by David Burke
Jay shrugged at Tyler as if to say Miguel had a point. He just shook his head at the two of them and said, “Well I guess we know who will bite it first. Remember what they always say, you don’t have to be faster than an owlbear while trying to run away, just faster than your friend who is trying to run away too.”
Tyler laughed at his own joke until Miguel said, “In that case, you are completely screwed, and Jay and I both have enhanced speed.”
“Oh yeah,” Tyler said glumly.
With that Jay sent out a pulse of Life Sense and told them what he found. They both tried practicing their heat sensing and sonar abilities. The heat sensing was able to find the larger creatures just like Jay had but for some reason the lizats were much harder for Tyler to detect than the owlbears were.
Jay speculated that it was because the lizats were cold-blooded and so didn’t have as great of a heat signature, but he knew it was just his speaking out of his backside. His knowledge of alien zoology was non-existent, and it made him miss Huong who had been able to figure out so much of this stuff.
Chapter 6 - Male Bonding
The first target they picked was a single lizat. Jay thought that the two of them should be able to take it out but he was ready to step in as necessary. When it charged, Tyler lashed out at it with his sword. The strike was strong and made a deep cut sending the creature to the side but wasn’t fatal.
The half cat, half lizard whirled around and moved to attack the one who had just hurt it. Jay watched to see how Tyler would respond but he wasn’t reacting nearly fast enough. While Jay didn’t want to interfere in valuable training, he also didn’t want to have Tyler skewered in their first engagement.
Jay reached out with his kinetic dampening field and slowed the cat’s strike. It was hard to refine the field so precisely since it was much easier to just use in a bubble around himself or even in a broad cone. So even if he hadn’t needed to do it, this was still good practice.
The field slowed the beast down enough that Miguel rushed in from the side and struck it a solid blow across its crown. Tyler then lunged in and finished it off. They were far from smooth but at least they seemed to trust each other.
“Did you do something to it there? It was almost like it started to move slower,” Tyler asked.
“Yeah, I wasn’t sure if you had it and I figured better safe than sorry.”
“Okay, I think we would have been fine, but thanks I agree with keeping me safe as a high priority,” Tyler said with a grin on his face.
The next kill was another single lizat. Jay’s Life Sense was helping them to avoid groups of monsters. This fight went much easier as Miguel attacked it first with speed knocking it off balance and Tyler stepped in with a spear that he borrowed from Jay and finished the creature with a powerful thrust.
“I see what you mean. The sword is cool and all but I have more range with this,” Tyler said after the creature stopped moving.
“And face it, none of us are exactly weapons masters so I think that the spear is good for the untrained. You can keep it for now and just buy me a replacement when you get the money,” Jay said.
“Hey speak for yourselves. I am all grace here,” Miguel protested playfully.
“Yeah graceful if you count swinging that thing like a baseball bat.”
It was like that between almost every kill. The banter was fun and refreshing in a way but by the middle of the day Jay was missing Amelia calling him a bone head, and Huong constantly checking up to make sure he had enough water or whatever other thing crossed her mind. Even Meikiyo’s quiet peacefulness would have been greatly welcome at this point.
That wasn’t who he had with him though so he tried to make the best of it. They talked about which girls that they were active with. Jay didn’t tell them much but everyone in the camp knew who was on Team Jay by this time. While he listened to their stories about aphrodisiac-fueled conquests, it only served to help Jay make a list of girls who were no-fly zone. He definitely didn’t want to share when it came to Team Jay.
There weren’t any solo creatures that Jay could find and in fact if anything the creatures seemed to be grouping up into even larger groups. He couldn’t help but wonder if his higher level had something to do with that. Either way the next fight was going to involve 4 lizats or Jay wasn’t sure if they were ready.
They stopped for lunch and started discussing tactics. Jay said that seeing the sword earlier had given him one idea. He wanted to see if he could shape the psionic construct into a sword. So far he had only been able to make a simple ball that he could pass from hand to hand but which dissipated if it got too far from his body. Anything more than two feet appeared to be too much.
He focused on visualizing the sword that he wanted. Visualizing and conviction seemed to be the key as much as PSI energy was. Once he had that image clear in his head, he began to activate the skill. PSI energy rushed out of him and he inherently knew that his technique must be sloppy because it wasn’t very efficient.
By the time he finished he had spent nearly half of his PSI but held in his hand a translucent sword. The blade was a good four feet long, which would have presented quite a problem except that it weighed next to nothing. A few practice swings again assured him that was easy to use and even if he didn’t really know anything about swordsmanship, it still would be easy to wield.
As the blade zipped around with each move he made, he felt the tiny drain upon his PSI from maintaining the blade. So far that was the way that it worked with the items he created. It took a huge amount of energy to make them, but very little to maintain them.
