End Boss

by Bryan Nyaude

  “You caught me by surprise, but it won’t happen again,” he spoke, hovering slightly into the air.

  His movements had changed drastically, like he was now a whole new person. “Do you know who wore that armor before you?” he continued as he made his way up to me in the sky.

  His question puzzled as I didn’t respond him—it almost sounded rude, like he was trying to make a mockery out of me.

  “So they didn’t tell you what the End Boss system really is?” he asked while reloading four bullets into his gun.

  The whole time he spoke, my eyes were glued to his guns. I saw my best chance of attack in the interval between each reload. That was the only time he seemed vulnerable. I glimpsed even closer and noticed that his armor had taken slight damage from one of my guns. It wasn’t enough to immobilize him since he could still move swiftly. Boy, this guy was tough—that last blast I shot at him had enough power to take out an assault ship, and yet it didn’t faze him that much.

  “It doesn’t matter who wore it first,” I screamed and reloaded my gun, hoping to put an end to this fight in four shots. “What matters now is that I have it and what I am using it for.”

  All that was just talk, the difficult part was backing my words up. I could tell that he sensed my desperation and fear.

  “You are still naïve, Den,” he said, rotating his head sideways. “Do you truly know what is going on earth? Just what did your superiors tell you? You seem to think you are doing the right thing, but you are wrong.”

  No, I wasn’t wrong. Dr. Vegai was just saying all these words to confuse me, and to make me doubt myself. I shook my head, trying to sort away my uncertainty. Although, I had found a few things rather suspicious, to say the least. Something about this whole mission seemed out of place for the most part. I mean, we were not briefed on anything, and half of the crew was some of the greatest military elites. There was another motive to this mission, I suspected that greatly.

  “Your world government is corrupted, Den,” he said sincerely, like he meant it. “I will destroy that corruption, once and for all, and bring my kingdom back to earth, once there is nothing left.”

  “You are talking about killing millions of innocent lives,” I growled and firmly gripped my revolvers in anger. “You are a monster, Dr. Vegai. How can you live with yourself after what you have done?”

  He laughed out loudly and looked away in the direction of the gate, in an odd manner, “have you seen what I have done? I created peace on this planet; I gave them one mind and made them become united.”

  Really! Is this what he called unity? The only thing corrupt I saw was him.

  “You took their freedom and liberty and used them like dogs to further your own ambitions,” I rattled and burst towards him at full speed. His armor was very strong, but if I could get close enough, I could disrupt its system functions.

  Dr. Vegai moved out of the way so swiftly, like he knew what I was up to and evaded every attack I made with my left hand. I didn’t attack with my guns, since I wanted to reserve my ammunition for the perfect moment.

  “There is no such thing as freedom,” he said and blocked my attack, with his elbow like it was nothing. “It is an illusion created to fool people into thinking they are in control of their lives. Your government has truly sullied you young people to the extent that you are beyond help.”

  I started to get the feeling he had something against the government, and I was curious to know what it was.

  “What did the government do to you to hate it so much?”

  The doctor lowered his guard down and looked down like he was in remorse. Perfect! This was the only chance to attack him while his guard was down, but I decided to wait for some reason. Darn you, conscience!

  “They took away everything I ever cared about,” he said and looked up at me.

  I couldn’t tell if he meant it, since I couldn’t read the expression on his face—because of the helmet he was wearing. “Do you know what it is like to lose everything? To live 500 years with that regret bottled up inside you, unable to sleep at night? Do you know what that feels like?”

  No! I truly had no idea how that felt, and I didn’t want to imagine how that felt like. Living without Rose, for these past 4 years, had been my worst nightmare—the world just felt sad and lonely for me. Like a piece of me had been stripped away from me.

  “You are right,” I whispered in agreement, “I have no idea what that feels like, but killing innocent people for your vendetta will not solve anything.”

  “You are just like the others,” he said in fury and dashed towards me.

  The sole of his foot connected with my stomach and sent me flying back first into the ground. It felt really painful like my insides had been turned upside down and swished.

  “You all say the same thing, but you truly don’t know what this emptiness feels like. Waking up to this cold reality everyday for five hundred freaking years is nothing, but torture.”

  Deep down, I could relate. The appearance of the terror beasts on my planet had marked the end of my nice boring life. I truly regretted not doing the things I liked while I still had the chance. All I knew was that my family was still alive somewhere on earth, and possibly, I would see them one day if I survived. I longed to see everyone I cared for, all this fighting had truly scarred what was left of my humanity. I wanted to laugh again and enjoy peace without worrying about terror beasts attacking. As I got up to my feet again, I realized there was no getting through to him. The man he once was had vanished, all that remained of his former life was filled with vengeance and destruction.

  “If you truly wanted revenge, then why didn’t you go after the people who took everything away from you? Leave everyone else out of it.”

  If he had done that from the start, he could have saved us all a whole lot of problems. It’s hard to believe I said those exact words, nevertheless, I said them.

