The statue of Bahamut is towering above us, and we enter into its shadow.
There is burning wreckage of ships all along the palace lawn, and dozens of dead and charred bodies are strewn across it.
I remind myself to later say a prayer for our fallen comrades, but for now I focus fully on protecting Anya.
There is no further resistance on the lawn– the Imperials must have decided my plasma attacks are too powerful on open terrain– and they want to try to force me into close-quarter combat.
I grin. Wait until they see what my suit can do up close.
When we reach the palace walls, we find a gaping hole where the doors were. One of the massive wooden doors is lying flat on the ground,full of arrows.
I see several dead Imperial guards lying in the hallway. Yet I also see more fallen comrades. We don’t have enough intel to know how many soldiers Bahamut had in Sankt Petersburg. It’s quite possible the bulk of his forces are boarding ships waiting to intercept an attack from space, and they could come back at any time when they realize the attack came from below– from the jungles.
We need to hit hard, and fast. If we take Bahamut down and seize the capital before reinforcements can arrive, they likely will give up their attack and surrender.
We move slowly through the palace hallways. I stand in front, shielding the rest of our warriors– but Anya most of all– from any potential attacks. But from behind me, Anya shouts out where we should turn, as she knows the palace better than any of us could.
“Turn left up ahead,” she says.
I sniff, but the palace is too full of the smells of battle. I can’t tell if the hallway ahead is clear based on scent alone.
I stick my hand out around the corner, and gunfire erupts. I feel a bullet slam against my armored hand, and I bring it back in.
“Let us fight, Yelda!” Irena says.
“I can clear this hallway alone,” I say, stepping forward. “No need to risk yourselves. Just cover me.”
I step around the corner, and the soldiers all unload their guns into me, but just as fast as their bullets, my suit forms seven sharp tendrils– one for each shooter– and they lash out from my body. Each tendril impales one of the shooters through his heart, and when I pull the tendrils back, every single one collapses dead onto the ground.
I hear Anya and Irena shout behind me, and I hear the telltale thunk of bow strings being letting loose.
I turn around and see two shooters with arrows in their chests, and their guns drop to the ground.
Anya and Irena are holding their bows up, pointing toward the dying soldiers.
“Good shots,” I say.
Anya smiles.
18 Anya
“The throne room is on the top floor,” I shout. “They’ll have locked the elevators.”
“I can get the elevators working,” Aegus says.
“You’re sure?”
He nods.
“Okay,” I say. “Go down the hall and turn right.”
We move in hunting formation, with Aegus in front. The wild boars would sometime charge us from behind while we hunted, and Irena and I move backward with arrows knocked. We trust that Aegus, Yulia, and the others can cover any threats from the front.
When we reach the elevator doors, we form a semi-circle pointing outward from Aegus. I look back and see that the fingers of his suit are melting off into the elevator’s control panel like thick goop.
“Shit,” he says.
“What?”
“They cut the cord.”
“You said you were sure you could get the elevators working, Yelda!” Yulia growls.
“Hmmm,” Aegus says. “Actually, I can.”
He pries the doors open and beckons us in.
All six of us crowd into the elevator, and he lets go of the doors.
“You’ll have to trust me on this one,” Aegus says.
He points up toward the ceiling, and his suit blasts through the top. I see his eyes narrowed in concentration, and after several moments he nods. “Here we go!”
His feet melt and solidify onto the floor, and suddenly the elevator begins moving upward.
“You’re pulling it up with your hand?” I ask.
“Technically it’s my suit,” he says.
When we’re about halfway up, I hear loud gunfire from above, echoing out from what must be the top of the shaft.
Aegus forms a shield, and expands it outward over the entire roof.
“Several shooters,” he says. “As long as they don’t try to cut my–”
His eyes widen in fear.
“Shit!” he shouts.
The elevator stops moving, and he shoots his other hand through the roof.
We begin moving up again, but when we are a few stories from the top, he points toward the door.
“Pry it open, fast!”
Yulia and I jam our spears in and pry the doors open.
“Out, fast!” Aegus says.
“What about–”
“Out!”
We all run out, and the moment my foot is clear of the door, the elevator– and Aegus– plummets down.
I peak my head down the shaft, and I see him falling down at full speed. Then I hear gunfire.
Irena tugs me back into the hallway.
“Idiot!” she says. “You know there are soldiers up there!”
“Aegus!” I say. “We have to go back for him–”
“No,” Yulia and Irena say in unison.
“Anya,” Irena says. “You know Aegus can take care of himself. If we go back for him, we endanger the mission. We need to take out Bahamut before reinforcements arrive. Surprise was our biggest advantage, and each moment we wait, that advantage shrinks.”
I hear a giant explosion from up above– it sounds like it’s the top of the shaft.
“See,” Yulia says. “He’s doing fine. Now, we must go!”
A wide-open shot to take out Bahamut, and all I can think about is going back down for Aegus. I never thought I’d be in this situation: my friends having to convince me to take the revenge for which I’ve waited so long. It must mean that revenge is not as important to me as I thought, or more likely, that Aegus is much more important to me than I ever imagined.
