by Jamie Hawke
“Nothing, forget it.”
She hesitated, then laughed. “If it makes you feel better, we were a bit busy fighting the whole time. None of them worked on their baby-making while I was present.”
“As stupid as it is, that does make me feel better.”
“Glad I could help,” she replied, and then leaned back, eyes looking like she was about to fall asleep.
“Except,” I added, ignoring her look of annoyance. “I’m confused. Why is it he’s in charge of this baby-making quest? Couldn’t we just as easily… you know?”
“It’s because of who found him,” Twitch said, turning and interjecting herself into the conversation.
“What do you mean? You’re familiar with whatever this is?”
“We’ve discussed the prophecy,” Twitch replied. “If this woman of the Citadel, Navani, had found you first, your roles might have been switched. Or maybe it was Xin’s decision? Maybe they thought that would be a better quest for the Marine, I don’t know. But either way, it’s because of who Navani’s mother is, and those half-sisters of hers from that same mother, that they might be able to have babies at all. That fact, combined with the genes you and your brother have inherited from your real parents means that this baby could grow up to stand a chance.”
“I… see.” No, I really didn’t.
“Of course, I think it’s a bunch of Citadel bullshit, but that’s just me.” Twitch shrugged. “They’ve been known to spread false hope, and now look at them? All but destroyed.”
“Nothing’s what it seems,” Gale interjected. “I’d seen too much of that place to think it was perfect.”
I considered this, determined to make a change when I finally took my place at the Citadel. My mind wandered off to thoughts of Xin and Lamb, wondering who and what they had really been, along with the other former Elders who had sacrificed themselves.
“Prepare for impact!” Twitch shouted, and I shook my head, realizing I’d gone off into a trance.
“What’s happening?”
“We’re closing in, and they’ve noticed us,” Twitch replied. “Shimmer, you and I should be able to figure something out here. Gale, be ready the instant we enter atmosphere.”
“Roger that,” Gale said, cracking her knuckles.
The ship went into attack mode, but what was genius was the way Shimmer started making illusions—copies of the ship at first, but then massive space dragons and demons closing in on the enemy. Apparently, they didn’t have any supers to counter this, or maybe it was all too fast for them to react. Enemy ships turned their guns on the illusions and opened fire, some even fleeing from the scene. The result was enemy fire taking down enemy ships with some crashing into each other. I couldn’t help but laugh, watching and wondering how terrified I’d have been not long ago to see something like that coming at me.
As far as I knew, such things didn’t exist outside of a super’s illusions.
Twitch’s power came in the form of more shields, along with deftly avoiding enemy ships as they nearly crashed into ours in their wild efforts to get away from Shimmer’s illusions.
A message came from the enemy but vanished as one of our strikes took their largest ship down.
“If they’d been prepared, there’s no way this could happen,” Gale said with a chuckle. “Shit, these guys must be the fringe mafia or something.”
“Not a real fleet,” Twitch agreed, “but still a threat.”
She dodged another incoming ship, then pushed for the planet. We entered the atmosphere and then our pursuers—those who’d smartened up and started using radar or other means to track us—were met with bursts of lightning from Gale.
“KICK THEIR ASSES!” Charm shouted, one leg mimicking a kick from her seat, hands punching the air, and I had to laugh. There we were, flying through a fleet and taking it down as we went, and my foxy girlfriend was cheering and looking like a maniac.
What could be better?
“We’ve got a few coming in fast,” Twitch said, pulling up the section of the screen that showed our rear. Sure enough, a group of fighters was on us and our shields were flickering out as they shot us up. “Breaker, take the controls.”
I did as she said, not sure what she was up to, but I used my troubleshooter skill to watch as she coded something. It looked like she was creating some sort of mirror?
“Whoa!” Gale said, pointing to the display, and I glanced over to see that half of the pursuing ships had somehow appeared in front of the others. They were flying right toward each other! They tried to dodge, but only one made it out intact. It swerved and came for us, but by then I’d turned us around and Gale had been able to redirect her lightning. When it hit and the shields went down, I finished the ship off and flew past as it went down.
“So hot,” Charm said, grinning at me.
“It doesn’t all have to be sexual,” Twitch said, pulling up the controls in front of her again, “but in this case, I agree. I’m mighty turned on right now.”
“Don’t strip yet,” Shimmer said, indicating a section of the ground ahead as we cleared a hill. There was the city in the distance, and on the ground in between a small battle was taking place.
“Coming in hot,” Twitch said.
The ship angled down, plowing through the enemy’s rear, and then we were down and pouring out, bringing hell. I busted out my tempest and threw chain lighting out, watching it thread between the enemy lines. At my side, Gale was blasting groups with lightning strikes from above, while Charm took off in her cloak and sent purple bursts as she cast her spells that turned the enemy against their own.
Twitch went to work on shields and boosts for us, and when my aggro kicked in I charged forward, ready to take on every one of those motherfuckers. Shimmer mostly kept us hidden when she could, though once or twice she made it appear as if massive dinosaurs were storming down from the hills, leading enemies and allies alike to scatter—the allies toward their homes and the enemies toward their ships.
