by Justin Bell
For a long time we stand there with his skin touching mine. A whirlwind of confusion and fog swirl around me, whipping away at my coherent thoughts, to engulf me in this strange tsunami of lost perception. No matter how hard or fast I blink, I can't seem to clear away this sense of confusion and a lack of understanding. It's like he's pulling me into him through his fingertips.
I don't like it. I don't like it at all.
With a gasp, I draw in a deep breath and push myself away, slapping at his hand to break contact. He draws back, hisses, and pulls his hand close as to his chest as if I burned it. He rejoins the other two Elders, who have been silent to this point.
Gragson islooking up at me in wide-eyed astonishment, either stunned by my reaction to the Elders, or shocked at their reactions to it.
"There is something about you," the lead Elder says again. "Something that lends credence to his words." His half-hearted gesture towards Gragson is an insult more than anything, a casual brush off identifying him as little more than refuse.
"I need to know more," I reply. "I don't know why I'm like this or what I'm supposed to do."
"My dear girl," the Elder whispers, moving towards me, his every motion far more kind than it was even minutes ago. "We must discuss this. This may be the turning point in this conflict."
"I don't want to be a turning point. I just want to be me again."
He halts before me, shrugging his large shoulders, dropping the cloak draped over him. The true form of the creature is amazing.
His head is narrow and slender, like all Bragdons, but a row of jagged horns grows up the center of his head and over, joining a ring of similarly shaped protrusion wrapping around his head. Unlike the normal gray flesh of Bragdons, his skin is more tan and brown, a muddy mixture of clay, broken up by more sporadic hard shell scales up each arm and over his torso. At his shoulders are a thick clump of long spikes, curled upwards and colored like exposed bone.
My eyes drift back over towards Gragson again, his reaction to these events my only barometer. His eyes are wide and his mouth is agape as he watches in stunned silence.
The Elder steps towards me, extending his hand again. "Please do not resist, young one," he says. "Trust in me. In us. We all want the truth."
I stand still, tensing my muscles, wrapped inside leather skin. My immediate sense of repulsion driven down, buried by focused concentration and a desire to know what they know. A need to know what they know. The Elders. They have the information. They must.
His fingers extend towards me, four long bones covered in thick cartilage, the tips brushing close to my cheek. I brace myself, anticipating the static spark of flesh-on-flesh contact. I wait for that repeated whirlwind of confusion and false recollection.
We're on the verge of it, there's a light tingle in my left cheek, a brief hum of warmth, then the narrow column of yellow light streams past me, punching into the face of the Elder, blasting the darkness with white brilliance and everything is chaos.
Chapter Six
The Elders explode and evaporate as plasma tears through their cloaked bodies. I dive for cover behind a granite outcrop. Luxen stumbles as the fire whips past him, but makes it to the wall behind me. Gragson pushes himself up against the rock surface behind him, clinging close for shelter.
Krelix eases down, his hand searching for a dropped weapon. A plasma shot barrels into his left arm, throwing him from cover just in time for three more beams to sear through his chest and knock him to the ground. Billowing smoke and the pungent stench of burnt leather emanate from his body.
Gragson sneaks out his foot and hooks it under a rifle laying on the ground, then kicks up, arcing it through the air and into his opened hands.
I know a good idea when I see one. I'm fortunate enough to have hidden near a plasma weapon. I copy Gragson's footwork to arm myself. Unfortunately, there's still an onslaught outside the cave mouth.
I glance out from behind the outcrop, wincing as thin traces of light pound against it, knocking away sharpened chips of stone. My Bragdon eyes snap in rapid blinks against the darkened night beyond the cave, focusing on dozens of approaching figures.
Scattered behind them across the entire landscape of rocky terrain are metal pods rammed deep into the dirt and stone. There are as many pods as there are figures, and at first my eyes focus only to the pods themselves, trying to find something familiar, but they are completely foreign to me.
As plasma blasts past my head, carving a ditch in the rock shelter I crouch behind, I whip my head towards the source and focus on the figures themselves.
