Chapter 19 #2
Cicarus ran towards the conference room at the back, his armband raised in front of his face as he talked into it.
The connecting doors on the left and right sides of the Great Hall burst open, and fully armored troops poured in.
I didn’t know what army they belonged to, but they were neither Guldans nor Dantorians.
However, a dozen Honor Guards—the Dantorian elite military—followed behind them.
“Move back!” Gavin shouted at the dignitaries, pointing at the back corner of the room.
Despite their panic, they complied, half running, half stumbling while the Braxians rushed to form a defensive wall in front of them.
Dhaxius ran up and slapped his palm on his ice wall.
It instantly shattered in a million shards that darted in every direction towards our enemies.
At least ten of them found their mark in Cicarus’ back.
He face planted with a shriek, just a couple of meters shy from reaching the conference room.
Its doors also burst open on more armored troops.
I silently roared in victory to see our powers still work with direct contact. Their disruptor only affected our long-range abilities, which made us insanely lethal. They had messed with the wrong crew.
As we all charged forward, Gavin emitted the same growling sound he had done in the pit of Talabor as he entered his berserker mode.
My skin tingled, and a wave of power surged within me, as did an intense bloodlust. I raised my armband in front of me and deployed its energy shield just before the first enemy swung his blade at me.
That they didn’t go for their blasters first indicated they’d done their homework about us.
The Veredian celesium armor had been designed to absorb the shots from most blasters and transform them into energy that it stored.
Once it had accumulated enough energy, it could be used as an electro-magnetic blast that would knock back enemies over a wide radius, based on the amount we released.
Enemies in close proximity at the time of the blast would sustain severe damage, including shattered bones from the impact.
So using a sword wisely prevented them from feeding us more ways to spank them.
Not that it would save them.
I was angry… beyond angry. Rabid even. I couldn’t tell whether Gavin’s berserker aura was to ‘blame’ for it, but every fiber of my being ached to kill and maim.
Images of Gavin burning alive while attempting to save me, of his corpse in Vintor’s arms when we teleported back to my dad’s ship, and of his long journey to recovery replayed in my mind.
Taseus’s face as he gazed at my mate with deep sorrow further fanned my anger.
So much nonsensical pain, and for what? Greed? Power?
They will pay…
I parried my opponent’s attack and raised my sword to retaliate.
As I swiped at an angle, he shifted his own shield to his right, leaving his left side slightly open.
Seizing that premeditated opportunity, I smashed my shield on his side, making him lose his balance.
Before he could recover, I pivoted in the opposite direction and slammed my shield in his face.
He stumbled a few steps back, but I whipped my head, sending my armored braid flying in his direction.
It wrapped around his neck. I pulled my head back, yanking him towards me.
Normally, this move would be followed by impaling our enemy on our sword.
But I slapped my hand on his shoulder, and my palm tingled as my power flared to life.
I latched on to the ethereal thread of his soul and snatched it right out.
He never made a sound and just collapsed to the floor, lifeless.
I released his soul, its light floating in the air, invisible to anyone but me, and where it would slowly decay.
Another enemy lunged at me. I dodged into a roll, then straight back up on my feet.
I thrusted my sword forward, the blade sinking deep into the chest of my assailant’s companion, who had been running up behind him.
I yanked my blade out, spun around, and raised it just in time to block said assailant’s second attack.
Before I could retaliate, Vahl grabbed him by the shoulder and shoved him backward.
The male’s body violently jerked on contact, then fell dislocated onto the floor. Blood immediately pooled around his corpse. The male’s full body armor and shaded visor kept me from seeing what damage my brother inflicted on him. But I suspected he’d crushed a few of his organs and brain.
Gavin blocked the attack of a fool who thought he stood a chance against him.
He caught his wrist and twisted his arm, snapping it at the elbow.
The male’s scream of pain mixed with fear when my mate picked him up and tossed him like a ragdoll into a group of his acolytes, knocking them over.
They fell to the ground in a tangle of limbs.
They never got back up. The floor beneath them appeared to melt before turning into deadly spikes that abruptly shot upward, piercing through their armor and vital organs.
I jerked my head around to see Lenora and Sylvius crouched a short distance away.
With their palms pressed to the floor, they were using their kinetic powers to turn our environment into deadly weapons.
Rhadames and Trehvus covered them. After a brief sword exchange, my brother managed to grab his opponent’s wrist. The male vanished only to reappear a blink later partially embedded inside a wall.
His body jerked, as if under the effect of an intense electric jolt, and then he went limp.
Trehvus didn’t go any easier on his adversary.
Although clearly a talented fighter, he failed to avoid my friend touching him.
As soon as Trehv’s hand made contact, flames burst out of the seams of his opponent’s armor.
The suit cracked, parts of it melting as dark smoke rose from him.
The male crumpled to the floor, some ashes piling around the remains.
As I fought my way through the other attackers, I spied Dhaxius near the Braxians. With a single touch, he turned his adversary into a solid block of ice. Without missing a beat, Vintor kicked it with all his might, shattering him into pieces.
It was a massacre.
The Braxians were terrifying, their natural incredible strength further enhanced by Gavin’s aura. My mate told me about how his savagery during a combat simulation disturbed my dad. Now, I was getting a glimpse of how easily he broke limbs, shattered bodies, and crushed skulls.
Getting overwhelmed, our opponents started backing away towards the left side door.
Vahl and I led the charge. With the armored fiends quickly getting decimated, the Honor Guards launched ranged attacks at us.
They wisely chose to attack us with repeating crossbows.
They also flew a few meters above us to avoid our touch-based psionic attacks.
With the disrupters preventing us from using our range powers, they foolishly thought themselves safe, aside maybe from blaster fire.
Big mistake.
Reyes retrieved a handful of tiny seeker balls from a pouch.
Smaller than a pill, they were one of the many wicked weapons Aunt Mercy had designed.
With her unique ‘virus’ power, she could imbue the nanites each sphere contained with a specific behavior.
This was what had allowed Siona to infect the Guldan ships attacking hers when she was flying to Sarenia to be with Zerien.
But where the rest of us were limited to whatever power the balls had been imbued with, Reyes didn’t.
He possessed the same hacking powers as my mother.
With a touch, he could hack into any computer or electronic device.
In the case of the seeker balls, he could reprogram their behavior to suit his needs, within their physical and mechanical capacities.
In this instance, he turned them into magnets, as we had previously practiced in training.
He held the balls in his hands for a couple of seconds to reprogram their function before throwing them towards the hovering Dantorians.
As indicated by their name, each seeker went straight for a valid target.
The moment they made contact, the balls latched on, then shifted their internal atoms so they would all align in the same direction, which magnetized them.
Our bracers immediately beeped to inform us of the presence of active targets.
Our suits’ neural interface read our thoughts and instantly enabled a focused magnetic force field around our gloves.
Almost as one, my companions and I raised our hands towards our chosen victims so that our magnetic field would get traction on the balls.
Then we yanked our hands down. Our respective targets flew towards us in a cacophony of startled and frightened screams as an invisible lasso pulled them.
Being greedy, Vahl, Rhad, and I all drew two enemies at once. With Rhad, they vanished as soon as his hands touched them, only to reappear somewhere incompatible with life. With Vahl, they also died on contact as he tore apart their internal organs.
As for me, feeling particularly vindictive, I killed the first one before he ever reached me.
Complying with my neural command, my suit used my bladed braid as a spear, the tip extending further to stab the Dantorian in the face.
The blade split open inside, wrecking his brain.
Two seconds later, his companion reached my hand.
I yanked his soul right out and let him fly past me, carried by his momentum as he crashed on the floor.