by Bryan Nyaude
“Wait a minute,” I said, starting to realize something was off. “Where am I?”
Where was my armor? Was this a dream? The last thing I remembered was being blown away when that dimensional gate fell down at us. Was I still alive? And where was I? This place, it looked peaceful and yet almost familiar. The grass was so green and the trees ever so comforting that my anger and guilt seemed to wither away. I got up from where I had been sleeping and stretched my arms and legs. I had no idea where I was, so I decided to explore this new wonderful place. Compared to the environment on Erzat, this place was paradise. There was no fighting, it was just me and nature, bonding peacefully in harmony. As I started to walk, I came across a door that instantly caught my attention. It said, “Rose,” like the one in my other odd dream. Whoa! I halted, completely taken back. “Not this again.”
Should I open it? The temptation to do so was too great, almost overwhelming. Was this the right time to know? I really wanted to know what happened to her and whether I was to blame. Still! How could I not remember the last thing she said?
I mean, she was dear to me and yet the memories of her seemed to come up blank, like someone had erased them from my head. Wait! If I opened this door, I would know; but on the other hand, something just felt wrong. Another door, which was the way out, appeared in front of me. I had a choice and two doors to choose from. Could I truly walk away from the truth again and never know what happened to Rose?
“When the time comes, you will know,” a part of me said, it was alarming but to be expected. Knowing the truth now would only hinder my performance on the battlefield—which was something I didn’t need at the moment. From the bottom of my heart, I knew we would be reunited one day, but now, was just not the time. I hesitated for a bit as I tried my best to not open the door, using every inch of willpower I had. The tempting chance I had been given seemed too great to pass on; however, I knew in my heart that now was not the time to search for what I had lost.
“I will find you, I promise,” I said and ran directly to the exit, without looking back.
Would I regret this later? Possibly! After all, this was the second time I had walked away from knowing what I truly wanted to know. In a strange twist of events, I was up. I was not dead at all, which was surprising. Painfully, my whole body felt cooked—an unbearable discomfort passed through my body, every time I moved.
“The armor shields managed to protect you from harm,” the AI commented, briefing me on the diagnostic status. “You are running at 60% below maximum.”
Suppose it could be worse. I mean, I was still alive but the worst was yet to come. For all I know, the crazy Dr. Vegai had survived and could come and attack me again. I scuffled to my feet, looking around closely at the damage. The level of destruction was calamitous. An incredible amount of debris from the gate was scattered everywhere I looked; it was creating a gas-like mist of obnoxious fumes that made it hard to see anything. It must have been some impressive device Kristin used to create an explosion of this magnitude. Had it not been for my AI system, I would have been dead.
The only problem I was still having was staying away from the fumes and the fire that seemed to be still blazing close by, ravaging everything to ash. Such flames, I didn’t think it was possible, but apparently I was wrong.
“Everything all gone, all my life’s work destroyed,” a voice said, in a tone with mixed emotions. “And it’s your entire fault, Den, you did this to me. You are just like the people who took everything away from me.”
“No way, it can’t be,” I said, sort of surprised, “how could you still be alive?”
Why was I so surprised? For some reasons, villains somehow always managed to come back for more, well, according to the movies I used to watch. I had a feeling the doctor was still alive, but I hoped I had been wrong—just this once. Fighting him was the last thing I wanted to do at this point. Nevertheless, it had to be done.
“You are just like them,” he screamed and rushed at me, at full force. He blazed out of the fire at lightning speed, with his guns raised up at me.
“The War Boss system gets more powerful in the brink of battle,” my AI added, giving me a heads up.
Wait what! Meaning Dr. Vegai’s power had intensified to epic proportions—flushing all my hopes and chances of victory down the drain.
“And you are just telling me this now?” I asked with an expression of shock. This was something I really should have known at the beginning of battle.
