Chapter 16 - Fight for your Life
Novan
men and women were falling, hundreds had been killed
As the main battle was going on
the Abstract prisoners were escaping through the portal behind the Abstract army, the Noble
wasn’t happy about that but was clever enough to know he couldn’t take on an
army of Abstracts on his own. The two Nobles behind him had fought their way
through at least fifty Abstracts and were nearly dead on their feet.
He
glanced down at the two Nobles kneeling behind him. Glo and Izzac were holding
hands, completely
he had said he was speeding up their bodies’ internal clock and therefore
massively increasing the already ridiculously fast healing of their Noble
bodies.
Svari
had put a plea out for any other Nobles to get here as fast as possible but had
only had a single response from the permanently stoned noble Shure, Svari
didn’t trust the drug-addled madman in the slightest but respected his power enough not to
turn down the offer. That had been ten minutes ago, still no sign of the man. Despite his many failings, Shure was not one to be tardy.
“There,
that should hold you together for the moment Izzy.” Svari heard Glo mutter, he
sounded exhausted but determined.
“Thank
you Glo.” Izzac replied, struggling to her feet and offering Glo her hand, “Can
you stand?”
“I
hope so, if not then I won’t be much help now, will I?” The blue haired Noble
replied with a hint of sarcasm in his voice, taking her hand and allowing her
to pull him unsteadily to his feet. “Thanks, Izz.”
“If
you wouldn’t mind,” Svari chastised the pair, pointing towards the still
shimmering portal in the wall. “We still have that to deal with.”
“Just
let them go, Svari.” Glo muttered, “They’ll kill everyone here, if not the
surrounding streets if you don’t pull the army back.”
“And
just let all of that scientific rigour go to waste? All of these Abstracts are
individual scientific achievements and you just want rid of them?!” Svari
asked, an angry tone marring his calm voice, “I can’t just allow them to escape.”
“Scientific
rigour?!” Izzy shouted, stepping forward, “Are you insane?! Asking all of these
people to die just to keep your science experiment?”
“Simply
a science experiment?” Svari growled, sounding utterly outraged and insulted at
the mere thought of the dismissive sentence, “You speak of me like a
schoolchild, someone tossing a lump of sodium in a bath of water! This is true
science you are marring with your damn words, be quiet and keep your head down
Izzac.”
“Don’t
speak to her like that.” Another voice joined the conversation, one accompanied
by a shock of red hair and a recently broken nose, “Glo and Izzy are right,
Svari, let them go.”
“Thank
you, Cathode.” Glo muttered, not enjoying having to be thankful for his input. “Stand
down Svari.”
“You
can’t stop this, Glo.” Svari snarled, his hands balling into fists that began
to pulse with his Nobility. “Get out of my way and I’ll do it myself.”
Glo, Cat and Izzac each connected with their
Nobilities, the air humming with danger as the four Nobles stared each other
down. Svari clicked his fingers once and a blinding flash of light burst from
his body, forcing burning stars into the eyes of the surrounding Nobles. Glo
focused through the blindness and tried to slow time but he wasn’t fast enough,
Svari had already vanished from within them.
Glo
let his concentration drop and cursed the Noble of Light, Glo had thought for a
brief moment that he could be reasonable but apparently not.
“I
can get us over there.” Izzac said, “He’s going to go back to the portal and
make an attempt to close it.”
Cat
shook his head, “I’ll try head off Shure before he gets here and blows the
place off the face of Nova, you two go and deal with Svari.” He explained
quickly before turning around, “Don’t get yourselves killed.”
“We’ll
try not to.” Glo replied, “You too.”
“Plant-bitch
likes me, he shouldn’t want to turn me inside out.” Cathode chuckled as he
walked away from the pair of other Nobles with his hands in his pockets.
----------
A cry broke out among the escaping
Abstracts, they had already been stopped by the one noble at the gate, forcing
them back into the courtyard. A pair of Nobles were falling from the sky towards
them. The Abstracts scattered before they landed with a great cloud of dust and
a deafening crack of stone. A moment passed as the Abstracts levelled hastily
drawn weapons with the blinding cloud in completely acceptable fear, quiet
muttering blossomed across the disorganised ranks of retreating captives only
interrupted by the sounds of metal clicking with metal and the seemingly
distant sounds of the battle still boiling and writhing like black tar meeting
white snow on a cold morning.
