United We Stand

by Christian Messe

  Barely thinking, she converted the shield, piece by piece, all in the span of five seconds, into a weapon resembling a laser light machine gun. Two supports drilled themselves into the ground to hold the laser gun. It took a few seconds for the soldiers to realize what was happening, and react. Most of them didn’t react quick enough.

  The sound of machine gun fire echoed through the hangar, as Claire fired round after round of lasers at the soldiers. The secretary woman dropped to the floor, filled with rage. Soldiers fell to the ground simultaneously, while others ducked for cover. After a few seconds, Claire’s eyes were starting to get harder to keep open, and her muscles were feeling weak. The Meta-Gene was beginning to drain her energy. She stopped firing and looked at the group of soldiers she had just mowed down.

  Two had successfully found cover, but they ran away when they realized she had stopped firing. All that was left, was the secretary. Claire squinted at her body, trying to figure out if she was dead or not. She wasn’t. The woman leaped from the ground, and onto her feet, looking angrier than ever.

  “You savages have limits…” She pulled out two rectangular handles, one in each hand, small enough to fit in a pocket, and pressed a button on each. A sharp, rectangular blade, with instead of having a sharp point, had a hole at the top of it popped out, and then a thinner one just like it popped out right after until the small handle grew into what looked like a sleek, white, polished katakana, “And you just reached yours…” The woman growled. She charged at Claire, wielding dual katanas.

  “Oh shhi…” Claire disconnected her Meta-Core hand from her creation and raised it to block the blade. The secretary woman lowered the other and tried to thrust into Claire’s stomach. Claire swept to the side, dodging, and held her Meta-Core hand up to keep the other sword away. Claire’s Meta-Core hand carved a hole through her palm, and generated a small ball of energy in it, then fired after charging for a few milliseconds. The beam hit the secretary in her shoulder, causing her to recoil from the pain.

  Claire backed up as quickly as she could, but it was getting harder and harder to stay attentive. She was getting droopy, while the secretary was just getting angrier. The woman felt the burn mark on her shoulder where the beam hit. A small trail of smoke was coming up from it. She looked at it, closed her eyes with an eerie smirk, and looked back at Claire challengingly.

  “Your dead already,” She leered. She spun her dual swords around menacingly, the sharp points hitting the ground, and causing sparks to fly. Claire’s Meta-Core hand transformed into a small, clunky laser cannon. She fired relentlessly at the woman, but she started to block the lasers with her dual swords. She spun them around so quickly in front of her that they were preventing the lasers from hitting her. She kept blocking, stepping closer, and closer towards Claire, until she was close enough to strike. She tried to slice right through the middle of her torso.

  The Meta-Core reacted fast, as usual. It turned into the only thing it could of fast enough — a pole. The gun was disassembled to make it longer. The woman swung incredibly fast, and Claire could barely keep up with all of her movements to block them. When the woman had an opening, she took it. She slashed the side of Claire’s left thigh. When she winced in pain, the woman went for her chest, but a plate of armor stopped her from causing any damage. It was the perfect time for Claire to strike. She smacked the secretary over the head with her pole, causing her to fall onto the cold, metal hangar deck. She roared, and kicked Claire in the face with her heel, sending Claire backward, and causing her nose to bleed. Claire held her nose with one hand and wiped the blood.

  The woman got up and charged at her again. Claire knew that she was too exhausted to fight anymore; she couldn’t hold on any longer. The Meta-Core had taken too much of her energy. Claire fell to her knees, the tiredness making her just want to fall asleep, and never wake up. The secretary gave a loud, menacing laugh, and leaped at Claire, ready to cut her throat, but before she could, a piece of debris from the overhead of the hangar fell to the deck, and caused the entire building to shake, making Claire and the secretary off balance.

  Another piece of the overhead fell, and an emergency shield was activated where the remnants of debris were so that the entire hangar didn’t get sucked out into the vacuum of space. The other piece that fell was bigger, and the slam into the deck rippled through the hangar and made an explosion.

