Chapter 23 Fracture
“You cannot fight, Brother,” Evo reiterates.
I am not leaving Roxi. And I am not sitting out a battle that is sorely not in our favor with so many Solcrue motherships in the area.
“He’s not going to listen to you, Evo. Would you listen if it was Aera?” A familiar Titan walks up to me, her red flower-shaped eyes blazing with admiration.
“No,” Evo replies.
“To be Bonded to a Creator is an honor as much as it is a fate. You don’t have to leave her behind,” Poppy says to me.
She walks to the bins of parts in the junker BoltBurner. Her hands move as fast as Roxi’s as she assembles a wire harness and connects it to a device she builds and lights up with a tap. The cables glow red. When she straps it to me, the light turns my shade of pale blue.
“You can let go, Evo.” Poppy stands back and watches as Evo releases me.
My core feels solid, but my fingers and toes tingle with the urge to pull apart.
“If you want to atomorph, tap the button. Just know you only get to do that once. Keep it on, and you can disassemble your limbs this way. It is similar to what was built for Chaos and his Trio of Terror in the beginning of his Mitosis shifting. Now go. Armor is with her, but stars know, he is not enough against a Mothership’s Incinerator if they turn one of those bastards on. ”
Evo gapes at her.
“Oh, stop. You’re making me feel old.”
“You are old,” Savage replies with a snicker as he passes and replenishes his ammo. Olive Solcruean blood stains his mouth and the front of his armor just like Menace’s.
“And you’re a fucking animal. All of you.” Poppy rolls her eyes.
“On approach,” Eon calls out. “Drop in thirty.”
Poppy picks up a fresh crate of belt ammo and hulks it to a rotary pulse gun mounted near a side door. “Don’t decom yourselves. And get back our Creator.”
“Yes, ma’am,” we all reply as we finish gearing up in the back.
Evo, Savage, Menace, and I rush to the ramp.
Armor’s wings are spread below us, new rocket tails ripping off his feathers.
Skysprinters are flooding the area and Relic Thruster is nearly taxed.
But the CSP ships are lifting off, giving three-burst patterns of visual confirmation as Brothers claim them.
I see the telenet list scroll over my vision.
We pick our enemy targets and leap off the ramp. Menace and Savage rip open the hulls they land on and slash the pilots, then jump to the next ships as the first fall. Evo touches part of the engine system and blows them.
I wish I had his skill as I drop onto a Solcruean Skysprinter piloted by a human.
I feel unsteady with the new harness and my core aligner missing.
Then I see Roxi, dangling from Armor’s arms hundreds of feet in the air, and the bullets that dice up the air around them.
He keeps her inside his squadron shield, but Poppy is right. Bigger guns can still take them out.
I want Roxi to have the safety she dreams of. And that won’t happen until CSP and Solcrue have been eliminated.
In my rage, I notice black charred lines racing through the ship in jagged patterns. Engines fail. The vessel breaks apart. And I begin to fall with it.
This is new—a much smaller scale of Chasm’s skill. Maybe my core aligner also limited my power?
I pick my next target, fracture my arms and legs, ride the wind, and land on a ship closing in on Roxi. All it takes is a single breath filled with fury, and the Skysprinter breaks apart.
I ride the wind as a cloud of glass, spot a larger troop transport rising below with a squad of Solcrue climbing out of a hatch, pulse guns in their hands, and pull myself together. I fall heavily to the top of the ship and am met with gunfire.
Blazing green incendiary pulses lance the air. My proximity sensors light up, and I dodge the shots I can. Those I can’t, I throw myself off-kilter enough that they punch through an arm or a leg, which I fragment and pull back together after the pulse passes.
It is like normal battle, except I will be decommissioned if I am hit in my core. It takes more focus than I’m used to, and slows my progress.
Another squad climbs out of a hatch in front of me.
I can’t let them get their rifles up, or I’m going to be in twice as much trouble.
I grab the first two, letting my rage course through my body and into theirs.
Black veins crawl over their skin, splitting them again and again until they crackle and finally burst.
The next two pause as they watch their brethren fall into black sand.
It gives me just enough time to grab the barrel of one of their rifles, pull it back, then shove it into their face, knocking him backward.
The last has enough time to warm up his igniter.
I see the glowing barrel and swat it away from me.
A loose shot skips off of the ship as I twist and shove my boot into his chest. I shoot the third as he sits up, then the fourth before he can.
Then I use the open hatch as a shield to take out the first squad who has turned their attention to Armor and Roxi.
A cloud of dark blue orbs hovers down from above. Atomizer semi-solidifies on the opposite side of the hatch from me. “I got this one, Brother. It’s good to have you back.”
Then he pours himself into the ship.
“I need you to get me closer to Guillotine,” I hear Roxi yell overhead. “Holo is in pursuit with Hijack.”
Roxi points to the right. “Jackknife has the Scimitar. Castor?”
“Took Glaive,” Armor booms.
She works on a tablet as Armor starts to glide away from my position.
The warning lights of hot engines flicker on a CSP ship sitting in a meadow, Guillotine written on the tail.
A Skysprinter charges toward them and, by its trajectory, will pass over the ship I’m on.
I jump up as it arcs overhead and latch onto the belly.
It is a hard snag that jolts my body and stretches my pieces.
