Now that I had a chance to think about, I could've kicked myself for assuming that the XAR wouldn't be at home in the tunnels. They weren't really bugs, but they were close enough to the insects back home that I shouldn't have been surprised at how easily they'd navigated the tight spaces.
Could they cast illusions, as well? I didn't know, but something told me that the XAR escape route would rely on a physical bolthole as opposed to a magically aided one.
That didn't stop me from reaching out every now and then to touch one of the walls, just in case. All I felt was solid rock, as smooth as glass.
Sabine and Lucas were already three or four hundred yards ahead of me. At least it was harder for them to vanish around a corner here, since the gently sloping ramp we were on was built to such cunning specifications that they'd have to run a mile or two before they had a chance to disappear.
"If I were a bug," I pondered, slowing down a little to catch my breath again, "and I wanted to bust into this tunnel without letting pesky humans chase me back to my Hive, how would I go about it?"
The answer was so immediately obvious that it made me smack my forehead with the palm of my hand. I'd have to double back to make sure that I hadn't already passed it, but at least being this slow meant that I hadn't covered much ground, anyway.
None of the XAR I'd seen yet had wings, but their long, strong legs gave them a climbing ability we could never hope to rival.
"I think the entrance will probably be cut into the ceiling," I called, scanning the roof as I retraced my footsteps. "Maybe hidden in one of the shadows the light from these crystals are making."
I was impressed by the way that both Lucas and Sabine got right down to the business of scouring the upper section of the tunnel. They could've asked a bunch of questions or chimed in with pointless suggestions, but instead they saw the logic in what I was thinking.
Everybody shut up and got to work, and a couple of minutes later Sabine's sharp eyes bailed us out. She whistled low to get our attention and waved us over, whispering, "You were right."
I headed over. Even though Sabine was practically standing directly beneath the shaft she'd discovered, its entrance was so cunningly concealed in shadow that I couldn't really see it until she stepped up beside me and pointed it out.
"Shit," I breathed. The main tunnel was at least twelve feet high, without a hand or foothold in sight. "How are we going to get—"
Lucas braced himself as Sabine ran up him like a feral cat, one foot pushing off his sturdy knee and the other boosting herself into the air from his shoulder. She bounded up to the ceiling with an ease and grace I couldn't help but envy, catching the edge of the shaft and spinning up out of view, all without spilling so much as a drop of flammable goo from the bucket she was still carrying.
"Okay..." I said, both in awe at the athleticism and annoyed that it looked like I was going to be left behind. There was no way that I could do that... "But what about m—"
My question died on my lips as Lucas set down the pickax before grabbing my collar roughly with his left hand and using his enhanced right one to hook me around the waist and throw me up toward the ceiling like I was a cumbersome sack of potatoes.
He was enthusiastic, but his aim definitely could have been better. My head popped through the shaft, but not without my shoulder crashing against the tunnel's roof. Sabine and I went through a scrambling, desperate struggle that finally resulted in her hauling me up.
After she'd dragged me to safety, I rolled over to lie on my back and gasp for air, my eyes watering from the pain jumping around aimlessly in me.
"You okay?" she asked, as Lucas obviously used his enhanced leg to leap easily through the shaft and land lightly beside me.
"Totally. Never better." The impact must have been harder than I'd thought, because I found myself staring up at a starlit night filled with four low hanging red moons. I was going to ask the others if they knew where we were, but the Citadel answered my question before I could verbalize it.
Citadel
Floor 2
Area 5
The Craters of Strife
*Individual Duel Parameters Enforced*
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
"Are you guys getting this notification?" Lucas asked, just as Sabine said, "What the hell are Duel Parameters?"
"I think that means we're all getting the same message," I said with a grunt as I struggled to get up under my own power. They both reached out to help me, but I waved their hands away. If I did it on my own I could rise at my own speed, going as gingerly as I needed to, but one of them was liable to yank my shoulder out of joint or worse.
Once I was upright again, I could see where the Craters of Strife got their name, since we appeared to be in the bottom of one of them. It was a massive, bowl-like depression as big as any stadium I'd ever been in. The ground felt stable enough, though it was dusted with a gritty black sand that would make our footing treacherous if we weren't careful.
A gentle breeze dipped into down the basin with us, and when it touched my face I realized how long it'd been since I'd felt the air move. Somehow it was the wind that convinced me we were outside again, even though the presence of the moons should have more than sufficed.
"The Citadel's obviously not a real tower," I said. I was standing now, albeit with a little wobble. "So thanks for the heads up, you guys..."
Lucas shrugged. "Don't look at us. We've never been here before."
Sabine was staring off into space. I watched her blank expression with more than a little concern. I only had two allies in here now, and if one of them was going to go catatonic every now and then, I wanted to know why.