  “Nothing is ever that simple,” he said and descended down to ground level. “You have your reasons for fighting and I have mine. I truly wished you had joined me, but I can’t force you to make that choice. It’s obvious now that words alone can’t settle this battle, so come at me with everything you got and I will do the same.”

  After saying that, he signaled the giant terror beast towards him and jumped up to its back gently. Not fair, there was no way I could win since it was two on one now. The huge beast dashed towards me at full speed and barely missed me, as I took off for the sky. It couldn’t fly which meant I had the advantage, in terms of attacking and defending. What the! Something began to form from its mouth. It was like that time with the giant lizard I fought.

  “Darn! I just can’t seem to get any breaks,” I said to myself and soared even higher, by transferring more power to my flight thrusters.

  Based on my last encounter, there was no way to truly counter a guided laser beam. I could deflect it with an equal power or get out of its path within a microsecond of impact. Last one—impossible. Crap, the large creature was still compressing the laser even further, making it stronger and more powerful. It was then I realized it wasn’t a real terror beast. More or likely, a machine, a robot created to imitate a terror beast.

  “Great job,” Kristin commented from the com link, “just keep him distracted. We are in the final stages of battle, it might be a while before the gate falls, but we will stop the invasion. Just keep doing what you are doing for now, and leave the rest to us.”

  Great! If I could keep it up for that long; at any second, that giant terror beast could fire the guided laser. I had less than seconds to come up with a solid strategy.

  “There is no escape for you,” the doctor screamed at me and I was able to hear it, thanks to the sensor enhancements in the armor. “This beam will find you, no matter how far you go, and destroy you.”

  He was right, there was no point in distancing myself. The beam could not be outrun, meaning I was wasting precious power. My best option for survival was to stop running and pu
t all my power into strengthening my defense.

  “Convert all power to the defense, now,” I ordered my AI, getting ready to prepare a solid shield around myself. It was then I realized that conserving ammunition was useless if I was dead. So, I had to attack first before it launched the beam.

  With my posture completely changed, I pointed my guns towards the beast in order to counter it and decrease the damage. I could only hope my left gun was going to shoot something in time, instead of what happened last time. Instantly, the large terror fired without warning, catching me off guard. I could barely see the beam come towards me.

  “Oh crap,” I panicked, tightening my stomach.

  Immediately, I countered back with my guns, aiming directly into the beam. Again, only the right gun fired while the left revolver shot another blank. Stupid dud! The two beams collided, in mid air, and sent massive opposing shockwaves in different directions. The wind generated forced me back in a defensive posture. In that short brief movement, I moved out of harm’s way, and soared down at lightning speed to attack them while they were still distracted.

  “It is futile,” the doctor snickered and the large terror beast shot another beam from its mouth at me. “All your words and petty actions are useless against the power of my inventions.”

  Darn! Perhaps, I had been too hasty in attacking. Regrettably, there was no way to avoid this incoming beam judging by how fast I was going.

  “Activating shields at 100%,” my AI said and a massive barrier of energy formed around me. The blast connected with the shield barrier, nullifying some of its destructive power. It wasn’t enough to stop it, since some of it got through—connecting physically, and burning a hole in my armor.

  “Hot! Hot! Hot!”

  It felt like I had been branded on my left pectoral muscle. I was knocked back up, into of the sky, with no control at all. I kept spinning up further into the sky with no clear projective path. “Reverse the flow by nullifying it with the back thrusters, at full power.”

  This was a risky plan, one instant mistake and that would be the end of it.

  “Command acknowledged,” the AI responded and activated the back thrusters at a constant increasing speed.

  My movements began to slow down, bit by bit, until I completely stopped further past the hot zone. I was a bit far east, but still close enough to hear the fight. In the final stages of the conflict, anything was possible. Nothing was left to chance anymore. But still, that was some hefty thinking on my part. By reversing the flow, I managed to nullify my anticlockwise rotation, with an equal and powerful clockwise force. Had I not thought of that, I would have been a goner by now. I guess I was smarter than I thought.

  Darn! As long as he had that terror beast, it was almost impossible to get close to him. My best chance was to separate him from it. To do that, I needed some help. No, it was just too dangerous, since none of my allies had enough fighting power to be on par with that giant monster. But what could I do? I pondered for a second as I hovered up above the sky, thinking of my next plan of attack. “Darn it,” I screamed as two more beams approached directly for me at a great speed. I evaded and maneuvered out of the way, but they turned around and came straight back at me. I tried desperately to outrun them just to be certain—useless plan. They followed behind me, gaining distance with each second.

  “So, that’s how it is,” I said to myself, as I came up with a brilliant, although stupid plan. If these beams followed me everywhere I went, then I could use them to my advantage. I redirected myself into the direction of the mad doctor, my heart racing wildly. In all honesty, it was a better plan than anything I could possibly think of at that time.

  “I got a gift for you,” I yelled to him, descending down at an increasing speed, using the massive gravity of the planet to hurl my whole body far beyond the sound barrier speed. “I want you to have this.”

  The giant beast was too slow to counter as I landed on its back so fast and dangerously, I almost broke my back.