We continue moving in formation. Irena, Yulia, two other male warriors, and me.
“The staircase is just over here,” I say, leading the way.
We breach into the staircase, and each sound we make echoes loudly. The staircase is never used, and it’s decorated as such: sparse concrete with almost nothing to dampen the sound.
All of the practice in the jungle paid off, and the five of us creep quietly up the staircase. We’ve strapped our bows to our backs and are holding our spears, ready to poke anything that comes around the next flight of stairs.
We reach the top after a few minutes, and I try the door.
It opens slightly, but hits something on the other side.
“There must be rubble on the other side,” I say. I ram it with my shoulder, and feel it open a few centimeters further.
“Move!” Irena says. “I am stronger at ramming things than you are.”
“I got it,” I say, ramming it again with my full strength.
The door moves open just enough that I fall through headfirst, but I get stuck halfway through.
“Idiot,” Irena says, kicking my feet. “Now I will have to ram the door with you stuck like this.”
“Behind us!” one of the men shouts.
I hear a loud and sudden hiss from behind, and it grows to a deafening buzz.
“Anya,” Irena shouts, and her body slams into me, covering me.
Something explodes behind us. I feel my ears nearly blow out from the shockwave, and there’s searing heat all over my body.
When the ringing in my ears dies down, I shove the door as hard as I can, and I hear the rubble on the other side scraping across the floor.
The door finally opens enough that I fall all the way through.
“Irena,” I say. “We’re through. Is everyone okay?”
I turn back and check on Irena, and I see that her back is badly burned, and her eyelids are barely open.
“Irena!” I shout. “Tell me you’re okay. Yulia? Can you hear me?”
I peek back into the hallway, but there’s no sign of anyone else. The ceiling has caved in, and there’s nothing but concrete boulders, metal girders, and chunks of drywall piled just behind us.
“Shit, Irena,” I say. “They must have been sealed off from us. We can go back around and–”
“I cannot go anywhere,” Irena says, pointing to her leg.
There’s a metal beam lodged into her upper thigh.
“I should have stayed in the jungle,” she says. “No sharp metal there.”
I look back into the hallway outside the staircase. I could reach the throne room in less than thirty seconds, but there’s no telling how many guards are there. I wonder if my best hope isn’t to just keep Irena safe while I wait for Aegus.
“I can watch over you,” I say. “The others from the tribe will find another way up here, or Aegus will get to us. Either way–”
“I will be fine here,” Irena says. “You can come back for me later...just don’t forget me here.”
I put my hand on her face. “I’ll never forget you, Irena. Idiot.”
“I told you I could ram the door better than you,” she says. “Now you have to scout the area, make sure Bahamut doesn’t get away.”
His voice is still audible all through the palace. He shouts propaganda while his soldiers fight and die.
“Do you really think he’s alone in there?” I ask.
“If he is,” Irena says. “You kill him. Avenge your father, and show Yelda that you are a strong warrior.”
I know Aegus wouldn’t approve, but this could be our only chance.
I squeeze Irena’s shoulder. “I’ll be back for you.”
I grab my spear and step into the hallway.
It looks like some kind of bomb went off here. There’s dead Imperial soldiers everywhere, but no signs of spears or arrows.
It looks almost as if...they were fighting each other. Could Bahamut’s grip on power really be so far gone?
I stalk quietly across the hallway. After trying so hard to move quietly on leaves and branches that crunch and crack, staying quiet on soft silk carpet is not even a challenge.
I hear Bahamut’s voice still booming over the intercoms as I approach the throne room. The double doors are wide open, but I hear him only over the speakers, and not in person.
“Martial law will restore order,” his voice says. “And anyone who aids the invaders in any way will be executed without trial…”
I wait with my back to the doorway, trying to figure out where he is in the throne room.
I still can’t hear him, so I risk a peek into the room. I see the long red carpet leading up to an empty throne. My father’s throne. My throne.
Could it be a pre-recorded message? Is Bahamut already dead? If he were alive, I’d expect more than dead bodies guarding him.
I grip my spear and step into the throne room.
It seems completely empty. There are large marble pillars spaced about two meters apart leading all the way up to the throne. The room is huge, but I see not a single dead soldier or drop of blood anywhere.
Nor do I hear Bahamut’s voice coming from the room. The images we saw earlier showed him speaking from the throne, but I’m still not totally convinced it wasn’t pre-recorded. Could he have fled? Where could he possibly even go now?
I step forward slowly, doing my best to make no sound. I grip the spear and prepare to strike. Halfway to the throne and still I don’t see him. If he’s here, he could be hiding behind a pillar.
I stop dead in my tracks and listen. A huge wave of deja vu washes over me, and I watch the pillars in front of me, wondering if I could hit him before he was on top of me.
Deja vu. No! He could be–
I spin around, and I see Bahamut charging me. His clothes are torn and shredded, and his body is covered in bloody gashes, but he’s clutching the Tsar’s ceremonial sword, and it’s covered in blood.