Realizing that the blade lacked much mass and so he couldn’t count upon the weight of it to deliver force made him realize that this was going to be more of a precision item not a hacking weapon. With that he thought about how he wasn’t limited by his normal conceptions of a sword so he set out to reshape it.
Changing the shape of it felt different than forming it in the first place, more complicated but less energy-intensive. He lessened the thickness and width of the blade while extending its length out to five feet. By the time he got done he actually felt a little silly about it. The blade wasn’t more than half an inch wide and the edge thickness was little more than a piece of paper.
“I need to rest for five minutes before I am fully recharged and then we can take on the next group. I will have to fight this time though because there are four lizats,” Jay said as he sat down cross legged. It wasn’t necessary for him to assume such a position but he found it easier to meditate if he did so. He shrugged as the thought crossed his mind. It was probably a faulty misconception, but he had his limits.
“If you can make stuff out of thin air why not just poof up a few guns for us?” Tyler asked.
Jay didn’t open his eyes but instead continued to relax and breathe deeply as he answered, “One step at a time.” He felt his PSI energy regenerating and visualized it as a swell of energy each time that he took in a deep breath.
When he reopened his eyes, both of the other guys were ready for battle. Miguel would go airborne and strafe the enemy from the air while Tyler would try to pick them off from the ground. Jay was to be the center of attention. He honestly felt by this time that the lizats didn’t pose much of a threat to him but he didn’t want to become too cocky so he was still going to allow the others to help. They needed the practice anyway.
Jay found clearing the underbrush with his new blade was effortless. It had such a razor-sharp, fine edge that it cut through the vegetation with little more difficulty than the air. He felt a tiny drain upon his PSI every time the blade made contact with anything. Apparently it required energy to maintain the form, but it was insignificant.
They reached the lizat nest when Jay sliced through a wall of bamboo-like reeds and then the creatures attacked. Their snarls as he invaded their home were likely no less indignant than he had felt when Kenley’s group attacked his cluster. Still this was necessary.
Given the dead
ly nature of his blade, Jay maintained both his precognitive ability and his Life Sense at the lowest minimum active level. He wanted to make sure he didn’t cut one of his allies in half and honestly he felt a bit like a Jedi at this point.
The first lizat’s leap was cut short as an upward swing took its head off. The cut was just a thin red line at first and didn’t even register with the creature until an instant later it head was gone and then nothing registered with it. Jay sidestepped with enhanced speed and was already swinging into the next attack which severed both the outstretched front paws of the next creature.
The fight was happening quickly. Too quickly for Tyler to react yet, but Miguel had dove hard at the lizat furthest from Jay. His aerokinesis made his motion both swift and perfectly silent. For that matter moving the air flow probably even prevented the creature from smelling his approach.
Since its eyes had been on Jay, it never saw the heavy mace head that crashed into the side of its oblong head crushing bone and ruining the eye. It certainly screeched in pain but wasn’t even able to make a counter attack as the winged human’s momentum carried him past it while redirected currents of air provided lift and forced him up and away.
Tyler took the opportunity to run in from the flank and finished the lizat with a strength-enhanced spear thrust. Jay could only laugh as both men looked for their next target only to find him standing amidst the cut-up remains of the other three lizats. It had been almost too easy. These creatures clearly weren’t going to be challenging him.
“We need to move on to clearing this floor. I’m not gonna get stronger here. So we need to get both of you past this level,” Jay said.
“Don’t we have to take out the boss for that?” Miguel asked.
“And have the quest for it?” Tyler added.
“Yes and yes, but I’m hoping that if you go outside to the terminal at the foot of the ziggurat that you can activate the quest and we can finish it all up in one day. I was level eight when I fought that thing before and today has shown me that I am far stronger than I was back then,” Jay said.
“Wait? You want us to go out there? With a bunch of hormonal women?” Tyler asked.
“Well we don’t know how bad it is, but we do know that we need to get you guys leveled up and that me being here isn’t going to do much for me. I need to keep descending. I think bad things will happen if we don’t keep pushing ourselves.”
The two guys both looked at him with consternation on their faces. His points were valid, he knew it. He knew it far better than they did and even if he wasn't sharing about the dreams, they could tell he was holding something back. He never really had much of a poker face.
“So what aren’t you telling us?” Miguel asked.
“Nothing that is concrete, just suspicions that I have. When I know something for sure then the entire cluster will know. Leave it at this, though. I am 100% certain that we need to keep descending and that we have less time than we think.”
“Fine, I will risk it, but if I get mobbed by a swarm of girls who want to talk about their feelings, then I expect you to come save my ass,” Tyler grumbled.
Laughing, Jay said, “Fine if you aren’t back 10 minutes after you leave then the cavalry will come running.”
By this point they had made it back to the entrance in the cliff and Tyler exited. Miguel looked back at Jay and said, “I don’t know how much it’s about the cavalry coming in as it is about misery loves company.” Then he too walked out of the dungeon.
