by R H Nolan
The minute he slipped his arms into the suit, it sealed itself around his neck and chest without any visible seam. He moved around in it a little, stretching his arms and legs and bending over. The thing was incredibly flexible and didn’t feel nearly as tight as it looked, even over his own clothes.
Yes, he could definitely learn a lot from what Zryk could show him of Qirinian technology.
Later.
If there was a later.
Max pulled back on his jacket. The glare of sunlight streamed through the pod’s window from the mouth of the tunnel, and he pulled on his goggles. Max was already climbing up out of the vessel before the door had fully slid open, then he scrambled over the sand through the last few feet and pulled himself up onto the surface of the desert. Now he was ready. When he activated his skates and kicked off to head west beyond Neo Angeles, he just hoped he hadn’t run out of time.
9
The sun was setting as he returned to the Peacewind settlement, and the entire desert was painted in a wash of crimson light, red as blood.
Screams of pain and terror and desperation filled the air even before he was close enough to see the Chaotix and Bloodletters had already begun their raid on his home.
Max slowed at the outer border of the shanty town, frozen for a moment by the sight of his people scattering in every direction. Most of them moved quickly enough to escape their pursuers, but there were already bodies strewn across the desert sand.
Chaotix screamed their insane battle cries as they rushed through the settlement, joined by brutal Bloodletter warriors swinging crudely cut swords and firing crossbows at anything that moved.
The rage boiling inside him reminded Max why he was here. He dropped into a crouch and slapped his hands against the sand. His hands glowed, a few centimeters of the desert disappeared beneath them, and he stood.
Energy Reserves: 2000/2000
Energy Blast
Accuracy: 21%
Forty feet away, a Chaotik laughed hysterically at the screaming Peacewind struggling against his grip on her hair.
Max raised his arm and fired—
But the blast of energy missed the Chaotik completely.
Instead, the energy bolt flew between two huts and caught another Chaotik man in the shoulder, sending him to the ground.
The first cannibal stopped and whipped his head to look at Max with wide eyes, then he sneered and released the woman’s hair.
With a startled step backward, Max lifted his left hand to release the other bolt of energy sizzling between his fingers.
It went right over the Chaotik’s head, which only made the man charge him that much faster.
A massive club, studded with rusted nails and bits of sharpened wire, came swinging toward Max’s chest. He dodged the attack, but he’d forgotten how powerfully his skates responded to the slightest movement. Max slipped backward in the sand, and the next thing he knew, he was on his back with the blood-painted Chaotik straddling him and hissing through red-stained teeth.
Struggling furiously, Max slipped his hand between his attacker’s arms and reached up to grab the man’s face.
He’d meant to poke the guy’s eyes or scratch him enough to get from under the reeking body on top of him. His dad had taught him that much about self-defense so long ago, which he’d rarely had to use.
But Max’s hand flared with a bright-yellow glow, and the Chaotik on top of him screamed.
Max felt it happening before he could fully process what he saw—the man’s flesh disappeared beneath his hand, followed by his blood and muscle, eye, cheekbone, and part of his skull.
The screaming stopped when Max saw the gray matter of the man’s brain beneath his palm, and he jerked his hand back as if he’d burned it.
The Chaotik slumped forward on top of him, blood spilling from the hole in the man’s face and spattering the sand beside Max’s shoulder.
With a shout of fear, disgust, and confusion, Max pushed the gritty body off of him and scrambled to his hands and knees.
A change in his secondary stats flashed in his vision.
Energy Blast
Intensity: 2000
Base Range: 20 feet
Accuracy: 21%
[§々ｳ ]: 50
He saw the new, strange symbols, but he didn’t have time to figure out what they meant.
The Chaotik he’d blasted with his stray energy ball had lurched to his feet and was coming for Max now. The man’s shoulder had been seared almost completely through, and he staggered forward with incredible speed, all the piercings and metal studs in his face clanking against each other.
Max didn’t think. He raised his hand and let ALL the energy he’d collected from the dead Chaotik’s face fly toward his attacker.
It was pure luck that the energy hit the man in the head, completely blowing off his head.
The Scavenger fell to his knees and keeled over in the sand. Two streaks of muted, yellow-gray light lifted from the headless corpse and spun in the air for a second before darting straight for Max.
Before he could think or even scream, a feeling something like the energy chamber flared through his body. Max gasped, every inch of his skin tingled, and then it was over. His life stats flashed again.
Energy Blast
Intensity: 2000
Base Range: 20 feet
Accuracy: 22%
[§々ｳ ]: 100
The numbers for the odd symbols had increased. He’d absorbed that energy—that was exactly what it felt like—directly from the dead Chaotik lying in front of him.
What the hell was it?
There was a grunt of anger nearby, and Max jerked his head up. Two Bloodletters were about thirty feet away, each wielding nasty-looking machetes. Their black-painted faces only intensified their sneers.
Max shoved his hands into the sand again and disintegrated more. When he removed his palms, they glowed with that electric-yellow energy.
