Flash. Noise. Pain.
Everything was blinding. Everything was deafening. Everything was agony.
Head was full of light. Head was full of sound. Head was full of aches.
Nerves burned. Bones shook. Muscle screamed.
Stop. Think. Focus.
Remembered. Had found ritual place. Seen the Witch summon the Demon. Ripped through the Witch's retainers. Tore through the Demon's squires. Couldn't penetrate the Witch's shield. Stayed ahead of the Demon's cannon fire. Saw the crystals powering the portal. Idea formed.
Grabbed the crystal. Leapt clear as Demon attacked. Hurled the crystal into cannon. Demon fired. Everything was noise. Heard Witch shriek. Heard Demon roar. Heard Force Unyielding bellow beyond portal. Enemy around them disintegrated.
Get up. Blood up. Eyes up.
Witch was gone. Not dead. Escaped like the Witch always did. Demon was injured, stunned, staggering away, blinded. Leapt onto Demon's back, kicked through armor. Demon fired its boomer, nowhere close. Grabbed its horn, fingers crunching into chitin. Kicked away boomer, drew shotgun. Click click. Boom boom.
Demon slumped. Knew it was still alive. Sensed its worm chewing at it. Pushed its head back. Click click. Boom boom. Demon went limp. Drew in breath, leaving the Champion to die. Felt the aches, blindness, deafness fade. Breathed out the pain. Turned and saw the people. Sized them up.
Enemy? Targets? Strangers.
Male of broad build. Dark crimson heavy armor with pauldrons. Scarred in the face. Loincloth of colored strips hanging off belt. Pouches of ammunition. Breathed in his measure. Scent of ozone, worthiness, but undercurrent of unease. One who dislikes the Enemy. But not the raw hatred needed.
Strength. Resolve. Soldier.
Woman with purple skin. Swathed in robes with amulets and beads. Luminous eyes that read with long experience. A waxen charm hanging from a belt. Beside this, a leather-bound journal. Breathed in her measure. Scent of oblivion, curiosity, but tinged with grim knowledge. One who knows the Enemy. But lacks the knowing of the logic.
Studious. Analytical. Scholar.
Person made of metal. Draped in a mottled cloak and leather armor. Head with actual face, numeral emblazoned on forehead. Knives stashed about their body. Orienteering tools on wrist. Breathed in their measure. Scent of embers, determination, but undercurrent of annoyance. One who hunts the Enemy. But not out of raw need.
Standalone. Farseeing. Scout.
Soldier, scholar, scout were examining him in turn. Attire stained with dust, grime, muck. Smeared with death-ash. Killers of the Enemy. Stunk of it. Good at killing the Enemy. Saw scholar and scout look at one another. Scholar nodded. Three started chattering. Ignored them, turned and regarded halls and chambers beyond them. Sensed something. Aimed shotgun. Drones beside each of them. Monocular shapes, speaking animatedly. Looked at them again. Breathed in the three again. Tasted their Power.
Weapons. Armor. Power. Lightbearers.
-=-=-=-=-=-
"Aren't you going to say something?"
Rega-7 shot Wahei a look. The Warlock hadn't taken her eyes off the Slayer after the initial exchange of a nod. Then again, neither had she. Despite the fact-- indeed, because of the fact-- that the figure before them had near-effortlessly taken down an Abyssal Champion with what amounted to a flying tackle and a sawed-off shotgun, something about the giant unsettled her. Something beyond the rage that emanated from him.
"Seriously? You're the one who knows who this guy is." Rega kept her submachine gun ready, but lowered. She instinctively knew that aiming a weapon at the giant would go very poorly. "You're the one who likes to talk."
"You're both supposing that he even speaks our language." They both turned to Morgan, who had his own shotgun out at this point. The Titan shrugged at them. "You're also supposing the guy's human. If we just found out about this guy from a bunch of ancient Hive tablets, then he could predate even the Golden Age. By a long way." He rolled his eyes at their expressions. "Oh, wait, sorry. Me am Titan, dummy speaky, no understand, me am only kill."