  The woman roared and thrust her sword through Claire’s stomach. Claire grunted, then whimpered slightly. The woman knelt down, a huge smile on her face, and got up close, looking Claire right in the eye.

  She grabbed her chin, tauntingly, forcing Claire to look at her, “This is for Cozaria,” she said, “My home, that your kind destroyed…”

  Claire’s head was too filled with pain, and fear to think straight, but the Meta-Gere was focused on only one thing. Survival, and it did that without her having to do anything. With all of her strength left, she grabbed the sword with her Meta-Core hand, looked the secretary in the eye, and grabbed her other sword out of her hands, and threw it. Then she grabbed her neck, energy from the Meta-Gene fueling the little she had left in her body. Her real hand choked the woman with an iron grip. She raised slowly, standing up, the woman cackling for breath, struggling, but too stunned to do anything more.

  Claire grabbed the sword by the blade with her Meta-Core hand, and slowly pulled it out, but she barely felt the pain due to the adrenalin rush coming from her Meta-Gene. She winced slightly. Her eyes were focused on the woman who tried to kill her. When the sword was all the way out, half of it stained in blood, she flipped it around and quickly thrust it into the secretary’s stomach. The woman choked and winced. Claire let go of her neck, and let her fall to the ground, to bleed out.

  Claire looked down at her, realizing what she had done, then looked at her stomach, suddenly feeling all the pain. She fell to the ground and closed her eyes, but the Meta-Gene had another failsafe. It carefully, piece by piece mended the hole in her stomach with tiny micro pieces of Meta-Core, stopping the bleeding, and filling in the cut organs in her stomach, leaving Claire to fall asleep, in a hangar that was being destroyed.

  The Queen sped out of the hangar and into space, looking for a way to safely get the small fleet of GT-67s that were docked on the massive ship bay. She hoped that Claire could fend for herself, because there was no other option. She flew past the front of the tower, to see the dual barreled Ion cannon aiming right at her.

  Click click click, booom! The Queen dove down quickly to avoid the shots. They barely missed. It fired again, and the Queen rotated the ship on its side to dodge again. She was a clear shot, in empty space. The Ion cannons were going to fire relentlessly until they hit their target. Suddenly, three of Infinity’s fighters took off from the landing bay and sped towards the Queen’s fighter. They fired a volley of lasers at her ship, but the Lore’s fighters were equipped with extremely durable shields.

  One of the things the shields couldn’t block, was an Ion burst. One hit and the fighter would explode on impact. She had to take fast evasive maneuvers to outperform the Ion cannon’s targeting system. The three fighters were still on her too. They split up and started to use a pincer attack to hit her at multiple angles.

  “Auugh!” The Queen grunted as a stream of lasers hit the bottom of her fighter. The ship that fired them flew up, right next to her, and turned around for another attack. A back compartment on it opened, to reveal a Gen-87UI missile. Sold on the black market, outside of the Milky Way, the missile would open twelve small compartments on itself, to deploy even smaller missiles, that would hit the target before It did in a circular formation, penetrating the outer shell of the target, and leaving whatever inside vulnerable to the main missile, causing devastating damage.

  An alarm blared from inside of the Queen’s fighter, and a caution warning appeared on one of her control boards. The missile was locking on.

  “Otaos’s beard!” The Queen cursed. She did a 360 degree spin twice and pulled up to d
o a 180 split, trying to avoid the lock on best as possible. The enemy fighter adjusted and spun around too. It fired, and the missile sped towards the Queen’s ship. She grunted and forced a lever to its maximum limit. The fighter was going as fast as it could. She looked over at the Ion cannon’s tower. It was still firing at her. She turned towards it, missile still following her, and aimed her fighter right at the center of the tower structure.

  She flew for it, as fast as she could, missile barely a few yards behind her. It released its smaller projectiles, and they flew in a ring formation, flying just before the tip of the main missile. The Queen got as close as she could, and swerved out of the tower’s way. The missile deviated too, but not enough, and hit the edge of the tower. The explosion was massive, but when the smoke cleared, there was no damage done.