Energy Reserves: 2000/2000
One Bloodletter raced forward as the other started to move away, apparently to look for other victims.
Energy crackled from one hand and hit the approaching Blootletter in the thigh. He screamed and stumbled across the sand before falling.
Energy Reserves: 1000/2000
That got the second Bloodletter’s attention, who was about fifty feet away now. He howled in rage and started towards Max.
Max fired a second shot.
It went wild again over the Bloodletter’s head.
Energy Reserves: 0/2000
Max plunged his hand down into the sand, but before he could disintegrate anything, a meaty hand grabbed Max’s arm, hoisted him up, and a knee slammed into his stomach.
Coughing and gasping, Max didn’t wait for the machete to come swinging at whatever part of his body seemed easier. He lurched forward in his crouch and dove for his attacker’s legs. The minute he clutched the man’s calves, he disintegrated them.
The Bloodletter let out a piercing shriek and dropped to his knees, blood dripping over the sand where two chunks of his legs had disappeared.
Energy Reserves: 2000/2000
Max toppled to the ground with him and didn’t even try to aim the energy blasts. He just slammed his hands into the bleeding Bloodletter’s chest and released a single shot.
It was awful. The man’s torso exploded from the attack, spattering blood and bone and flesh in every direction.
Max pushed himself to his feet, trying to ignore the flashing life stats in his vision and the yellow-gray balls of light floating from the dead man’s body and into his own.
HEALTH: 950/1000 (95%)
STRENGTH: 95/100
STAMINA: 209/220
AGILITY: 105/110
ENHANCEMENTS: Level 1
Energy Reserves: 1000/2000
Disintegration
Efficiency: 20 units per cc
Energy Blast
Intensity: 2000
Base Range: 20 feet
Accuracy:
23%
[§々ｳ ]: 150
Gritting his teeth against his rising nausea, Max stumbled forward and saw the first Bloodletter he’d blasted in the knee reaching for the machete he had dropped in the sand.
Max raised his other hand and let off a second blast.
It only partially struck the man’s fingers, but the Scavenger shrieked and cradled the bloodied stumps against his chest. Then he reached out with his left hand.
Max reached out to fire—but numbers blinked in his field of vision.
Energy Reserves: 0/2000
He had no energy left, and no time to get more.
With the machete between them, Max reacted the way he had only a few times before in the few fights he’d ever had. He scrambled forward and grabbed the weapon before his enemy could.
Enraged, the Bloodletter stumbled to his feet and raced at Max.
Max didn’t even think. He brought down the blade right into the Bloodletter’s neck.
THOCK.
Max stepped out of the man’s way just in time.
The Bloodletter’s eyes grew wide—and then as blood poured down his chest, he fell face-first into the sand.
Max began to tremble. He’d never killed anyone before, not with a weapon. Not with his own hands. It felt worse than obliterating somebody with an energy blast.
The Bloodletter’s legs shook and drummed the sand, then grew still.
Max didn’t know whether or not he expected the tiny spheres of energetic light to rise from this man’s body, too. He hadn’t used his powers, but when he saw the orbs lifting into the air, he staggered away. Without knowing what they were, he had no desire to stand there and just let them enter whatever part of his body was absorbing them. But even when he moved away from the body, the lights followed swiftly.
When they hit him, Max froze, his entire vision overwhelmed by a flare of bright light and a lesser version of the burning sensation from the energy chamber. But it only lasted a split second.
When it was over, his life stats flashed again. All of them had changed.
HEALTH: 1100/1100 (100%)
STRENGTH: 105/105
STAMINA: 230/230
AGILITY: 112/112
ENHANCEMENTS: Level 2
Energy Reserves: 0/2500
Disintegration
Efficiency: 21 units per cc
Energy Blast
Intensity: 2500
Base Range: 25 feet
Accuracy: 20%
Lightwave
Intensity: 150
Focus: 10
Electrical Current
Intensity: 200 volts
Base Range: 1 inch
Accuracy: 100%
[§々ｳ ]: 0
He made the mistake of paying more attention to his new stats than what was around him.
So of course he payed the price for it.
Something slammed into his back and sent him sprawling across the sand.
HEALTH: 1000/1100 (91%)
Core: 550/550
Secondary: 250/350
Max stopped sliding just in front of a huge sheet of metal serving as a Peacewind hut. Spitting out a mouthful of sand, he scrambled around on his hand and knees to see the Bloodletter who’d attacked him from behind.
The man was already missing one eye and half of an ear. He grinned stupidly until he realized he hadn’t opened a huge gash in Max’s back. He paused to glance mutely down at the roughhewn sword in his hand, and the grin turned into a frown.
Max caught his breath and pushed aside the dull throb in his back, but he was incredibly grateful for Zryk’s last-minute armor suit, no matter what the alien had said about it not working with his new powers.
The Bloodletter’s momentary confusion disappeared, and he stalked forward through the alley of Peacewind huts, scraping his sword along the metal walls with a harsh, grating sound.