"Are you okay?" I asked her.
Lucas glanced over at Sabine for a second. When she snapped out of it, he demanded, "What'd he say?"
She looked embarrassed. "He's pretty pissed off that we haven't introduced him to Adam yet. I tried telling him that we were more than a little busy, but you know how Isaac gets..."
Lucas nodded. "Tell me about it."
"No," I growled, not at all liking the way they were talking, like I hadn't been standing next to them this whole time, "Tell me about it."
Sabine whacked Lucas on his flesh and blood arm. "You're always so suspicious. Just extend the invitation and let Isaac do his thing. It's a lot easier than trying to explain it, anyway."
"Fine," Lucas said begrudgingly. "But let the record show that I'm not on board with this. All we know is his name. Our time up here is too precious to waste with some no—"
Sabine gave him a glare that shut his protests down fast. "Come on. Don't be like that."
"Fine. I don't know why it's my responsibility anyway. I already told you guys I wasn't comfortable being the leader."
Would you like to join the Faction from Earth?
Your participation can be terminated either by yourself or the Faction's leader at any time.
I didn't have much practice accepting Citadel prompts or answering system questions, so I just thought, "Yes!" at the world around me as hard as I could.
It seemed to work.
Adam Harris is now a member of the Earth Faction.
Faction members inside the Citadel: Sabine Morgan, Lucas Collins, Isaac Dale
Faction members outside the Citadel: Benjamin 'Atlas' Stathakis
"Um," I said, glancing slowly around despite how useless it was. The speaker clearly wasn't present. "Isaac?"
It was like flexing a muscle you never knew you had and thus had never used. <
Like this?>
I nodded, even though it clearly wasn't necessary.
Just like that, his presence was gone. I hadn't felt like he was looking out of my eyes or anything, but even for the brief time he'd shared my headspace it felt no stranger than having a conversation with someone who was in the same room.
I guess people really can adapt to anything...
Lucas wasn't moving, which I assume meant that he and Isaac were still discussing whatever had been important enough to interrupt us. I was about to ask Sabine what the deal was with the person in our head, but she caught my eye and flicked her gaze pointedly at the rim of the crater before I could.
"Guys," she hissed.
She had better awareness than I did, though. I didn't see anything up there other than a quickly brightening sky. I felt Isaac hop back into my mind.
I heard him laugh.
That was it. The line went dead, just as he'd predicted. "Isaac says every single XAR is headed toward us," I relayed. If I'd been the only one he had a chance to tell, that made it my job to pass the information on.
Lucas spun the pickax menacingly in his hand. "What else did he say?"
"Good luck..."
A lone insectoid figure appeared on the ridge in front of us. This one was silver. It had eight legs, and instead of claws on the end of them each tapered to a delicate hypodermic very much like the one CAV had between his mandibles.
It stood there, swaying slightly and balancing with a precarious ease on the edge as its eyes glittered down at us. A pair of red suns was rising behind it, adding a sense of drama and flair that I didn't for a moment believe was accident or happenstance.
Lucas shifted his weight beside me, and when I looked over at him I saw a determined look in his eye that got me worried. Sure enough, the next thing I knew he'd raised the pickax over his head and drawn a bead on the arachnoid XAR.
It wasn't my place to stop him, but I'd rather overstep my bounds than let Lucas do something rash before we knew what we were in for.
I reached over and grabbed his bicep. My intent had been to drag his arm down, but whatever augmentation his arm had received made it a lot stronger than I was. Since that hadn't worked, it was time to escalate matters.
Desperate, I licked my finger and stuck it in his ear. Lucas shook me off in disgust, wiping at the side of his face with his free hand. "What the hell, man?"
At least he wasn't still taking aim at the XAR. "Get a grip on yourself. Individual Duel Parameters, remember? I don't know what they are, but I'm willing to bet that if you chuck that at the spider, he'll be well within his rights to come down here and kick all of our asses."
"So?"
I sighed. He was right. This guy wasn't capable of cunning or strategy. Lucas may be effective as a blunt object, but he'd struggle to be anything more than that. "So let's see what happens, okay? I just told you there are thirteen XAR about to cozy up to us. This feels like something far more monumental than a simple ambush. If they are all here, we're dead anyway."
Thankfully Sabine was right beside him, backing me up in an effort to help my words sink in. "He's right, babe. Relax."
Lucas seemed to listen, and just in time as well because CAV took a spot beside the silver spider. A moment later the glowing firefly creature stepped up on the other side of the arachnid, and over the next few seconds ten more members of the XAR Hive assumed their places in an arc up on the crater's ridge.
Each of the aliens were different in color and composition. Some of them only had four legs, though the majority had six. Only the one in the middle, the guy that I felt was probably calling the shots, had eight. All of the XAR had some sort of siphon or syringe, be it as a stinger on a jointed tail or otherwise.