  The Ion cannon’s tower had a shield surrounding it. It was invincible. The Queen panicked for a few seconds until she remembered. Her artillery shields were underground. So that would mean, that if these weren’t above ground, they were under as well. The only problem, if the turret was shielded, the bay floor probably was too. The Queen looked around desperately, Claire’s, and her life hanging on the balance. Then she saw them. Sleek, thick metal fuel tanks. Small enough to have to be looking for them to see them.

  “Here goes nothing,” The Queen said. The enemy fighters behind her sped at full speed towards her, firing relentlessly, making her fighter shake and thump. She growled, then roared, shouting. She swooped down, firing everything she had at the fuel tanks.

  She kept yelling, getting dangerously close. The pilots of the enemy fighters must’ve realized what she was trying to do because they started to press harder onto their attack. The Queen was only a few meters away before the last laser bolt did the trick, and she pulled up, the explosion covering her ship.

  She flew out through the smoke, into the clear void of space, and turned her ship around to see the damage. The explosion caused a chain reaction through the bay floor, and sure enough, the back area of the ship launch bay was blowing into flame. The chain of explosions reached the tower, and the duel Ion cannons blew to pieces, debris flying everywhere. Some of them collided with the fighters and GT-67s on the bay, but there was still enough for the mission the Queen and Claire needed them for.

  The destruction of the Ion cannon tower was so distracting, the Queen had forgotten about the three fighters still harassing her. She smirked, while laser bolts collided with her windshield.

  “No one screws with the Lore,” She grabbed a control lever and pushed it to the max. The engine roared, and her fighter flew past the three enemy ships, and she turned around to face them.

  She fired a stream of lasers at one of their engines. The enemy fighter tried to escape but didn’t get far. The engine was on fire. It spread and blew up the entire ship. The other two fired two Gen-87UI missiles at her. The Queen dodged both and flew towards another enemy ship. She rammed right into it, her shields keeping her fighter intact, but destroying her target.

  The missiles turned around and were still after the Queen. They unleashed their smaller missiles. The Queen flew next to the last enemy fighter and chased it. It was trying to escape. The Queen wasn’t going to let it. The missiles made a whistling sound, getting close to the back of the Queen’s ship. She pulled a backflip at the last second, making both missiles hit the enemy fighter. The explosion caused the Queen’s ship to recoil, and be pushed away from the blast.

  She looked around, the area calm, and the sound of fire churring at the ship bay. She panted, and collapsed in her chair, sweating. Then she remembered.

  “Claire!”

  Claire woke up and instantly felt for the hole in her stomach. It was hard, like metal. She looked at it, to see that the Meta-Core had sewn itself into her skin.

  “That’s insane.” She gasped. She looked around. The roof above her was collapsing, and if it did any more, it would leave her unprotected from the vacuum of space. There were no ships left in the hangar; the Queen had taken the last one.

  Did she abandon me?! Thought Claire.

  “You!” Yelled Infinity, “You did this?!” He was holding a laser rifle, with a group of scared looking scientist behind him, armed with what looked like whatever they could find. He aimed the gun at Claire, shaking, clearly overwhelmed with anger.

  “I had to you… you idiot! The entire universe is at stake here, and you try to kill us because of my, my hand?!” Claire yelled back, “I don’t know if you can see clearly, but I’m no warlord!”

  She said that as there were dozens of dead bodies on the floor.

  “Ok, those guys tried to kill me first!”

  “I don’t care who you are, what you are… I just know that you might not be a savage now, but you will be, the power will go to your head, and the massacre will happen again!” He charged his rifle, the energy spilling out of the barrel like an electric cloud.

  Claire couldn’t make anything out of her Meta-Core hand; it wouldn’t let her. Her energy was used up. She raised both of her hands nervously.