“Well, you never asked,” it said and then went silent completely, which sort of annoyed me a bit. But it was true, it was my fault for not asking. After all, an AI was a machine not programmed with human emotions. Even if I knew, I doubt it would have changed anything in this gruesome battle. The doctor approached fast and fired a few bullets at point blank. With the help of my AI, I dodged every single one of them, by flying out of the way at an even greater speed. The toll on my body was massive: total fatigue and aggravating pain were starting to wear me down. Dr. Vegai somehow sensed my extreme anxiety and further intensified his actions to eradicate me. He matched my speed and fired with distinct accuracy, it was almost like he could predict my trajectory before I even did it.
“How do I stop it?” I asked my AI out of options. Due to exhaustion, my mind could not fully function and analyze the situation rationally. There had to be some way to stop this berserk mad man.
“Power up the left revolver to 100 percent,” it replied me, reeling my mind into utter confusion. “Your left gun only activates when enough flux energy has been capitalized.”
“Really, I wish I had been told that sooner.” I growled, steadily rotating my body out of his firing range. “How long will it take to gather enough power?”
The AI calculated for a little while, without answering. I took that time to gain even more speed, further amplifying the pain to my body greatly. Even in this day and age, there was still a limit of g force a human could take. I think I had broken through the limit seconds ago. Even so, the mad doctor kept up with me without falling far behind. I had to say—Rasians were really something.
“Approximately 14 minutes, at the least.”
“No, that’s too long,” I grunted, looking back.
This maniac was not going to give me the chance to charge up the revolver. I glanced away and suddenly noticed something peculiar.
“What is that?” I said and looked towards the other side, where the gate had fallen. My scanners were picking up large heat signs, coming from burning creatures that seemed to be immobile.
“You have ruined everything,” Dr. Vegai screamed out.
Like a total idiot, I stopped, peaked by curiosity. He was acting uncultivated and out of control. The look on his face was almost beast in nature. He moved swiftly and attacked without warning, catching me completely off guard. I saw his punch connect with my helmet, but did nothing to stop it. So fast, I couldn’t counterattack or move out of the way in time. My head rolled like it was going to come off completely, while I fell backwards, headed towards the ground. Instantly, he then proceeded to grab my leg and throw me up into the air like a light feather. Everything was a big blur for a few seconds; I couldn’t comprehend what was going on around me. What a punch, it was definitely worthy of appraisal. After a few more seconds, I gained control of myself and stopped halfway in the air. Man, this crazy man was out of control. The longer this battle lasted, the worse things could get for me. I looked back and was directly stung by a ray of bullets. Fortunately, my shields stopped half of them, while the others got through my defense. They were painful and mind blowing, but I held on, putting everything I had on my final and last hope of victory.
“Charge the revolver to full power,” I ordered my AI, while placing both arms in front of my face.
The shields had stopped working, since all the power was being diverted into my gun. Persistently, Dr. Vegai did not stop his assault. He kept firing bullets at me, moving in every direction at the speed of sound. All I cou
ld do was just endure it for now, and try to avoid the worst.
“Everything is all gone. All my life’s work, my creations, and my invasion plans. But it’s not too late; I can rebuild everything with years, of course, and destroy earth as I planned before. Yes, it can be done.”
No way! He was still trying to destroy earth, even when his plans failed? He was relentless, to a point of annoyance. I kept my arms clenched in front, taking his merciless physical abuse. This man was out of control, his psychotic rage was making him irrational and increasingly violent.
“Do you think you are the only one with problems?” I yelled and blitzed to the left, with my arms still in front. I soared out of range, trying to buy my AI more time.
I gazed back and saw him following me with his guns extended in front of him. Impressively, he reloaded and fired at quick intervals with such precise accuracy, it was scary good. If it wasn’t for the fact that I was moving all over the place, it would have been over for me already. “Because of your terror beast invasion, I lost things that were dear to me, too,” I continued, while surging horizontally at even greater speed. Crap, I had doubled the amount of g force I could tolerate. Thankfully, I was flying horizontally and not vertically. Vertical g force was less tolerable and more dangerous—better avoided at all costs. I took in a deep dose of air, thinking of Dr. Vegai. I just couldn’t hate him as much as I would like to.