Some of the enemy even held spears, though on closer inspection it looked to me like they were actually the cannibalized legs of their brethren.
Lucas groaned. "So much for not walking straight into the jaws of a trap."
Sabine shrugged. I could tell that she had the right attitude. If death were to come for her, so what? It was nothing other than a doorway to another chance at victory. "If they just wanted to kill us, I don't think they'd still be standing up there."
She was right, but there was something more. I thought I sensed a reluctance on CAV's part, and when I watched him closer I saw the hesitation again. A moment later, he tried to take a step back and the spider reached out and tapped him forcefully on the carapace. "They're tired of it, too," I said. When I heard the thought out loud, it rang true to my ears.
"Who is?" they both asked at once.
"The XAR. At least, the boss one is. Watch the firefly and the asshole mosquito. See how they keep getting prodded by the one in charge? Those two don't want to be a part of this any more than you do, Lucas. They look like they're ready to bolt."
"This feels like ritual combat," Sabine said, cracking her knuckles. "Just like the old days."
I nodded. "I think you're on to something."
Without warning, the XAR at the center of their assembly lashed out with its spidery legs and tripped CAV and the firefly over the ridge. They tumbled a third of the way to the bottom amidst a cascade of pebbles and black sand before they were able to splay their legs and slow their descent.
Another of them stepped down of its own volition, its black carapace shining. It had three rows of mandibles that all ended in jagged needles. The lower pair of its six arms held slender lengths of chitin that looked like javelin, while its upper arms were shaped into bulky shields.
The XAR in charge raised all of its arms to the sky, and I squinted up at it. My mind filled with his words. They were a tidal wave of power compared to the low tide presence that CAV and Isaac had been able to maintain during previous mental communications.
I glanced at my companions. Neither one of them looked like they were going to answer, and I was worried about what would happen if our side went voiceless. "Adam Harris, here. I guess I speak for Earth." I took a deep breath. "Um, what are the rules?"
"He means best two out of three," I told Lucas and Sabine, just in case they hadn't worked it out.
"Obviously," she shot back, though the grin took a little of the sting out of her words.
I shrugged. "Give me a break, huh? We just met. For all I know, you guys might be phenomenal idiots..."
Lucas laughed. "Personally, I appreciate the vote of confidence."
Sabine pointed at CAV. "Okay, well he's only level four. Our firefly friend is seven, and he's mine."
I'd ask her how she worked that out later. For now, I nodded enthusiastically. "Because if you kill him again, he's out of the Hive for good. Agreed."
Lucas narrowed his eyes at me, pitching his voice low. "How do you know that?"
The real answer was that Zane had told me, but I couldn't own up to that. Time to make something up... "It's not worth getting into now, but the first creature I met when I started was a silver orb. Apparently, he and his kind are in charge of showing people the ropes. Anyway, he's the one that told me."
They both shook their heads. "We've got no idea what you're talking about," Sabine told me.
I held up my hands. "That's not my fault. Let's just get through this and we can sort the rest of it out later, okay?"
"Fi
ne," Lucas told me flatly. "But I won't be letting you off the hook this easily then."
"Fair enough." I was left wondering how truthful I'd be when we finally did have the awkward discussion he was referencing, but the three chosen XAR were almost at the bottom of the crater, less than thirty yards away from us.
I looked to Sabine. "Time to get our head in the game. What level is the new guy they sent down to fight?"
"Ten."
"Shit," Lucas growled.
That didn't sound good. "What level are you?" I asked him.
"Eight."
"And Sabine?"
"Seven."
"Okay... Well, it could be worse. At least her fight is going to be a fair one, right? And you've been itching to bust someone open with that pickax for the last half hour. I'm only level one, but it doesn't matter. All you two need to do is win and the combat's over."
Damn. I didn't realize he'd been listening in on us. At least he'd verified that I wouldn't need to fight once Sabine and Lucas beat their opponents. I'd defeated CAV once, but I'd tricked him into underestimating me more than he already had.
Plus, I was already hurt and he wasn't...
"We reserve the right to pick the match ups," I shouted. I wanted to get that locked down now that their leader knew who our preferred adversaries were.
I dug my heels in. "Yes. You've already chosen the field of battle. We'll choose our own opponents, or we'll walk away."
The sound of my voice was making CAV hiss and scratch little trenches into the gritty sand that made up the bottom of the crater. I smiled sweetly in his direction before going back to ignoring him. He twitched in fury, which was fine with me.
Sabine was ready, bouncing anxiously on the balls of her feet. "Let's do this, then," she said, cracking her knuckles and slapping her hands against her pockets, no doubt making sure that whatever equipment she planned on using in the upcoming bout was in its place.
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