Wahei looked abashed. "Fair point. I should have considered that." She acknowledged his reasoning, and turned back to Rega. "But now I'm sort of left wondering how to respond to this. I mean, he's a Guardian, or something like it, right?"
Vizier decloaked beside her. "I'm not so sure if he's a Guardian, exactly," the Ghost murmured. "The Light readings I'm picking up from him are unlike anything I've ever seen."
"I've seen some things like it," Eyeball muttered as he appeared next to Morgan. "Like with the creepy guy with the weird tanks down in the Tower Annex."
"Or those Thorn-wielders," Chaukeedar added, popping up beside Rega. "It's Light, but it's not the purest."
But the Guardians barely paid attention, because the sudden appearance of the Ghosts had caused the giant before them to suddenly raise the gun in his hand. It happened so quickly, if he'd pulled the trigger, they would never have been able to stop him. All three of them snapped their own weapons up in return, as their Ghosts quickly ducked out of view.
Rega watched the Slayer as his chest rose and fell in one deep breath. The visor of his helmet gave her no real indication to his expression, but she could just make out a slight furrowing of the brow. His head turned as he looked from the cringing shapes of their Ghosts, to the Guardians. Slowly, he lowered his gun, and after a moment, so did they.
Then the Slayer abruptly marched past them, turning his head again as he took in the surrounding decay of the Bray facility, and Rega heard him breathe in again. He went to a railing and looked down into the atrium, then up toward the cavernous roof, and one foot kicked away a fragment of Hive chitin.
"I think he's looking for more Hive to kill," Vizier whispered.
Wahei nods. "That makes sense. If the tablets were right, his dedication to killing Hive was why they dubbed him 'The Slayer.'"
Morgan watched the giant warily for a few moments as he marched past them again, back into the room with the now-broken portal. "Eyeball, you had a good read on the signatures of the Hive Champions down here, yeah?"
His Ghost's black-in-white shell swiveled toward him. "Yes. No more Abyssals at the moment, but still some other powerful ones."
Rega frowned. "What about Kateäk?"
The mention of the Queen of Chains caused the Slayer to stop in his search of the Hive chamber. He swung back to them and stomped through the muck on the floor, approaching the Hunter. She held her ground and held up a hand. "Easy there, big guy." He stared down at her, and without breaking the stare-down, she hissed to Wahei. "So he understands the chain-witch's name."
Eyeball opened his shell and pulsed the Light in the atrium again. "Her energy signature is faint, but still somewhere around here. She might have escaped to the Ascendant Plane." The Ghost swiveled and indicated a direction. "But there's another big one this way."
Vizier added, "Applied Research is that way."
Rega nodded and looked up at the giant. "You want to kill Hive?" She raised her gun, without aiming at him, and then indicated the dead Abyssal. The Slayer stared at her, but she saw the slight turn of the head within his helmet as he glanced at it. Then he raised his shotgun with a ponderous nod. Rega jerked her thumb in the direction the Ghosts had indicated. "This way. Big Hive. Maybe even new guns. Come with us?" Again, the Slayer stared at her, and there was the movement of his head in his helmet as he evidently looked in that direction. Then he nodded again.
-=-=-=-=-=-
The scream echoed across the Ascendant Plane. Kateäk's robes smoldered, her headdress cracked and smoking, and she felt her worm writhe in agony. She had been a fraction of a second too late to completely avoid the explosion of Baalgar's Boomer and Void crystal. But the pain was endurable. She was Ascendant, so it would take more than a mere blast like that to end her. But the pain was excruciating, above the mere agony of stepping into the unfit reality that the Deep sought to unmake. It was the Slayer's Light doing it, she realized, twisting the energies of the Void and of the Deep against her.