This was genius, I realized, because then we could go really hardcore on group attacks, taking out larger numbers of the enemy at once. Twitch opened holes in the ground, Shimmer used her rifle to fire on them, and I kept up with the lightning with Gale.
Damn, we were one slick unit. All along the battlefield enemy ships were crashing down, and soldiers we’d fought on the ground were kneeling, hands behind their heads in surrender.
It was over, we’d won.
The woman who’d sent out the distress call approached, three guards behind her. “Allies, I hope?” she asked.
“We are,” I said. “We were passing by when we received your distress call.”
“The school,” she said, motioning to a tall building in the hills. It had an arched dome of blue crystal, tall pillars out front and carvings of a pegasus on one side, a phoenix on the other.
A glance at Charm showed her backing up, left eye twitching. For some reason, she seemed very against the idea of going back there. For now, though, we were here and determined to help. To my relief, she followed when we took off for the school, the woman following us.
“I’m Headmistress Mashatt,” the woman said as she ran with us. “I run the school here, and also the nearby cities. You can call me Angeline.”
“Why are they attacking the school?” I asked, with a glance back to my ladies to tell them not to say anything about the prophecy.
“As far as I know,” Angeline said, “it’s a raid. Ranger and his supervillains have been preparing for the final assault against the Citadel, and now that the Elders have fallen, he’s growing bold. They’ve been attacking other cities and planets, threatening all who won’t join them. This isn’t the first time those like him have tried… As you’d imagine, Supraline’s wasn’t first on the list to see him as an ally.”
Charm scoffed, earning her a glance from Angeline.
“Do I know you?” the headmistress asked, eyes moving to Charm’s ears and tail, and frowning. “I’d imagine I’d remembe
r, but can’t quite place it.”
“No, I wouldn’t think so,” Charm replied. “Must be a few like me out there.”
“Not many,” Angeline replied, giving her another odd glance before turning back to focus on where she was leading us.
We’d come to a path that led up along the rocks, passing by several buildings before coming to the school gates. It was even more grand up close, and here I was able to see the sun sparkling on stained glass windows, each telling stories of great supers in battles. A garden ringed the school with large shrubs, but sections had been destroyed in the recent fight.
Inside, more fighting was ongoing, judging by the shouts and explosions we could hear.
“Is it like this all over?” I shouted to be heard over the chaos, preparing my powers.
“The attacks were centered around the schools,” she said, and let off a burst of light that took the form of a tiger that darted out at her command—almost like a deadly puppet of light. “Not sure if it’s an attack on the students, or because our teachers are known to be among the most powerful supers. Either way, they’re trying to take us out.”
Two supervillains noticed us and charged, but her tiger of light took out the first, while I shot down the next. A loud commotion came from our left and a wall fell in, more supers piling in toward us mid-fight.
We all joined in, Charm cloaking and appearing as she tore through the enemy, me with my tempest lightning strikes and the occasional terror. As it was my newest skill and not easily controlled, I only used it in areas where I wouldn’t risk hitting friendlies. Plus, it was just mean, and the shrieks of those hit by it made my skin crawl. My best bet was that it was all mental, but still, I’d rather kill them and be done with it. Only once did I have to use my hands, when a super-fast guy came at me. Fast, but not too bright. I simply kicked out and sent him flying before hitting him with lightning. Twitch opted for mostly bumping up our stats, but occasionally created holes for enemies to fall through or a wall where there hadn’t been one previously, so that they’d slam into them or suddenly be imprisoned in stone.
Several supervillains took off, glancing over their shoulders at us and muttering. The only name I caught was Ranger’s. My guess was they were going to tell him about us, which likely meant he’d now caught on to who I was and put out some sort of message to everyone.
If we hoped to find these pyramids and get in there without him attacking us from the rear, we needed to ensure that didn’t happen.
I gave chase, following these supers up a winding set of stairs and shooting at them with the tempest and terror, but the one on the right kept touching the other’s arm and they’d flitter out of sight, appearing farther up and to the side. It wasn’t that they were teleporting, exactly, but seemed closer to what I’d learned to do when traveling through materials.
Shooting out my tempest and then my terror, I managed to catch one of them with the latter, a fact that sent him sprawling on the floor with screams and sobs as the second vanished ahead. This one paused in the hall, where it diverged in either direction, and seemed about to come back for his buddy. Instead, he vanished again as my lightning hit the wall behind where his head had been.
“The library,” Angeline cried, and I ran to join her at the broken wall on our right where we could see smoke and flames.
“Gale?” I called out.
“On it!” Gale went over the wall, already moving winds to carry water and clouds to form rain.
Meanwhile, I ran after my new enemy, trying to see if there was a way to catch him. As soon as I turned the corner, he appeared and thrust a hand out, sparks flying, but I was ready and had my tempest ball of energy ready, so he cursed and vanished.