“We mean you no harm!” Came Izzac’s calm
voice from within the now swiftly dissipating miasma, she knew that the surrounding Abstracts understood her perfectly well with the universal
translator device sewn into the seam of her now tattered jacket, “We wish for
you to return home but our comrade has decided to be objectionable, we will
move you if you get in our way.”
A quick jostle of deliberation twitched
and rustled through the gaggle of Abstract captives, the majority just looked
tired and in great need of getting back to their home to rest. Thankfully for
Both Izzac and Glo, that majority won the quick debate that happened across
them and the sea of grey and white faces parted to allow the Nobles to pass.
“Thank you.” Glo muttered sarcastically,
“You wouldn’t have killed any to argue your point.”
“Unlike you, my time-natured friend.”
Izzac began to reply to Glo before pausing a moment to think of an appropriate
insult. Unfortunately, she couldn’t find anything in the discrete pause she
left herself so she had to settle with something subpar, “Unlike you, I have
the skills that help me resolve issues such as this one without having to
resort to threats or violence.”
“And those would be?” Glo asked as they
began to make their way towards the still fuming Svari through the tunnel of
Abstracts.
“Tits and diplomacy.” Izzac replied
pointedly, her expression not moving at all.
Glo snorted in amusement, “I’m sure you
can use those special skills to help me beat the hell out of Svari, although I
can’t see how tits will come in handy besides as distraction.”
“I could smother him.” Izzy replied, a
small giggle escaping her tight lips. “Whether he’d enjo-.”
“Stop talking.” Glo interrupted her, of
all the things she could have said at that moment. “Double down.”
Glo and Izzac broke into a run towards
the raging Noble, Glo’s arms rippling with energy-filled lightning and Izzac’s
wrists becoming encircled with countless black rings. She kicked off the ground
and high up into the air over Glo’s head as he bounded along the ground below
her.
----------
Svari was standing with his back to the
portal in the wall, his face feral and angry. He had his arms held out wide and
glowing with wild power just begging to be released and incinerate anybody that
crossed him, thankfully, someone did make an attempt to cross him, an Abstract
woman holding their sword quite obviously in their offhand. He could tell
immediately that she was one of the Guardians that had been leading the charge,
someone he’d great take pleasure in butchering before the rest of her people.
“You.” Svari growled at her as she tried
to slip by him, “Stop right there, Abstract.”
She didn’t
hesitate at all, keeping her gazelle-like pace up.
She did stop when he clicked his fingers and blasted the stone ground where she was
about to step into plasma.
She made an
odd squeak of surprise, something you’d hear from a startled cat, before
grinding her heels into the ground and skidding to a halt. She looked up from
underneath her helmet at the man who had shocked her to savagely bare her teeth, Svari
wasn’t overly intimidated by the display but still raised his hands to defend
himself against the foreign woman.
The woman
raised her sword across herself, Svari could tell she was injured, the Abstract
was holding the blade in her offhand. Svari didn’t want to kill her, a Guardian
would be an interesting scientific subject but he needed someone to make an
example of before the other Abstracts swarmed forwards in a tide he couldn’t
hope to quell.
“Drop the
sword.” Svari ordered, rolling his shoulders in preparation for her to lunge
forwards, “Drop it or I’ll obliterate you on the spot.”
“Rather die
fighting than kneeling before a false god.” The Abstract spat viciously as she
lunged and leapt, somehow springing high into the air like a giant hare.
Svari
responded by stepping back and clicking his fingers, a beam of light tore the
air behind her into plasma a moment before her boot landed square in the middle
of his chest. The air blasted from Svari’s lungs in one great rush and he collapsed,
gasping to one knee before the woman. Before the Guardian could pull her sword
back, Svari clicked his fingers and blinded her with a flash of light. In the
few precious seconds that gained him as she rubbed her sensitive eyes Svari
managed to wrestle his breath back into his lungs and scramble back to his feet,
he was immediately on the defensive though as her sword began to swing and stab
at him with dizzying precision.
Svari kept his
connection to his Nobility strong as he dodged and deflected countless strikes
from the desperate Guardian, his shirt was in tatters with hundreds of tears
and holes inflicted by the razor-like blade. He just couldn’t get the second to
focus and blast the Abstract into plasma.
“Quizzical!?”
