moved it? He would feel pretty damn stupid if he had gone through all of that, including losing his hand, only to find that they had moved the egg somewhere he couldn’t find it.
Without Gary, there was no way he could locate it again. Correction—even with Gary, he wouldn’t be able to find it again. The machine had told him that he could no longer scavenge the network for information. An entire world was a large place, and this one was uniquely hostile. This was his only chance.
Even if they’re just machines, they’re intelligent, Matthew reasoned. If it isn’t here, I’ll just keep coming back and blowing things up until they come to the intelligent decision that it would be better to just give back the egg. With his current bravado, he could almost believe that, but deep down he knew he wouldn’t have the strength for it. Once he left, he was never coming back.
The main entrance of the building was a pair of what had until recently been a beautiful set of glass doors. Now they were shattered and in ruins. I should tell someone so they can fix them, thought Matt wryly. Glancing around at the burnt and torn lawn, covered in broken, smoking, and in some cases burning machines, he decided not to bother. They’ve got bigger problems to worry about. He suppressed what would probably have been a semi-hysterical giggle. The stress was definitely getting to him.
He was just starting up the steps to the entrance when he felt it. It was Desacus’s aythar, bright and strong. Matt was so glad to see it that he almost hesitated when his extra sense warned him of danger. Almost.
Directing his power downward against the ground, he leapt skyward. It was the only option to avoid the massive blast of power that obliterated the entrance, the steps, and what little had remained of the once-proud doors.
He sailed thirty feet into the air, and as he reached his apogee, he decided that he had probably overreacted. Adrenaline was funny like that. Now he had to manage a considerable fall. He was also a convenient target, since he couldn’t dodge while in the air.
Sure enough, his precognition warned him he was about to be blasted. Without enough time to get the words out to activate the staff, he created a shield instead: double layered, with a soft cushiony exterior and a hard, inner layer. If he survived the blast, it would do double duty by breaking his fall.
The shield held, barely, but the force of it ripped away the outer layer and sent him hurtling to the side at dangerous speed. When he finally struck the ground, the jarring impact rattled him so hard he was almost rendered senseless. His vision returned a second later and he found himself sprawled against a dead tortus. His shield was gone—he had lost it during his momentary blackout—but nothing seemed broken.
He felt as though he were swimming, though. Maybe a concussion, he realized. In the distance, he could see his dragon’s aythar, so bright it had extended the range of his magesight, like a lighthouse on a dark sea. It was approaching.
He needed to protect himself. The staff was his first thought, but it was gone; he had lost it in the fall. Struggling to his feet, he looked around for it, but his eyes weren’t cooperating. Everything was blurry, and his balance felt off.
Several thoughts ran through his jumbled mind at once. First, he might be about to die at the hand, or claw, of his own dragon. Second, dragons couldn’t use their aythar, not directly. Only a mage bonded to the dragon could do that. Third, he was supposed to be the only mage left in this world. Fourth, Annie had been a beautiful dog. It had really bothered him seeing her killed.
My thoughts are disordered. Not a good thing, considering his current situation. He reached for his enchanted shield stones, but then changed his mind. They were excellent protection, but another blast like the last would knock him unconscious with that sort of rigid shield. It might even kill him.
The itching in his left hand was driving him mad, and it was accompanied now by an aching throb. Glancing at, it he could see it was red and swollen. I’m going to regret that choice, he thought idly. Then he realized he had lost track of his priorities. His enemy was fifty feet away, studying him.
His vision cleared, and he saw the dark metal of one of the special ANSIS androids. It leveled a searing blast of flame and heat at him, which he only narrowly avoided by dodging sideways. He stumbled and almost fell as he did.
“Nice to meet you,” he announced in English.
A dragonling was on the android’s shoulder, its long slender tailed wrapped firmly around the throat of the machine to hold it securely in position.
“You speak English,” observed the machine. “What are you? She’Har, or something else? Where is Karen?”
Matthew felt slightly more confident now that the battle had shifted to conversation. With every second that passed, his balance was improving. He hoped. “I’m a nutjob,” he answered proudly, then adding, “A completely human nutjob. What are you? Are you Karen’s mother?”
It stared at him briefly, its face incapable of expression, while it wondered if his mind had been damaged. Finally, it answered, “We are many things. Karen’s creator is among them. Give her to us and we will let you leave unharmed.”
The demand didn’t sit well with him. “I have a counterproposal. Give me back my dragon, and I’ll let you leave here unharmed.”
“Your proposal is rejected,” responded the machine. “You will not leave here alive.”
“On the contrary,” he replied, “I can leave whenever I like, but I hold the upper hand. I’ve survived everything you could throw at me, and destroyed your army in the process. The only reason I remain is to give you the opportunity to surrender my dragon to me.”
Briefly, it considered his words, then decided they were merely a bluff. Rather than answer, it would annihilate him while he was off-guard.
He felt the impending attack an instant before it came. It would be a wide blast of raw power, too broad for him to dodge and too powerful for him to shield against. However it had managed it, the machine was a mage
of some sort, and it was using the vast power provided by the dragon.
Matthew had spent his late childhood sparring with his sister on many afternoons. They had fought with their power in much the same way that many normal siblings wrestled. While he had always been slightly stronger, he had learned early on that simple strength was not the most important thing when fighting with magic.
A true wizard’s strength was imagination.
As the machine was beginning its attack, he ripped the ground from beneath it, pulling upward. The android fell backward and the blast went tearing through the air above his head. Even as it fell, he was stepping backward and tossing a few of his enchanted metal spheres in its direction. Lightning erupted from them. He hoped it would be a quick end to the fight.
“Hope in one hand and shit in the other,” his father had once said. “See which one fills up faster.” Supposedly it was a saying from his grandfather, but in any case, it was certainly true today. The thing he fought shielded itself, and stood up from the torn ground, unharmed.
Running sideways, he only just avoided its massive return blast.
They fought that way for a minute that lasted an eternity, and as eternity dragged on, Matthew could see he had several problems… and a few advantages. In the technical sense, he was a stronger wizard than his opponent. He could discern that with his magesight. The machine was roughly as powerful as Karen had been. Matthew was also much more skilled.
In a fair fight, he would have already won.
But they were fighting in a world starved for aythar, and while his reserves were limited, its were not. It could draw nigh inexhaustible power from the dragon, while he was growing steadily weaker.
Because of that, it did everything as powerfully as possible. Its shields were as strong as it could make. The blasts it hurled at him were intense and broad, making them difficult to dodge. If he had met the thing while at his best, he might have been able to overwhelm it, break its shield, and destroy it before the dragon enabled it to wear him down. But it was too late for that.
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