“Destroying you, Dr. Vegai, would not bring any justice to me, and to the people you have hurt. Seeking revenge will not reverse anything, nothing good comes from it. I feel your pain, but this isn’t the right way to do it.”
“Really now,” he laughed, mocking me. “Then tell me what the right way to do is?”
Good question, I had not thought of that far yet since I never figured he would ask me that question.
“Forgive and let go,” I said with compassion. If there was still a chance to save this man, then I was willing to take it. I had once adored him as a kid; he was, after all, the person who inspired me into the science field.
“Never,” he screamed back to me with a response filled with fury. “I will never forgive them at all, I will plunge their world into chaos like they did to my family and country.”
What! What was he talking about? Man, this guy was out of his mind. He stopped following me and hovered motionlessly in the air. Stupidly, I stopped fleeing, completely taken over by curiosity. Bearing down on me was an intensified feeling of fatigue and pain. I knew, I needed to keep moving, but something deep was stopping me. My words had finally pierced hard into Dr. Vegai’s heart, and I was waiting to see what he would do next. Surprisingly, Dr. Vegai dropped his guns all the way to his waist, tilting his head down—there was a discern look of anger written on his face.
“Some of the world government’s leaders you adore so much ruined my life and that of my people, forcing us to live off this nightmare planet. I lost my family, my friends, and thousands of my kinsmen, and I want them all to pay. I want vengeance for my brethren and the good name of Ras restored.”
Just what was he saying? Something about his new story didn’t make sense to me. Well, in all honesty, we heard Ras was a terrible place, the instigator in the Third Planetary War. Rumors were that they were selling weapons to everyone which resulted in all countries hating them. When the entire world turned against them, they fought back for an entire two years, against an armada of soldiers. No one knows how, but the entire kingdom disappeared or just vanished off the face of the earth, that is until now. Oh boy, this was starting to become messy. The new information I was acquiring did not correlate with what I was told. So what was true and what was false? I really wish there was a third party to circumvent these stories for me. Not that I believed any of his stories.
“But you were selling weapons to the terrorists,” I said without thinking. He was still hiding some more important information, and I was willing to risk it to acquire the information. I descended down, a few feet, while watching his facial expression, trying to anticipate his next move.
“Do you really believe that was true?” Dr. Vegai said, gazing back at me with piercing eyes. “I gave my life’s work to the world. I spent my entire life trying to better humanity with my inventions and technology, but look at how they repaid me. My son, my wife, everyone I ever loved all died during that incident, five centuries ago. How can you tell me to forgive and forget? You don’t know how I feel, you have no idea what it feels like to harbor this much hatred in your heart for five hundred long years.”
“You are right,” I said sincerely. “I have no idea what that must feel like.”
Everything he said only made me feel some sympathy for him. Perhaps, there was truth behind his story; I could tell by his emotions and reactions. Those tears and those words, he clearly appeared to be telling the truth. Part of me wanted to believe him, although I knew he was my enemy. What should I do? I was diving deeper into mysteries I couldn’t begin to phantom possible. However, it brought further questions to surface. Concerning, mostly our reason for being here on this planet. What were the further anomalies our superiors found? Surely, it couldn’t be the crystal core, could it? Was anything the mad doctor was saying true? I sensed a dark secret motive behind our mission to this planet. This was getting interesting, I had suspected there was something up and it looked like I was right. This top secret mission stuff was more of a diversion for something much sinister and really bad, but what? My hunch told me that the doctor knew what it was.
“You know the reason behind them turning on you, don’t you?”