Max pounded the sand again and disintegrated, which seemed to take a second or two less than before until he was at full capacity.
Then he raised his energy-filled hands toward his attacker. Whatever this Level 2 was, it apparently came with Lightwave, and he might as well use it now when it mattered.
It was just as easy to activate this power as it had been when he first disintegrated and used the energy blast. All it took was a thought.
The energy flared around his hand into a blazing flash of pure-white light, which strobed rapidly in a wide ring around him and the Bloodletter.
Max grimaced and looked away from the glare.
The Bloodletter growled and jerked his head away, but that was it. Nothing else happened.
When the Scavenger seemed to realize this, he snorted and ran forward.
Max disintegrated another two handfuls of sand, then brought them up and fired one shot from each hand at the same time.
The bolts were clearly larger than what he’d done before—though unfortunately no more accurate.
His left shot went just over the Bloodletter’s shoulder, and the right shot obliterated the man’s good ear.
The Scavenger roared again, blood spraying from the side of his head, and then he was on Max.
His sword came slashing down again at Max’s throat, but Max dove aside just enough to bring the steel edge scraping across his collarbone beneath Zryk’s black armor. The impact hurt, but he could tell the sword hadn’t cut his skin.
HEALTH: 903/1100 (82%)
Core: 550/550
Secondary: 157/350
The Bloodletter advanced again just as Max scrambled to his feet.
He ducked below another swing of the rough sword, then leapt back again before it could graze his belly; he still didn’t know how well the armor would hold up under attack.
Max tripped over something in the sand behind him and only caught a brief glimpse of the bloodied Peacewind body there before both his palms were pressed flat against the shack wall behind him.
He disintegrated a piece of the metal sheet. This time, he let off both energy blasts at a close enough range that he couldn’t possibly miss.
He didn’t.
The crackling balls of energy slammed into the Bloodletter’s chest and his lower abdomen and nearly went right through him. The sword dropped into the sand just before the body followed.
Two more faintly glowing orbs of light sifted from the corpse and right into Max, but the rising screams behind him kept him from thinking about it.
Spinning around, Max ran through the narrow alleyways between the densely packed Peacewind huts. The sick, wet thump of blades splitting flesh came from all around him—screams and pleas for mercy, insane cackling, roars of triumph.
He turned the corner into a small ring of open sand among the huts and found half a dozen Chaotik leering over a group of Peacewind women and children. They whimpered and cried out, clutching at each other as the twisted cannibals chuckled and licked their cracked and blood-crusted lips.
“Hey!” Max slapped a hand against the nearest hut wall beside him before he realized he should have tried attacking before they knew he was here.
At the metallic echo, all six Chaotik turned to look at him with varying degrees of irritation.
“Come to join our meal, did ya?” one of them spat, the massive metal ring through his septum swinging obscenely.
Max put his other hand against the wall and disintegrated the steel. The Chaotik blinked at him when he raised his glowing yellow hands, then he fired.
His accuracy might not be perfect at this range, but when his targets were lined up in a row, he couldn’t miss.
One blast missed its intended target but caught the man standing beside him just below the shoulder. The other went a little low and hit another Chaotik’s upper thigh, but it was better than missing altogether.
Both of them screamed in shock and pain, and the other four spread out in a ring between the huts.
There definitely wasn’t time to see what they might or might not do. Max grabbed the wall again, disintegrated, and fired
at the closest man. It hit him in the hip and spun him almost all the way around.
As soon as the glowing charge left Max’s hand, he placed it on the wall again to disintegrate while he tried to aim his other hand at the center of the Chaotik’s back. That one hit the mark, and the man dropped face first into the sand.
The other Scavengers charged toward him together as the yellow-gray lights rose from their dead tribesman and zipped into Max’s body. They didn’t seem to notice that part at all.
Max found himself screaming as he moved along the row of huts, alternating hands between disintegrating and discharging the larger, more powerful, and only slightly more accurate energy blasts.
Most of them missed, but he couldn’t figure out how to aim better, and the accuracy numbers in his stats had only increased a couple percentage points. But firing quickly to keep the Chaotix at bay was a heck of a lot better than taking his time for careful aim.
Finally, two more cannibals dropped. The top of one’s head had been blown clean off, and the other was missing a large chunk of his ribcage. Four more bouncing orbs of energy lifted from their bodies and disappeared inside Max’s chest.
The first two men he’d attacked were back on their feet now, limping toward him, and Max just kept flinging wild energy blasts at him as he tried to keep moving.
It would have been a lot easier if he wasn’t also worried about hitting the women and children huddling behind their almost-murderers with wide eyes and gaping mouths.
“Get out of here!” he shouted at them, though he never took his eyes away from the three Chaotix trying to close in on him.
He heard the gasps and moans of desperation rising from the Peacewinds as the mothers pulled their children to their feet and fled with them through the maze of metal shacks.