Each one of them stands at least seven feet tall, if not more. Their heads are sloped and covered with form-fitting helmets. Clenched muscles sculpt their dark faces around black eyes and narrow mouths, and those few who have their mouths open show rows of pointed teeth. Dark hair and bushy beards hang around broad, round shoulders.
Bulging torsos are covered with thick, matted fur that escapes here and there from formed armor vests. Each one is a different color, from black to brown, with a few a strange, shimmering silver.
Their legs are thick tree trunks of fur covered muscle. Long, arms curl around thick, double-barreled weapons, and each barrel is blasting plasma coated projectiles instead of the typical light of Athelon or Braxis weapons. The hardened metal slugs propelled by pure energy would certainly explain the unusual viciousness of the damage incurred by the Elders and Krelix. No splash damage here, just ragged tears and shrapnel.
I look over at Gragson huddled behind the curve of the rock wall.
"Reblons!" he shouts to me.
Reblons? All of my life, I've heard of Reblox and its animal inhabitants, but like the Bragdons before them, have never seen one face-to-face.
I wish I still hadn't.
Before I finish that thought, three of them enter the mouth of the cave with shotguns held tightly to their shoulders.
"Come out!" One of them growls. It's not the same gravel-soaked hoarseness of a Bragdon, but a guttural shout formed into words.
"This is neutral territory!" Gragson shouts back. "You are defying the treaty!"
One of the Reblons barks a laugh, a husky woof more animal than anything. "All treaties are severed when you bring the weapon!"
I shake my head. "What weapon?" I demand. "We have no weapon!"
"You are the weapon!" the Reblon screams back at me.
"And you won't have her!" Gragson shouts, sweeping from behind his cover to fire his plasma weapon. His first shot catches the lead Reblon in the face. He roars as he topples backwards, but a second moves in behind him, firing his shotgun.
Gragson pulls away as the rounds smash his rock cover into broken shards. I step forward with my weapon, firing several swift shots of energy into the second Reblon's upper torso, tearing at its fabric and scorching fur and flesh.
The third fires his shotgun at me, but I duck back out of the way as Gragson moves into take his shot. With a grace defying its size and shape, the intruder steps aside and fires the shotgun again, and this time Gragson has no cover. He takes the two rounds high in the chest, flies backwards off of his feet, and slams into the rock before stumbling into an awkward sideways roll.
My heart skips a beat at seeing him flopping like a gray-skinned stuffed animal, even though he was ten seconds away from killing me a month ago. Those memories slide away to make room for focus and concentration.
My weapon is up and firing, and the Reblon doesn't dodge this time. He spins as the plasma comes at him and emits a gut-wrenching scream as he's overwhelmed with yellow light.
For a moment there's a lull in gunfire from the mouth of the cave as the three Reblon's lay prone on the ground with wisps of smoke spiraling from their still bodies.
"Go!" I shout to Luxen, pointing in the direction of Gragson, who is lying half behind a boulder.
I charge, hot on Luxen's heels, as more projectiles hurtle into the cave, chopping up the packed dirt behind my rushing feet.
I stumb
le, still getting used to the strange shape of the Bragdon legs, but I reach the boulder in time to slide down behind it as another series of shots drills deep holes in the dense stone, but is unable to penetrate.
Behind the boulder, Gragson has pushed himself up into a seated position and lies there with his chin lowered and his tunic soaked with dark blood. He presses one of his large hands to his torso, though it's easy to tell that any pressure he's putting there is far from enough to prevent this wound from killing him.
"Gragson," I say. "Reblons are everywhere out there. There are dozens of jump pods. I thought they were shooting stars, but—"
"Neutral territory," Gragson groans.
"Not anymore."
He coughs and spits on the ground. Luxen kneels down beside him as two streaks of energy soar overhead.
"We don't have much time," I say to him. "What can you tell me? Is there anything I can do? Everyone seems to think I have these mystical powers."