  “What are you doing?” the doctor asked and then looked up at the incoming energy lasers. “Oh no, what have you done?”

  “Sorry, no time to talk,” I responded and jumped off before the two beams collided on the terror beast’s back, within fractions of seconds.

  There was a huge explosion, followed by a chaos of heavy shockwaves that knocked me down, a few yards away. The ground where the terror beast once stood collapsed completely, sending it underground in a blaze of fire. Yes! My plan had worked and it seemed I had killed two birds with one stone. All in a good days’ work—I might add to that. And I did it without even breaking a sweat.

  “That was brilliant,” someone emerged from the fire. “I never thought you would use its greatest weapon against it, you truly have exceeded my expectations, Den.”

  Getting praised by him did feel somewhat good; after all, he used to be my idol. With the creature gone, it was just him and me now.

  “I hate to disappoint you, but I have somewhere to be and a world to destroy,” he smiled and raised his right hand. “It was indeed fun playing with you; however, all good things must come to an end, my friend.”

  His armor seemed to be feeding his right revolver energy and making its destructive power greater. Amazingly, an astounding excess of power was flowing dazzlingly into his bullet chamber cylinder, causing a glowing effect. This was bad.

  “Threat levels rising.” my AI said and kept repeating that phrase for a good long while.

  I backed away and tensed greatly in gruesome anticipation. His attack range had increased greatly, meaning there was no way I could dodge or flee. Dr. Vegai’s movements changed, he was ready to go on the attack. I moved away even further, feeling a slight dim of fear up my spine. Out of the blue, the huge gate began to fall to the ground and explosions followed its collapse. I took my eyes away from him and looked towards the heavy explosions. Had they done it finally?

  “No, what have you done, you fools?” the doctor screamed, clenching his revolvers tightly in anger. “You have just destroyed all my plans and decade’s worth of work.”

  Yes! That was the plan. Without that gate, he couldn’t mount any invasions anytime soon—I was sure of that. I looked back at him, with a moderate feeling of hope in my heart. Despite the danger he posed, I felt like I still had a chance of victory.

  “Get out of there,” Kristin yelled to me, “that entire place is going to get destroyed by the aftermath of the explosion, once that gate falls.”

  Crap, the explosions were slowly building up and coming heavily towards us. I could feel the heat all the way from where I was hovering. Oh no, the debris of the gate was falling in our direction, too. I needed to flee, but there was one thing in my way. It was the doctor. The moment I turned my back to flee, he would fire his gun and I would be vaporized instantly. What luck!

  “You ruined everything,” he pulled off his helmet with ease.

  His facial expression had completely changed and he seemed like a mad dog. Oh man! It didn’t look good for me; either the gate was going to crash me or the doctor would blast me.

  “Get out of there, Den,’ Kristin screamed to me, although it was now beyond my control.

  The doctor blitzed and attacked me relentlessly without pity. His movements were wild, but none of his actions were wasted. He maneuvered swiftly, moving idly like a shadow in the wind. Although reckless and wild, the doctor’s punches connected and hurt badly. I rotated on my axis and spun to the right, to get away from him; however, he did not give me the chance to counter as he kicked me in the stomach. I punted out loud and clung onto my dear breath.

  “You are good, for a kid, but I have 500 years of combat experience,” he laughed, grabbing my chest plate, raising me up. “You are way too young to face someone of my caliber. If you were a few decades older, you might have stood a chance.”

  Darn! I grunted and struggled to get free from his incredible power grip. In terms of power and experience, my abilities were a far cry compared to h
is. It was like he knew all my moves and could easily counter them without the slightest effort. I had no idea why my AI, which seemed eager to help me before, was not taking over to fight for me. Stupid machine!

  I felt the fires getting close, their intensity burning powerfully. The gate was still falling towards us, and I was trapped. Dr. Vegai pointed his gun at my forehead and got ready to pull the trigger. But before he could administer the final blow, pieces of the giant dimensional gate fell towards us, and exploded inches away from our bodies. One of the debris pieces fell between us and separated his clutch away from me. We fell towards the ground, engulfed in a massive bowl of flames. The energy of the flames was intense and so great—it didn’t feel like it was normal fire. Everything around me turned orange red, the color of the flames and went quiet. Was this how it was going to end? Oh well! It wasn’t so bad since I was taking the person who caused this entire mess with me. I faintly closed my eyes and let the flames take me into the abyss.

  “Rose, I wish I could just see you one last time,” I whispered, raising my hand to touch something in what appeared to be empty space. “Does she even still remember me?”

  It had been four years ago; I truly wanted to know the answer to that question, which seemed to be the only thing that kept me going. My mind began to fade away like everything around me was disappearing into nothingness. I slowly closed my eyes and thought of my happy place, a place where I truly felt joy. “Hmm! That’s nice.”

  11

  There was a sound of water flowing down a stream or river. It was so soothing and calm, like a quiet storm. The gentle smell of flowers and leaves dropping down from trees reminded me of home. I slowly opened my eyes and yawned out loud like I had awakened from a dream. The clothes I was wearing were so soft and truly felt comfortable pressed against my skin.