Jay sat down to meditate and focus on his Body Modification skill. He still felt funny using it in front of other people, but now he had at least 5 minutes of alone time.
Chapter 7- A Big Fish in a Small Pond
Their worries ended up being all fuss and no muss as both the guys were able to sneak down to the terminal, get the quest and return without being seen by any of the girls. When they told Jay that, at first he was worried, thinking that something had happened to them, but they assured him that they had heard the girls’ voices and thought they were all somewhere around the bungalows.
Once Jay was sure that it was okay for them to continue without checking on the girls he said, “So, I was thinking about this. I want to get you guys as leveled up as possible and that requires you fighting and training your skills. The more skills you can practice at a time the better, but if we want to finish this quest before dark, we are gonna have to really up our pace. It is already past noon.”
“What are you suggesting then?” Miguel asked.
“Don’t want this to sound bad, but you guys just can’t keep up with me yet. So for the next hour, I am gonna move through the jungle killing stuff as fast as I can. You two just try to follow as closely as you can. Keep as many skills active as you can and push yourself. Then let your energy regenerate some after you hit half energy. Don’t want you to be dry in case the fit hits the shan,” Jay said.
“Ha, okay, but I’m not sure how many skills I can keep going at once. Maybe two,” Tyler said.
“It gets easier with practice. When we attacked that last group of lizats I was keeping at least four skills going but I wanna keep working up. I think it is one of the best ways to improve. You can never be content.”
Tyler grinned and looked at Miguel. “Guess we got a life coach too, not just a leader.”
“Look, we don’t have to do this if you don’t want to,” Jay said as he glared at Tyler.
“Don’t mind him, he is just feeling inadequate,” Miguel said as he elbowed his friend.
In that moment warning bells went off in Jay’s head. It wasn’t a sense of anything imminent so it felt different. Yet he recognized it as an extension of his precognitive ability. He hated it but he just kept getting the sense that he couldn’t trust any other guys. Liam hadn’t been so bad and he never really got a chance to know Oliver.
Since his interactions with the invaders he had been hesitant to trust Tyler and Miguel. Yet the desire for camaraderie was a strong motivator and they seemed very different. Maybe he was just jumping to conclusions, but he didn’t like to be ribbed by people that he was helping out of the goodness of his heart.
“Let’s get started. We are burning daylight.” With that Jay activated Life Sense and Precognition to level one then formed his sword. It came much more quickly this time now that he had a better idea of what he wanted. Also having wielded it before seemed to have created a better mental image so that he didn’t have to shape what he formed. It came out as he intended the first time and with far less wasted PSI.
Once the weapon was formed Jay activated his enhanced speed and wanting to show the others up pushed it all the way to level four before he bolted out at a pace that would make an Olympic sprinter drool with envy. He weaved his way through the jungle flawlessly thanks to the combination of skills.
Initially he had only meant to use the Life Sense and precognition to help him control the deadly blade. Now though he realized it could be so much more. He internally kicked himself for not realizing it before. With these skills his awareness of his surroundings was greatly enhanced. He knew the proper place to put each foot without even looking and so was able to move without diminishing his speed in the thickest undergrowth.
The others would undoubtedly have lost him if it weren’t for the fact that his swiping slices with the blade left an unmistakable trail behind him. As he sensed a pair of owl bears in a small clearing ahead, he slowed slightly and then strained as he magnified his strength to level 1 as well. Five skills running had his head swimming, but it was only for a second.
He used the blinding speed and the extra burst of strength to practically fly through the air. The beasts never knew what hit them. He had taken the head off the first and eviscerated the second before it struck back with a feeble slash of its claw-tipped paw. Not one to be cruel he quickly ended its suffering and then didn’t even stop as he rushed towards the next pocket of life he felt.
After an hour of this he had killed over 20 more lizats an
d 13 owlbears. Tyler and Miguel had managed 3 lizats between them. He didn’t want to be too hard on them as he knew that they were capable of more if he had given them time but it was taking everything they had just to keep up with him.
The more that he learned to balance his speed with his extra sensory skills the more he felt alive. It was like he knew where everything around him was at all times. He had a sense of being in touch with the world in a way that he never felt before.
Still, he kept pushing himself, pushing his skills. He worked on maintaining five skills until he had a splitting headache and that core deep within his chest felt like it ached. It wasn’t that he was running out of stamina or PSI points. Rather it was that five skills stretched him in ways that he didn’t know he could be stretched. It was sorta like trying to rub your belly and pat your head at the same time while also blowing bubbles and riding a unicycle.
As much of a strain as it was, he felt alive. The fights were all trivial, and he knew he wasn’t going anywhere near his most deadly. Rather, he was trying to balance a new set of skills in a different way. He didn’t know exactly why, but he strongly felt that diversity would be important. Being a one-trick pony seemed like a sure way to die.