A shout rang out over their battle, making the Guardian hesitate for a moment;
a moment long enough for Svari to step back and crack a kick hard into her
stomach, sending the Abstract reeling backwards.
Svari glanced
over to where the shout had came from, the persistent pair of Nobles, Izzac and
Glo, were running towards their fight with power rippling across their bodies.
“Don’t worry
about me, comrades.” Svari shouted back to them, his hand raised to deal the
killing blow to the winded Abstract, “Let me just deal with this scum. I’ll
have time to tousle with you afterwards.”
The Noble of
light pressed his finger and thumb together, preparing to evaporate the
Guardian, when the ground beneath his feet jarringly flipped sideways and he
was catapulted hard into the wall surrounding the building. His impact came with a crunch of concrete breaking and Svari sliding comically
down the wall to hit the ground with a soft crumpling of cloth on hard stone.
----------
“Quizzical,
are you alright?” Glo asked, kneeling carefully down next to the Abstract
woman. She raised a bemused eyebrow at him before shaking her head and trying
her best to indicate her burned sword arm.
“Your arm?”
Izzac asked, she’d been rather perplexed when Glo had shouted at her to fling
Svari away from the Abstract.
“Yeah, the
electrical sword burned me.” Quizzical replied in broken Novan, sitting up slowly and reaching
up to take her helmet off. Glo undid the buckle around her chin and pulled the
metal dome from her head, grimacing at the bruises on her face.
"We have tra nslators,
“We won’t have
long till he works out what’s happened.” Glo muttered, looking for a way to
take the tight leather armour off from around her arm, “I’ll do my best in
healing your arm but you’ll have to take the armour off.”
“You’d do that
for an Abstract, Glo?” Quizzical asked, rubbing her face and wincing as she
smeared something red and sticky across her cheek.
“I’m just
going to assume you two know each other and not question it.” Izzy declared,
looking to where she had thrown Svari. “He’s getting up, I’ll slow him down as
much as I can.”
With that,
Izzac kicked off the ground and began to rise quickly into the air in the
direction of Svari. She had black rings of power flitting up and down her arms
like angry wasps, mixing that with the blood from multiple wounds. The normally
meek and pleasant Novan lady had assumed a terrifying visage.
Glo glanced up
at her for a moment before gently grasping Quizzical’s burned hand, the
Abstract grit her teeth and he could see her trying to muscle through her pain
without crying out. She looked so vulnerable lying in his arms, Glo considered
for a brief moment how easy it would be to grasp her head in his hands and snap
her neck with a quick twist of his arms. Ending Quizzical here would only end
with her martyrdom in the disorganised rabble of Abstracts, instead he gently
placed his hands on her shoulders and furrowed his dirty brow in concentration.
The Abstract
slowly removed the armour from her injured arm, wincing in pain when the rough
leather scraped against her sensitive, burned flesh. After a moment of effort
she felt the cool air on her burn and immediately regretted taking the armour
off, Glo had to fight her not to scream with pain as the freezing cold air
intermingled with the still hot burn.
Eventually the
Noble managed to restrain her so he could get a better look at the injury. He
was no medic but he knew that the wound was grizzly and would probably end up infected
with something, Quizzical would likely have to get her hand or her arm
amputated if he didn’t get it closed up soon.
“Calm down and
look at me, Quizzical.” Glo instructed as his Nobility began to ripple across
his forearms, blue sparks jumping between veins and over bruises as he warned
her. “I’m going to speed up your healing. It’s going to hurt.”
Quizzical
didn’t say anything, just nodding in reply she balled her hand into a fist and
prepared for the pain. She’d probably felt worse, she’d had malachite thrust in
her face before and that was agony. At least that was what she thought before
Glo’s gentle hand touched her shoulder and her arm was wracked with torture,
she instinctively tried to scramble away from it as her skin began to knit back
together. It was over in about a minute worth of the Abstract screaming
obscenities at the top of her lungs, luckily for Glo none of the Abstracts
waiting to get through the portal jumped him as he was working on their
Guardian.
----------
Izzac growled
in effort, she was trying her hardest to keep Svari down on the ground but the
Noble would just keep staring up at her from his kneel on the ground, no matter
how strong she made the gravity around him he just wouldn’t fall. The Novan man
on the ground was shaking with the effort, but he stayed strong against Izzac’s
power.