  “You seriously think I’m gonna let you live… oh, I’ll kill you just for thinking tha…”

  Booom! The Queen blew through the blast door, and had the landing gear down, with a ramp leading to the entrance of her fighter. She made the hole too big, because the air was still being sucked out into space. The entry made everyone in the hangar fly towards the hole, towards the vacuum of space. Claire grabbed the floor with her Meta-Core hand, and dug into it, holding on, trying to position herself to land inside of the fighter.

  Infinity hung onto a storage crate. Some of the scientists were caught off guard in the wrong place and flew into the void of space screaming.

  Claire looked back at the fighter, and let go. Infinity was roaring behind her, firing lasers at her desperately. Then, she missed. She missed the landing ramp and was sucked into space. She was screaming, so scared out of her mind that she didn’t realize she wasn’t dead yet. She wasn’t dead yet. She should’ve frozen to death in the fraction of a millisecond by now. Her lungs should’ve exploded… but they didn’t. She didn’t die. She was just floating through space. Warm. The UV rays from the distant sun, millions of miles away, didn’t even bother her.

  Infinity climbed to the hallway doorway, and shut the door, grunting angrily.

  The Queen detached from the broken hanger blast door and turned the ship around slowly. Her grief turned to shock. She gaped, looking at Claire, floating, and in perfect condition. Claire felt her arms and looked at the Queen. She waved jokingly.

  The Queen slowly pulled up close enough for Claire to grab the boarding ramp. Claire climbed in, and the ramp shut. The airlock sealed, and the door to the cockpit opened.

  “How?” The Queen asked, mouth wide open.

  “I have no idea,” Claire said, “But what if I couldn’t do that, was barging into the hangar-like that really the best option?”

  “It was the only option… I had assumed that you might create some sort of… spacesuit or something, not just let go without any protection…” The Queen grumbled. Claire sat in the seat next to her.

  “Well, whatever… I’m fine anyway,” She paused for a second, “You think it was my Meta-Gene?” She asked.

  The Queen didn’t say anything.

  “Hello?” Claire asked.

  “In the final battle against the Fallen Empire, Lord Eraus, The Meta-Gene that led them. The man that murdered billions in his crusade across the universe, was killed by a torpedo that hit the bridge of his mothership, and sent him into the vacuum of space, killing him instantly,” The Queen said, “He was incredibly powerful, able to create a Gigantium-Class warship in minutes… but not even he could survive the void. However, you did.”

  “How long ago was that?” Claire asked.

  The Queen looked at her, “Let’s just say that back then, the Cyrisians, were our allies…”

  “Maybe the gene, mutated or something?” Claire guessed dumbly.

&nbs
p; “Maybe… or maybe something else,” The Queen shook her head slightly, “Either way, we need to get these ships back to the Lore… somehow.”

  “What about Infinity? Isn’t he still dangerous?”

  “The damage we’ve done today, he might as well already be dead. We don’t have time to worry about him anyway. It’s time to avenge my kingdom.”

  Claire nodded, “And save the United Worlds. Karalus isn’t going to leave them alone.”

  The Queen looked at the burning ship bay, and the twelve GT-67s they needed that were on it, “We’re gonna have to make a lot of trips to the Lore and back,” She sighed, while pressing a button to release the teleportation cubes.

  PART 2

  CHAPTER 17

  “Sir, we’re being hailed by an unidentified signal… should I accept?” Asked an Asian United World’s recruit. They were in the bridge of an Asteroid Belt Checkpoint base. It was one of the main stations on four sides of the inner asteroid belt, a giant ring of outposts surrounding the entire inner part of the Solar System. He was wearing the standard white, United Worlds uniform, with the Earth pocket patch.

  “Unidentified? What is this? Another, ‘miss-call,’ from Aculus 5?” Asked the Admiral. He was Kelisian and was wearing a more official, sleeker uniform, with more pins and awards on it, “Answer it,” he said, annoyed, like he had better things to do.

  A holo-screen appeared over the windshield, with the smirking face of Karalus.

  “Now you listen here; I don’t know who…” The Admiral paused abruptly, in dead silence when he saw the face on the screen, “Neptunian…”