Yaad Matu growled at her as she dragged her claws through the soil beneath her. "You weren't fast enough," the Force Unyielding declared. "If you hadn't stopped the ritual to summon me, we would have killed the Slayer. Instead, you were weak, and now the Deep is less a Champion--"
The chain speared out and through his neck armor, wrapping around his throat. He staggered back, grabbing at the links, then raising his axe, but another chain lashed out and snared his wrist, pulling his arm to the side. Within moments, all of his limbs were splayed out and he was lifted into the air by spectral links. Kateäk lifted her head and glowered at him. "Know your place, Yaad Matu. I am not some fresh-spawned wizard who speaks carelessly, who weaves without understanding. I am Ascendant. I am a Queen. So mind your tongue, lest I tear it from your maw and feed it to my worm." She flung him away, hurling him deeper into the Ascendant Plane. "Begone from my sight, until I have need of you."
She felt the plane twist around her suddenly, and fell into a pose of supplication. Only a being of greater power than herself could twist reality here, which meant it must have been her Sovereign. But when she lifted her gaze, she froze. Instead of the ruins/throne/abyss, it was something else. With one eye, it was a chamber of study, musty and littered with scrolls and tools. With another, it was a ritual space, redolent with the effusion of death, festooned with the blades of the trade. With the third, it was the formless shape of the true Deep. But in all three places, there was a Sovereign.
No. Not a Sovereign. A Prince.
His face was twisted into a smile and he slowly brought his hands together, clapping slowly. "Honored, Tem Tak." She narrowed her eyes as he spoke her spawn name, discarded in ages past when she chose her god. But he continued, "Honored, Te Akka." Again, her eyes narrowed as he used her wizard name, long disused since her growth in power. And finally, he bowed his head, but with a tone of mockery to it, as he used her ascended name. "Honored, Kateäk."
She sent one of her chains lashing toward him, but he lazily caught it with one hand, then plunged it down onto the altar, pinning it in place with a knife. He reached out to catch another, and this was pinned to the table in the study. Then he plucked a third from nowhere, without her even trying to attack him, and wound this around a sphere of nothingness in the Deep. It left her pulled in three different realities, and she screamed again from it as the Prince floated over toward her.
"Know your place, Te Akka." His voice was the scratch of a quill through her flesh, the scrape of a knife scraping across her bones, the hiss of dying atoms in an accretion disk. "I am not some scrabbling thrall who charges without worry, who claws without thinking. I am no mere Ascendant, grown fat with tribute. I am the child of a Sovereign. So remember this, or I will peel your chains from your body and flay your soul to the smallest iota, and leave you to drift in the Deep until the end of all things."
She pried his claws from her face. "Blasphemous traitor! The King Your Father cast you out!" He tightened his grip on her, and she cried out as her chains were pulled taut.
"Expected to wither and die, shunned by His gods, bereft of tribute," the Prince agreed. He abruptly released her, and with a casual flick of his fingers, her chains were freed. "Be still, O Queen of Chains. I am not here to seek some pointless vengeance against my Aunts. I am here to lend my aid."
She went still for a moment, eyes narrowed. "Why should I accept your aid? Why should I risk defying my Sovereign for even speaking with you?"
"Do you think that the Slayer will care that I am an outcast?" The Prince shook his head. "It will kill every Enemy he perceives. Me and what remains of my Hive included, since the Lightbearers slaughtered their way through them en masse."
He floated back from her and gestured to the altar. There upon it now was the corpse of Baalgar. "I was there when the Rage Unrelenting burned the fleets of the Heliophiles of Baldu, when he crushed the Baldurite Arch-Hierophant in his fist. To lose such a Champion of the Deep is a blow to your Sovereign." The Prince gestured in the air, ethereal threads strung between his claws. "But he need not stay dead."
Kateäk considered this. "To bring back a Champion such as Baalgar would violate the edicts of my Sovereign. And he fell so easily to the Slayer's might."