Luckily for
Izzac, the shout she had been waiting for finally arrived from the ground, Glo
and Quizzical were ready to back her up.
“You can let
up now, I’ve got the Guardian on her feet!” Glo shouted, Izzac spared a moment
to look over her shoulder and watch as the Noble and the Abstract walked
alongside each other to reach Svari.
Quizzical was
striding confidently forwards, she’d taken her helmet off and had let her hair fall
around her face and obscure her eyes; Izzac knew they were locked firmly on
Svari with murderous intent burning in her deep purple irises. She was holding
her sword loosely in her right hand now, she looked far more confident holding
it like that than when it had been misplaced into her other hand.
Glo looked
equally confident, walking along the stone ground in long paces with the woman
at his side. He was moving as if he held the most feared weapon in the galaxy
at his side, although what actually hung there was a small energy pistol that’d
be little more than a tickle to Svari.
Izzac was thankful
to be able to loosen her powers, the toll it had taken on her already strained
body had exhausted her. She released her hold on Svari and floated gently down
to the ground behind Quizzical and Glo. As the Noble woman touched down, she
fell to one knee, fighting for her waning consciousness. She wanted to watch
the fight that was about to go down.
“Svari!” Glo
shouted, his arms crackling with dangerous blue power, “Stand the hell down or
I’ll have to kill you.”
“Don’t you
want to kill me, Glo?” Svari replied calmly, walking in order to meet Glo and
Quizzical, “Or are you going to leave it to your pet Image?”
Quizzical
flinched at the use of the slur, keeping her anger in check by letting a low
growl escape her throat. Glo gently held his hand out in case Quizzical snapped
and lunged at the Noble; if she had lost a fight against Cat when he was
holding back the Abstract would barely stand a second against Svari.
“No, I don’t
want to kill you Svari.” Glo replied, he and Quizzical were close enough to
Svari that they wouldn’t have to shout to be heard, “You’re Noble, you know me
well enough to know that I don’t enjoy killing.”
“Nobody should enjoy killing, Prizmatica.” Svari spat at the other Noble, “Now either
you kill me or I’m going to have to obliterate you and keep these Abstracts as
my own.”
Svari didn’t
give Glo a moment, stepping forwards and clicking his fingers. Blinding light
flashed around them and Glo was struck hard in the stomach by the other Noble,
another burning ball of pain burst out from Svari’s fist and Glo was thrown
backwards where he rolled along the ground like a boule thrown by a
professional.
Quizzical
wasn’t offered much more mercy, Svari took advantage of her temporary blindness
to smash his shin into her stomach. He concentrated a blast of photons where he
contacted her and sent her crashing backwards into the wall next to the portal.
“I don’t want
to kill you Glo.” Svari spat, rolling his shoulders and walking towards the
fallen Noble, “I just want you to leave me to do what I want to do.”
“You want to
commit atrocities against these people, Svari.” Glo growled, pushing himself
back up to his feet and pointing the pistol at the other Noble, “They may be
our enemies in war, but they don’t deserve this treatment. Don’t lower yourself
to their level.”
“They have
hurt all of us Glo!” Svari shouted, raising his hand to click his fingers
again, “They’ve killed thousands, even on our soil!”
“And we
haven’t killed them too?” Glo replied calmly, looking over the other man’s
shoulder at the Abstract who was sneaking up behind him, “Stand down before
someone else gets hurt.”
Svari didn’t
get a chance to replsy as Quizzical leapt upon him, slashing down to his head
with her sword. Svari snarled and grabbed her arm before she could injure him,
“Get off me, Image.” He spat before throwing her down to the ground next to
Glo.
She rolled
back to her feet behind the taller man, being stopped from leaping back onto
Svari by Glo’s outstretched arm.
“Stand down
Svari.” Glo said again, calmly, “You kill her and she’ll become a martyr, you
kill them and you’ll piss off every Abstract in Imagination.” He took his
finger off the trigger of the pistol and dropped it to his side, “You don’t
want to be the one who’s telling the governor that you’ve escalated the war.”
Svari growled and
glanced back at the portal shimmering behind him, “I should just kill everyone
here.” He said slowly, “You’re in my way Glo, and you, Image.” He spat the last
word with enough malice to make Quizzical’s skin crawl with fury.