He’s too close for me to jam the spear into him, as he could cut my head clean off. I swing the spear up to block his sword, and the long shaft deflects his blow.
He grabs hold of the shaft and pulls, hard.
Bahamut is stronger than me, but I don’t dare let go of the spear. He pulls me in toward him, and the sword begins swinging back around for another slash.
I slam my heel into his balls as he pulls me into him, and he lets go of my spear as if it were a venomous snake.
He staggers three or four steps away from me, and he points the sword to me as he steps back, hunched over in pain from my kick.
“Tsarina,” he says. “I’d given up all hope.”
“You’ve lost,” I say. “It’s over.”
“Yes,” he said. “I’d thought so, I truly had. I’d considered following in the Emperor’s footsteps and killing myself. Better than to–”
“If you surrender now,” I say, “I’ll give you a clean execution.”
He holds his sword up toward me, and as it trembles in his hand, blood drips off it.
“Execution? Don’t you want real revenge for your father?”
“I want this shit to be over,” I say, holding the spear out toward him. “Do you really want to take your chances against a spear? That sword isn’t even meant for real combat.”
I consider slowly backing away and drawing my bow, but I’d likely only have time for one shot. As it is, I outrange him with the spear, and he has no more hope of a sneak attack on me.
“Oh,” Bahamut says. “I’m going to use this.”
He reaches behind himself, and draws a gun. Before he can fire, I throw the spear.
19 Aegus
The elevator begins to plummet, and suddenly it feels as if I’m in zero-g again.
I shoot tendrils out through the floor, and I harden them to slow the descent. It takes longer than I’d like, and I’m down to the twentieth floor by the time I stop the fall. I still feel bullets hitting the shield above me, and it’s quickly draining my suit.
I pry open the elevator and see that I’m halfway between floors. I jump out onto the twenty-first floor, and only after my body is clear, I pull all of the biomatter back into the suit.
I don’t even know where the stairwell is, but I reason it’s close to the elevator. I pray to all that is holy that Anya will not try to come back for me. She needs to get to the throne room, and those soldiers at the top of the shaft are there.
Shit.
I dive back into the elevator as I charge up a blast of plasma.
I fire straight up through the hole in the ceiling, and moments later I hear the explosion from the top of the shaft.
That should make things easier for them.
I climb back out, and begin to feel hunger gnawing at me. I’ll need to use the suit less, saving it for life-and-death emergencies. Otherwise I’ll completely deplete it and be effectively unarmed.
Now...to find the stairwell.
I circle around the hallway, and see a window.
Fuck the stairwell.
I kick the window out, and climb out onto the windowsill.
Below me I see the smoldering remains of our crashed ships, but I see no movement, and out on the streets I hear no gunfire.
The only constant sound is Bahamut’s droning voice, speaking as if this small “rebellion” is nearly over.
It definitely seems like it’s over, just not in the way he’d hoped.
The palace is made of red bricks, and using my Marauder strength, I begin to scale the wall with just the grip of my toes and fingertips digging in between the bricks.
The climb saps more of my strength, but it’s safer than the stairwell. I have a bad feeling that I am the top target, and that they will unload everything they have if they spot me.
Anya and the others are likely in the stairwell now, and I don’t want to draw danger to them.
I climb up and up, and after two or three minutes, I reach the last window. I don’t know which floor it leads onto, but I kick it open and jump inside.
As soon as I hit the ground, I hear the faintest patter of footsteps. Bare feet.
I sniff, and I smell Yulia, but not Irena...and not Anya.
“Anya!” I shout, surprise be damned.
“Yelda?” Yulia’s voice cries out, and then I see her turning the corner.
“Where is–” I start, but Yulia cuts me off.
“There was an explosion, but Irena protected her...we think.”
“Where?”
Yulia points up, and I use the last of my strength to blast a hole in the ceiling. Without waiting for anyone, I leap through the hole and climb up onto the next floor.
I sniff as soon as I reach the ground, and I smell Anya.
And I smell fear.
I shift to bear form for maximum speed, and I rush down toward the scent of Anya.
I spot a large opening from the corner of my vision, and I roar as I run into it.
It’s the throne room, and Anya is standing face-to-face with Bahamut.
And he’s drawing a gun.
I shoot a tendril out from my back, aimed at the gun.
Anya throws her spear, and just as my tendril worms into the barrel of the gun, I hear it go off.
The gun explodes in Bahamut’s hand, and he yelps, dropping it. The spear jams into his gut, but he ignores the pain and charges toward Anya with his sword.
I run faster.
Anya tries to back up and pull an arrow from her quiver, but Bahamut is on his last dying breath, and nothing but death will stop him.
And I am his death.
I roar and leap over Anya.
Bahamut doesn’t even look at me, he just wants to take Anya down with him, but I land on top of him, slamming him down to the ground.
He jams his sword into me, but I bite into his soft neck and tear it apart.
I taste his blood, but I bite in again and claw his arms.
I shred his flesh to ribbons, roaring with abandon.
“Aegus!” I hear Anya’s voice behind me, faintly. I’m too consumed by rage.
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