The Prince chuckled. "There is more than one way my arts work. And there are ways to strengthen him." He turned from the altar into the study and picked up a long spike. It gleamed with a dark necrotic sheen over the tarnished silver metal, and the blunt end glowed with poisonous yellow light. Kateäk stared at it, sensing the power that emanated from it.
"The King Your Father forbade the usage of an Argent Nail." Her voice was flat as she glared at it. "Stealing tribute and accumulating it without sending it up the Great Chain to the Sovereigns is--"
"I have heard it all before," the Prince snapped. "And when you've already committed one sin against kings and gods, what is one more?" He held the Nail up. "With this, not only can I resurrect an Abyssal Champion, but I can enhance their power by an order of magnitude."
"And warp them into something that is given its power rather than taking it," she spat. "Twisting them and replacing their flesh with metal and wire. Anything that must rely on external assistance does not deserve existence. That is the logic of the sword, O Exiled Prince."
"If it means stopping the Slayer from its unstoppable path of annihilation of our people," he retorted, "then it is worth doing. Any of the Sovereigns would agree with that. None of Them wanted to spend the tribute necessary to charge a Nail the last time the Slayer marched. This is why They failed to kill it, and why you have been stuck on that wretched world, endlessly working to keep it chained away in your Oubliette."
She finally turned away. "I will not condone this. I cannot condone this."
He simply nodded as he drifted about the shapeless singularity of the Deep, beginning his spell's weaving. "I would not expect otherwise of one bound by the same chains she commands."
She glanced back as she prepared to leave his aspects of the Ascendant Plane. "But I will not stop you." When he cocked an eye toward her, she continued, "As you said, if it stops the Slayer, then it is worth trying."
As she departed, the Prince drove the Nail deep into the chest of Baalgar, drifting back as metal armor plates began to form from the point of impact. The titanic body of the Champion shuddered, arching off of the altar, and its eyes snapped open.
The roar echoed across the Ascendant Realm.
-=-=-=-=-=-
"Here we are," Eyeball said as they came up on the archway. The Ghost turned to the Guardians. "Applied Research. There's a big Hive energy signature this way." The Guardians considered the heavy bunker doors that blocked the way. Eyeball continued, while beginning to hack into the lock console, "Lot of smaller Hive signatures, too, so might want to get ready."
Morgan stashed his shotgun and hauled out his chaingun, doing some perfunctory checks that it wasn't jammed and that its magazine was topped off. As he did so, he noticed the Slayer was looking toward him. No, that wasn't right. The Slayer was looking at his weapon. Morgan held it up and gave the barrels a quick spin. "Like it? Call it the--"
Abruptly, and without speaking, the Slayer plucked it from his hands and lifted it up, inspecting it more closely. He gave the barrels a quick spin, then hefted it and appeared to be aiming down the way they'd come. Finally, the giant gave a grunt and a nod. Morgan held out his hands expectantly, but the Slayer just turned and marched up to the archway, where Eyeball was at work. With one hand, he shoved the Ghost out of the way, then pulled out a knife. He used this to pry the lock console's panel open, before ripping it open with one hand. Then he plunged his fist into the components behind it, tearing entire handfuls out.
An alarm blared for a moment before hidden speakers warbled and popped. The tenor voice of the UAC Project AI spoke brightly. "Door me-mec-mechaniiiiism malfun-fun-fun-function, sa-sa-safeguaaaarrrds activating-ing-ing." The doors slowly trundled open, as the voice continued, "Please repor-por-por-port maaaallllfffunction to maintenan-an-an-ance as ssssooooooonnn as convenient."
"You'd think that breaking the mechanism would actually make it harder to open the door," Rega-7 mused as they waited. "It's where Bray's mad scientists were working, after all."
Wahei explained, "Actually, that's a safety feature. So that people don't get trapped somewhere in the event of an emergency. Plus, when this facility was fully operational, they would have had security on hand to restrict access in the case of a stuck-open door, plus on-call maintenance support. And also, I don't know if 'mad scientists' is the right term for it. 'Mad' implies outright insanity, and even at their worst, Clovis Bray would have balked at giving clearance to-- much less hiring-- people with psychological disorders of that type, so really the best term for them would be something like 'amoral'--"
"Not the time, Wahei."