A long moment
passed on the battlefield, with the Abstract and Novan soldiers clashing over
and over again behind them. All the three could hear was a distant roar of feet
on the stone ground and metal dashing itself against metal, Quizzical was tense
enough to snap, her body coiled like that of a snake; ready to spring at Svari
if the Novan made a move.
Svari stepped
forwards and Glo stopped Quizzical from leaping at him by grabbing her wrist,
she responded with a violence-filled snarl, flashing her teeth at Svari like a
caged animal. The Noble of Light’s face was about an inch away from Glo’s, the
Nobles were breathing the same air for a moment before Svari spat on the ground
next go Glo and walked past him. As he stepped past the older Noble, Svari
snapped his fingers and there was a detestable cry from the ranks of Abstracts,
one of them jerked on their feet before falling to the ground with a faint plea
for help.
Quizzical
pulled her wrist from Glo’s grip and turned away from him, beginning to usher
the surviving Abstracts through the portal. Glo watched as she disregarded him
in favour of helping her own, the Noble was running possibilities through his
mind; Svari wasn’t done with this campaign. Glo would have to keep an eye on
that man before he did something else ridiculous, he knew that the other Noble
was holding back when he had attacked Quizzical and himself, he could have
easily killed the Abstract woman with a gentle flick of his wrist. Glo also
knew that he was holding his own power back, he could have simply caught
Svari’s punch in his hand before snapping the Noble’s neck in a single fluid
motion. He knew on the other hand that he couldn’t do such a thing without
losing the support of the other Nobles.
----------
“Aphré.” Glo
shouted to her after a few minutes and most of the Abstracts had been herded
through the portal, “A moment if you will.”
Quizzical
waved her hand at him to wait before crouching down and gently picking up the
Abstract that Svari had killed in his rage at Glo, they were young, maybe twenty
years at most. His pale grey skin was speckled with blood and malachite
scarring, sweaty matted hair plastered to his sorry scalp. Quizzical slowly
walked into the portal, stepping back to her homeland and gently lying the man
in the capable hands of one of the healers tending to the wounded and the dead.
The Guardian
took a moment to compose herself before turning and walking back through the
shimmering portal back to Glo, her hand on her sword behind her back as a
precaution.
“You won’t be
needing that, Quizzical.” Glo said, showing his empty hands to her, “I don’t
want to hurt you.”
“What do you
want.” Quizzical asked him warily.
“I want to
thank you for helping with Svari.” Glo said patiently, being careful of the
spring-loaded Abstract standing in front of him. “I don’t want to fight your
people, Quiz, I want to end this war with as little bloodshed as possible.”
Quizzical
frowned, “Crashing a flying craft on me says otherwise.” She growled.
“First off,
you crashed that ship.” Glo snarked, cracking a small smile which the Abstract
shared after a moment. “Secondly, I was being ordered to do that, I don’t like
killing.”
“After you two
have done making out, there’s still a battle going on back there!” Izzy weakly
shouted from behind them.
A quick blush
rounded Glo’s cheeks before he turned to Izzac to be able to look away from the
Abstract, “Be quiet, Izzy.” Glo snapped with a small smile on his face, “Go and
find Shure or Cat, have one of them keep an eye on Svari.”
Izzac chuckled
and struggled to her feet, wobbling gently like a thin sapling in a gale. “Not
sure if that’ll be happening today Glo, keeping Svari down took a lot out of
me.” She mumbled, half asleep on her feet.
“Right, get
yourself off somewhere safe, I’ll find one of them.” Glo reassured her before
turning back to Quizzical and giving the Abstract a polite smile, “Get yourself
home, Aphré, take your army with you.”
Quizzical
nodded and bowed a little to him before cracking her knuckles and sprinting
back off towards the battle.
Glo watched
her go, a little put out that their conversation couldn’t have lasted a moment
longer. Eventually he turned back to Izzac and helped her stand, ignoring her
snide remark about him having his eyes on a foreign prize. He only gave in and
replied to Izzy after she jabbed him in the ribs; his reply was to drop her and
pick her back up over his shoulders in an uncomfortable fireman’s carry.
“No fair Glo!” Izzy protested, banging her
fist on his back with about as much force as a sneeze to a tree, nothing
compared to Izzy’s usual punches.
“Keep that up
and I’ll leave you here.” Glo snorted, still walking back towards the battle to
find Cat or Shure.Chapter 17 - Empathy↦
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