"I do not know much," Gragson replies. "Only what Command told us. What he said of you during our briefing." Each word comes squeezed from clamped teeth as if filtered through tiny pebbles.
"So tell me."
"It will not help."
"I need to know."
Gragson turns and squints at me through his pale, yellow eyes, searching me for some indication of my intentions.
"Ancient Bragdon legend," he starts, breathing out every word as if it might be his last . . . and each one very well could be. "Ancient Bragdon legend speaks of a girl . . . A girl born of all three races of the Yarda Quadrant."
I narrow my gaze, but decide not to interrupt.
"Part Bragdon, part Athelonian, part Reblon . . . the combined knowledge of all three species. The . . ." he coughs. "Innate skill of thousands of years of evolution."
With a sigh I press my Bragdon palm to my head, shaking it. "I don't have anywhere near those abilities."
"Not yet," Gragson wheezes.
I lower my hand and look at him, his face pale, even grayer than normal, and a narrow strand of black grime dribbles from the corner of his mouth.
"So why are the Reblons trying to kill me? Why did the Bragdons try?"
Gragson draws in a deep, difficult breath, his lungs rattling. "Too dangerous," he says. "If the races cannot harness you . . . they will destroy you. So the other races cannot have you either."
"Do my parents know? My Athelonian parents?"
Gragson shakes his head. "At this point, they must suspect. But they don't know for sure. For most of your life, they knew you as their daughter. Nothing more, nothing less."
"But you? The Bragdons?"
Gragson's eyelids flutter, his eyes fading from yellow to a milky white.
"Gragson?" I ask. He doesn't reply. I'm not sure he can reply . . . So close to an answer. I don't believe this child of three races thing, not for a minute, but I was so close to finding out the connection between Braxis and my parents. It was right on the tip of his tongue.
So what now?
A shot barrels into the cave and careens off the boulder, ricocheting up and burying itself in the rock ceiling.
Oh, right . . . Reblon army . . . Imminent death . . . I almost forgot.
"Luxen, we need to move, now! Those shooting stars were Reblon drop pods. They are pummeling the planet out there, dozens of them!"
"Where will we go? What can we do?"
I curl around the edge of the boulder as two more Reblons stride into the cave, their fur-covered silhouettes visible against the dim starlight behind. I fire three plasma shots and one of them spins away and falls back, his shotgun spiraling from his grasp. The second one whirls toward me as I fire another shot, a single shot that punches the next Reblon in the stomach, doubling him over.
"Come with me," I say. "Towards the door. Let's move while there's time!"
But there is no time. I know this and Luxen knows it, too. I run low to the ground, moving towards the mouth of the cave, hearing the padding of his feet behind me. Five Reblons lay splayed at the front of the cavern entrance, but I see no other approaching figures, no immediate danger.
Luxen comes up next to me and we both glare out onto the rocky, uneven surface of this strange, artificial Bragdon planet where war cannot exist and where a treaty has bound these three races to a cease fire.
You wouldn't know it by looking.
Slick silver pods plummet from the dark sky, slamming down onto the surface, blasting up chunks of hard ground. Small propulsion thrusters slow their descent to manageable speeds, rattling the strange curved pods, but only slowing them, not stopping them. They still move with enough momentum to dig chunky divots in the ground when they land. As each one lands, a jet of steam bursts from around the sloped, translucent canopy as it swinging open to reveal the massive, fur covered Reblon commandos within.
My eyes dart from pod to pod, trying to count them, but I give up at twenty-three. More are falling. Far too many are already here. This is a veritable Reblon invasion force against me and Luxen.
My Bragdon night vision adjust in the starlight. Far off in the distance, I spot the jump ship, our one chance of survival and escape from imprisonment or brutal death. Between us and the jump ship are layers of drop pods and squads of Reblon commandos, each one carrying one of those twisted shotguns, and each one appearing taller and more menacing than the next.
By the time these drop pods land, dozens will become hundreds.
Luxen and I glance at each other, but neither of us has a good idea about how to get out of this one.