The Warlock frowned slightly, and looked about to summarize her point (and she was ninety percent certain she had one) when she glanced at the Slayer. She'd picked up a lot of restless energy from him as they'd made their way over to Applied Research. Just in the few moments they'd been standing in front of the door, when he wasn't swiping Morgan's chaingun, he'd been sweeping his gaze from side to side, checking all of the angles, looking for threats. But now, he had gone still, his helmeted visage turning to look at the door. She saw his chest rise and fall as he took a deep breath, raising the chaingun to aim at the space at the door.
"Eyes up, Guardians!" Wahei called out, lifting her scout rifle, moments before the shrieks of thralls and howls of acolytes came echoing out toward them.
-=-=-=-=-=-
Move. Search. Hunt.
Lightbearers were hunting the Enemy. Could tell this was the case. Hunting the Witch. Heard Witch's Name from scout's mouth. Scout had spoken. Deciphered her meaning-- Wanted to kill Enemy. Enemy Champion this way. Had followed Lightbearers through ruined bunkers. Stench of Enemy everywhere, but stale. Stink of death and filth.
Death. Destruction. Always.
Stopped before doors. One of the drones chattered, fiddled with lock. Lightbearers began checking weapons. Scanned their choices. Scout with rapid-fire gun, sniper rifle, narrow sword on belt. Scholar with rifle, hand cannon, grenade launcher. Soldier with shotgun, rocket launcher, and minigun. Last one caught eye. Soldier showed it off. Snatched it from his grip. Inspected it. Found it suitable.
Stalling. Impatient. Enough.
Drone was taking too long opening door. Shoved it aside, pried panel open. Ripped it from archway. Tore out internals. Doors started opening. Voice stuttered nonsense. Ignored it. Doors were opening. That was enough. Scout and scholar spoke among themselves. Scholar kept chattering on. Was about to glare at her. Scout got her to be quiet. Stoked the rage, took a breath.
Scent. Stench. Fresh. Enemy.
Tide of thrall and acolytes rushed out. Raised minigun. Bullets tore through the Enemy. Advanced slowly while holding down trigger. Lightbearers fired from behind, cutting down acolytes. Knights charged forth, boomers thundering, swords swinging. Dashed past a sword, caught knight by throat. Drew shotgun. Click click. Boom boom. Turned to next knight, but soldier slammed shoulder into it with crack of lightning. Turned to next, but scholar appeared from nowhere, slapped glowing palm into its face. Turned to another, but scout plunged her sword through its face.
Power. Force. Light.
Last knight blasted scout with boomer. Soldier and scholar turned on it with guns. Knight staggered back, threw up shield. Caught knight by crest, wrenched it back. Ripped knife through its throat. Tore its head from its body. Stomped it to paste. Enemy were depleted, in retreat. Looked to scout's body. Took in breath. Knew she was dead. Drone flitted to her, opened its eye. Felt the Light flow. Scout sat up.
Not dead. Resurrection. Impossible.
-=-=-=-=-=-
Morgan reloaded his shotgun as he replayed what had just happened in his head.
The doors had opened and let out a horde of Hive, and instantly, the Slayer was firing his minigun. Whatever the giant was, his aim was true, as the bullets all ripped through the thrall and tore the acolytes down. Morgan and the other Guardians quickly started firing as well, to wear down the forces behind those. When the knights had emerged, the Slayer had moved with impossible speed for someone so massive, closing with the nearest sword-bearer and drawing out the sawed-off double-barreled shotgun, blowing a hole through the knight.