If my guess was right, though, he was traveling either through the light or through the floor, so I took a fifty-fifty shot and guessed right. Dismissing the tempest I thrust my hand onto the floor and sent an energy wave through it, and a second later he appeared with his back to me, shaking as if hit by a Taser, as he collapsed on the floor.
A second later he was gone though, appearing at my side and trying to tackle me, so I went with it, bringing a knee up into his face and a downward elbow to follow. Thanks to my good ol’ kung fu days, I knew at least enough to get me through that.
He fell and I brought back the tempest, but he vanished as the lightning made contact. He reappeared for a second, flashing and smoking, and then was gone.
The others caught up to me, finding me staring at the scorch marks in the floor. I wanted desperately to know if that was a sign of my victory or of this supervillain getting away, but would likely never know.
“The library?” I asked, still trying to catch my breath from that little encounter.
“They’re taking care of it,” Twitch replied.
A glance back showed the fighting had indeed died down. Students in uniforms that reminded me of the Catholic schoolgirl look emerged from classrooms, holding each other and staring around at their school in shock. It still stood but had sections of walls missing, others scorched.
“I can’t imagine you in one of those skirts,” I whispered to Charm, and at her frown decided not to add the part about wanting to see it.
“Imagine the red dress instead,” she replied, and turned her back to me, to all of us, staring through a broken window at the smoke rising from the now-quiet battlefield. There were definitely skeletons in her closet regarding this place, but this wasn’t the time to ask about them, I could tell that much.
“Thank you for coming to our rescue,” Angeline said, taking my hand and then Twitch’s, apparently thinking we were in charge. I guess, in a way, we were. “Without your help, we surely would have lost this battle. If that had happened… who knows where we’d be. I really must check on the library though,” she added with a nervous glance back at the smoke in the sky, visible through the opening past the broken wall.
“We’ll go with you,” I said. “In case there’s trouble.”
She had a group of supers at her side now, but nodded and said to her people, “See to the students and get our defenses back up. This cannot be allowed to happen again.”
With that, she nodded and we went with her to find the library, where Gale was waiting. It wasn’t in as bad a situation as I’d expected, which was a relief. In part because I cared, but also because the mention of a library had given me an idea. After waiting for Angeline to be comfortable in the knowledge that her library was mostly in one piece and the books hadn’t been harmed, I asked, “A school like this… I imagine you have books on legends, on other planets in the system and whatnot?”
“Of course,” she said, but then turned to me with confusion. “You have something you’re looking for?”
“Actually, yes.”
“Gurstrad,” Charm said, standing to my right. She took a step closer to me—a bit territorial, it seemed—and said, “We’re looking for the place. Specifically, the pyramids.”
Angeline frowned but motioned her to follow. “I have a school and more to check on, but if we have anything related, it would be back in this corner.”
She led us to the spot, and even pulled out a large, leather-bound book with frayed edges and told us it would be the best bet. Before excusing herself though, she turned to us, serious.
“Without your help, we might have lost more lives today. I want to thank you, and must insist you be a guest at our feast tonight.”
“We couldn’t poss—” I started, but she waved me off.
“I insist. The baths are just there,” she indicated a building out the window. “Freshen up, relax, and then join us. After that, you can be on your way, if you must.”
She didn’t even wait for an answer, just turned and left us to the books.
“This is great!” Charm exclaimed, but Gale looked cautious.
“We need to get back out there,” I protested.
“And we also need to clear our minds,” Twitch countered. “Clean up, eat. Maybe,” she leaned in, close eno
ugh for me to see my reflection in her eyes, “get a chance to replenish your skills.”
“The key to a man’s heart,” I said, shaking my head. After everything we’d just been through, there wasn’t much arguing from me on this point. I didn’t bother clarifying whether I was referring to the chance for a meal or the other stuff, but agreed it all sounded great.
But first, we dove into the books, determined to find something—anything—before heading to the baths to get washed for the feast.
7
While the mission was of the utmost importance, all of that vanished from my mind the moment I stepped into the bathhouse. We walked through a changing room to find an outdoor area of rock-surrounded hot springs. Trees stood tall above curved roofs that provided shade in spots.
As we stripped, we went back over what we’d discovered in the library. The short version was that we hadn’t found much. There had been mention of Gurstrad, making it sound like the Bermuda Triangle of this galaxy. It didn’t give us much to go on, saying that the surrounding area was treacherous and therefore travel had been forbidden to the region long ago, but didn’t give much more than that aside from that it was in the second quadrant as mapped out in a star map in the book.
There was one legend, though, that was quite interesting. I stared off at the walls of the changing room, considering it as I pulled off my boxer briefs and tossed them over with my other clothes. The legend was that Gurstrad had been one of the few places in the system where reports of alien craft had come in. Apparently there had been a time when the region wasn’t off limits, but then one day ships started disappearing. After a while, some brave supers attempted to find out why. Two out of a dozen ships returned, some telling stories of insane asteroid belts and meteor storms, others of alien craft.
However, someone had written notes to the side of that, claiming that the supposed alien craft had logos on them, and one person had even reported seeing the name Orion Corp. Therefore, this individual had surmised that they couldn’t have been aliens.