Chapter Seven
The horizon is a mass of silver spheres. It looks a lemon fizz, but the "bubbles" are going the wrong way. Drop pods chunk and slam to the hard ground in rapid succession, increasing the already impressive number by the minute.
Not ten yards away, two pods punch down into the rocky ground. Both canopies slam open with puffs of steam, revealing big, angry Reblons. The moment they're visible, they're lifting their double-barreled plasma powered shotguns and snarling in unfocused rage.
"No no no!" Luxen shouts as he turns to run deeper into the cave. I press my back against the rock wall as chunks spray out from the first round of shotgun fire, then I swivel and return fire with my plasma, striking the fuel cell of one of the pods. It splits and breaks apart amid an awesome flash of light and a rolling boil of flame.
As it clatters to the ground in pieces, the second Reblon jumps from his pod, crouching low and bracing himself with his long, furry arm. He leans back, lifting his weapon, but before he can fire, I unload my own weapon, streaking yellow light into his face and sending him sprawling. Other Reblons are stepping free of their scattered pods. I fall back myself, pulling deeper into the cave where Luxen crouches with his arms coiled around bent knees.
"What do we do?" he's asking nobody. "There are so many of them, too many."
I crouch down next to him and place a calming hand on his shoulder. Even now I do a double take upon seeing my four long fingers; forgetting for a moment that I'm in Bragdon form.
"Luxen, be calm. We'll find a way out of this. If I'm a fraction as powerful as the Elders seem to think I am, we can fix this."
He looks up at me with trembling, yellow eyes; something that I wasn't sure was possible in these emotionless creatures.
"You said you weren't," he replies. "You weren't that powerful. You can't do all that stuff."
"You never know until you try, right?" I ask, though I have a fraction of the confidence that my voice portrays.
In truth, I have a sense of calm settling about me. As if donning armor to prepare for battle, my mind slows and my thoughts expand beyond the confines of my narrow scalp. Even as I look at Luxen, I can see eventualities, smell possibilities, and taste the bitter twinge of fate at the tip of my flicking reptile tongue.
Outside the cave the shattering clash of drop pods has ceased and everything is silent, not even the guns are firing.
As I lift myself to my feet, Luxen reaches out
to wrap his fingers around mine.
"Be careful, Brie," he says. "Without you, I'd—"
"You saved my life, remember?" I reply. "Anything that I've done or anything I'm still to do, it's because of you."
His gray cheeks flush either from pride or from embarrassment. I'm not sure which, but the sight warms me inside.
A scattering of shots has the boulder next to us shaking with the impact as shards fly into the air. With a lunge, I duck down behind the rocks, realizing for the first time that my weapon is dry. A dead battery means no plasma.
Maybe one of the Reblons has some rounds in his shotgun?
. . . Reblons.
The cave is littered with the corpses of the dead creatures, the living beings Gragson and I have just obliterated with concentrated energy blasts.
Low to the ground, I duck walk towards them.
"Stay where you are, Luxen!" I shout back.
The first prone Reblon provides a charged weapon. I reach for the strange weapon, a cool metallic rectangle, split into twin square barrels with a large blocky box of some sort screwed to the base of the barrel mount. The entire structure and function of the weapon feels alien to me, more than even the Reblons themselves with their long, matted hair and pocked faces.
. . . Pocked faces . . . Long matted hair. My eyes drift to the Reblon itself and inspiration hits me.
The last time I did it, it was so easy, but it wasn't new. It was something I'd done before. This looks and feels like a whole new level, evolved from the basic skills I've almost mastered after such a short period. I'm not even sure I can do it, but at this point, I'm not sure what choice I have.
I peel the vest and tunic from the Reblon creature and unclasp its layered armor underclothes. It doesn't take long to remove his garments, leaving a fur covered mass that might as well just be a huge dog, but which I know is something far more advanced and far more dangerous.
With a grunt, I roll the large creature on its back, study its face, and absorb every detail. My fingers clench, my muscles bunch in tense coils, and my knuckles crack.