The once gloomy face of his turned into something like a smile as he said, “you are really smart, Den, I will give you that. Indeed, there is a reason behind what they did to us and it wasn’t about the weapons or technology. 500 years ago, the kingdom of Ras created what you might call the fountain of youth drug. It was a genetic altering drug that could make you stay younger for as long as you wanted and not age or weaken in strength at all. This drug was too valuable, and too powerful for the whole world to know. We hid it, but the world leaders somehow discovered our secret, and wanted us to share it with them. But we refused, knowing full well what would happen if it fell into the wrong hands. That was when everything fell apart and stories about us began to emerge, making us the enemy of the entire world. After struggling and fighting a brutal battle, we had no choice, but to escape off the planet through the dimensional warp gate. We found ourselves here, stranded, and completely surrounded by these powerful creatures. Horribly, a good number of my allies lost their lives in the battle with these creatures. It was terrible and all the memories of that year are imprinted into me, forever haunting me in my dreams. Now you know most of the truth, so what is your response?”
Whoa! He had said a mouthful and I had no idea how to respond to him. That was an intense story—I had no idea whether to believe him, or keep believing what my superiors told me.
Something like this was far above my pay grade; maybe someone else should answer him because I had nothing. I hovered there, silently, feeling down and sad for this man who had suffered so much. Given five hundred years or so, his fate would be my fate.
“To tell you the truth, I have no answer,” I replied back to him and looked away. My posture changed a bit, once I got all my thoughts together again. “I can’t give you the answer you want from me, but I am truly sorry, on behalf of everyone on earth. If it is revenge that you seek, then you should have gone after the people who did this to you in the first place, who are probably dead by now. We are a new generation and had nothing to do with what happened to Ras, okay? Please let it go, Dr. Vegai.”
He laughed out loud and put his right hand on his forehead in shock, “you are right, you are indeed a new generation; however, those leaders from 500 hundred years are still on earth, in hiding somewhere. If I destroy everything on earth, I will flush them out and then get my revenge.”
Despite losing his army and pets, he was still bent on revenge. I took a dee
p breath and realized that all my tendons were hurting. I needed to keep him talking, to allow myself more time to rest. Besides, my revolver needed more time to charge up to full power. I thought carefully, deciding on what my next questions would be. My goal was to keep him talking.
Dr. Vegai mentioned something about his enemies being alive. The mere thought of it was bending my perception of reality. How could these people be alive? Why had no one ever heard about any of this? Seriously, these people had to be over 500 hundred years of age if they were really real.
“Wait, don’t tell me they,” I gasped, in shock, as a thought occurred to me.
Dr. Vegai nodded and looked at me, “they somehow managed to get a hold of a few of our drugs, before we teleported off earth. By my guess, five or six of them are still alive on earth, giving orders in the shadows.”
Was this really true? Could I believe him? Darn! I mean this was the man who had invaded earth with his terror beasts. He was my sworn enemy and I needed to defeat him, but now I didn’t know what to believe. I wish someone would tell me what to do or something. The reality I was facing was cruel, but I had to make a choice now, and act on it.
“I understand,” I said and gripped my guns tightly. “I will bring your story to light, if it is true, to the world. However, I have to stop you now for all the crimes you have done to the earth.”
My resolve had now changed completely; I was acting on something more than impulse and instinct. The world deserved to know the truth, and I was determined to see that through. But who were the old leaders? I had never seen or heard of them. How had they hidden for so long? This situation was going to get chaotic very soon. Just what was I signing myself up for?
That being said, there was something I needed to do first. It was going to be hard, nevertheless necessary. The man I saw before me was no longer the man I adored as a child. That person was gone, revenge had consumed him to a point of no return. It had rooted itself deep into the core of his being—nothing except an empty shell of his former self hovered in front of me. The thought of it all made my stomach swirl. Had I not known who he was, it would have made it less painful to battle him. Still, I had to do it for the sake of everyone back on earth. That was my reality.