Morgan had charged in behind him, intercepting the knight that had been aiming its boomer at the giant. Drawing the Arc around him, he'd slammed into the knight and knocked it to the floor amid sparkling death-ash. Wahei had Blinked into the face of the next and slapped it with a grenade, blowing its top half off. Then Rega had unsheathed her katana before burying it in another sword-bearer's maw. That last knight had blasted her at near-point blank range. They'd gunned it down enough for the Slayer to rip its head off. And then the Hive were vanishing from the mortal realm.
Neither Wahei or Morgan were worried overmuch about Rega, but he'd seen the Slayer looking down at her body. It was difficult to read the giant's expression through that faceplate, but there was almost a bit of regret in the man's frame. "Eyeball," Morgan looked at the Slayer, who was still holding his minigun, "can you rez me up an auto-rifle?"
"Got a preference?" his Ghost asked.
"My Breakneck should be fine." He sighed a bit as he looked at his gun again. "I don't think the Big Guy is going to give that one back."
Then Chaukeedar was helping revive Rega-7, who sat up with the usual gasp of a freshly-rezzed Guardian. She shook her head as she got to her feet. "I'm getting sloppy. Should have swung that guy around to use as a meat-shield."
The Slayer was staring at her still, and had actually taken a step back to see her resurrection. Morgan could see the tension in the giant's muscles, and a glance at Wahei showed that their Warlock had picked up on it as well. Rega looked at her teammates, momentarily perplexed, before she looked up at the Slayer and realized. "...first time seeing a Guardian rez?" she asked, kicking her katana up into her hand before taking out a cloth to wipe Hive ichor from the blade.
The Slayer stepped toward her, looming over her for a moment. Both Titan and Warlock slowly raised their weapons, but Rega raised a hand to them without looking away from him. The Slayer took another one of those deep breaths, and she could have sworn she saw the shape of his eyes narrow beneath his faceplate. He lifted a hand and poked at her body in the ribs, approximately where she'd been hit by the boomer. She held still as he looked from her to the nervous shape of her Ghost.
Vizier flitted into the anteroom from one of the open labs. "Hey, guys, I found something!" This broke the tension in the air, as the Slayer turned his head to look at the other Ghost, glanced at Rega, then stepped away from her and toward the room where Wahei's Ghost had disappeared. The Guardians shared a look, the unspoken agreement that there had almost been a fight just there.
In the lab, Vizier was scanning a computer bank, while the Slayer was eyeballing a large device that was supported over an equally large workbench. The Guardians spaced themselves around it as well. It was a weapon of some kind, as there was a long handled grip attached to the back end, and a secondary grip further up the belly. From the top of the weapon, there was a slowly spinning cylinder, in which they could see a green-glowing crystal. Similar glows lit up tubes and panels on the sides of the weapon.
Vizier spoke up again as the Ghost extracted information from the computers. "Let's see... the UAC Project designed this based off of materials found in the mines... so much of this is all redacted. They don't know what kind of energy the crystal puts off, but it's power, in joules, is..." Vizier blinked. "That's a lot of zeroes." The Ghost continued, "Since they couldn't really classify the energy type, they just called it the 'Blast Force Generator.'"
"Whatever they called it," Morgan drawled, "that is one big fucking gun." He then cleared his throat before declaring, "Dibs!"
"Er, no," Wahei interrupted. "My Ghost is the one who found it, so it's mine."
"I don't trust our resident scatterbrained Warlock with it," Rega-7 shook her head, "and, Morgan, you're so twitchy I'd be worried you'd blast us with it by mistake. So I'm taking it."
The Slayer just ignored them all, reaching out and taking the massive gun from its stand. He looked it over, then pressed a few controls on it, until the crystal cylinder spun up, the glow becoming brighter as the generator primed itself. His helmeted face turned toward them and leveled the weapon at them.
The Guardians considered, then raised their hands. "Sure, you can have it." "All yours, Big Guy." "Keep it, honestly, we don't need it."
Submitted September 12, 2019 at 03:12PM by Jay2KWinger https://ift.tt/2Ltz8Yk
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