But as my momentum picks up, I coalesce again.
It takes a second to steady myself before I send the black veins crawling up and around the ship.
Pieces launch outward as the ship disintegrates mid-fire.
Armor tucks himself around Roxi, and their elevation tanks. Roxi screams as the missile races past them.
I hold my breath as the ship crumbles, and I fall.
Armor spreads his wings again, soaring back into the fight, and I’m certain Roxi is okay.
I smash into a CSP Whip, planting on its nose. There’s not enough time to shatter the whole ship, so I grab the hot guns and rip them free from their mounts, rendering the ship incapable of battle.
Looking ahead to check on Roxi, I see her straining to look back at me. Her hair dances wildly around her face.
I crawl over the ship to the cockpit, shatter the glass, rip the pilot out by his chest harness, and hold him over the edge in the wind. “Humanity or humans?”
“Humans.”
I let go and watch him fall. His anti-gravity chute will save him, not that he deserves it. I guide the ship up beside her and Armor. “What’s left?”
“Obsidian!” Roxi smiles at me.
I am glad I can still fight for her. I would do anything for the wonderful feeling she fills me with, even just in a glance.
“Flamberge is last.” Roxi points below.
Armor scrutinizes me. “You do not ping, Brother!”
“Atomizer cut out my beacon!”
Armor nods. “Savage is pulling us back. We have only a few Brothers left to claim this ship. We dive fast, enter battle, and Roxi takes the ship. Do you comply?”
“I comply!” I shout.
Armor nods and banks them toward the tail of Flamberge. Solcrue and CSP track our position from the ground, and forces not engaged in the sky battle rush toward the ship Roxi wants to take.
Setting the Skysprinter on a crash course away from the airfield, I leap off and fall in behind Armor and Roxi. He creates drag with his wings and slows them as he sets her down by the ramp. Armor’s wings form a shield around her as the ramp lowers.
I spread my pieces into wing-like shapes that drop me in behind them.
A Solcrue is first to us, charging Armor.
I crash into the enemy and fling him away in a cloud of black glass.
The next, from his squad, I catch by the throat.
Anger pulses in me, hot, vibrating, wanting out.
When I finally shove him back, covered in black veins, he hits the ground and shatters.
Bullets fly in our direction. Armor shields Roxi.
I wish I were like him, but I fracture my arm, letting a pulse pass.
The torrid gust fades when I pull myself back together.
I return fire until I’m out of ammo, so I pick up the Solcrue’s dropped weapon and fire, taking down a CSP soldier.
It becomes a rush of fracturing, firing, and shattering every combatant as we make our way to Flamberge.
Armor’s shield plinks and thunders with bullets and pulses. Then he shouts back at me, “She’s on, but there’s a manual override box on the landing gear. Flamberge is locked to the ground!”
Nix lands beside me. “Go, Obsidian. I’ve got your back.”
His black eyes smile as he lifts his hands and redirects a pulse at the squad that fired it. They’re thrown back and into other forces. I’m glad to see he’s on his feet, but I’m not sure he’s going to be enough with as many ground units as are headed our way.
Castor falls beside us, straightens, waggles his fingers in a playful wave at me, then rolls into the enemy, knocking them down.
Vandal and Siphon drop in, launching flames and creating a barrier on the other side of the ship.
A flickering light rounds the nose, and Flashbomb lights off a bang that rips through three squads.
When the ramp is up and Armor is back on battle duty, Roxi safely inside, I crouch down and crawl under the ship. The lock override is jammed. I place my hands on it and channel my fracturing sensations into the metal arms that I can muster, but it still won’t break.
Just when I’ve maximized my effort, Jackknife slides in beside me.
He places a large hand on the brace, grabs the opening in the landing pad, and pulls.
His body tenses as he puts force on my fractures.
Together, our effort makes the lock groan and bend until it finally breaks free, releasing Flamberge.
The ship’s engines hum louder. Thruster heat swirls under the ship.
“She’s calling us, Brother,” Jackknife tells me.
Vandal, Siphon, Flashbomb, Nix, Castor, and Armor have gathered near the opening ramp as a shield ignites around the CSP ship. Jackknife joins them on the ramp when a new force field opens like a green umbrella around us.
A CSP officer pushes to the front of the crowd now stuck outside our shield. “You really thought you could just take off with my ship? That gravity net will hold long after the ship is out of power. You’re all going to die here!”
I look up the ramp at my brothers.
Roxi runs back to them, speaks with Armor, who shields her body with his wings.
Jackknife’s eyes flash. He’s closest to me and relays the issue.
“She says Flamberge has the most Titan cores on board. We cannot let them have our lost Brothers. But she has no way to access this gravity system. It’s…
new. And Rogue Fleet is pulling back. We’ve taken damage and can’t afford any more. ”
There has to be a way to break free. I descend the ramp to a gravity generator inside the ship’s shield. It blocks me out with a different barrier.
“Nobody can get inside without the code.” The captain lifts a tablet and smirks at me, like he’s certain he’s captured us.
“What if I wasn’t…a person?” I ask.
The confusion on his face as I fragment a hand grows the notion that I might have a chance to save my Brothers and our most precious human. A loose shard of my finger makes it through.
I look around at the generators. Five weave green light over the ship. I think I can free Flamberge, but it may be the last thing I do. My power is low. My aligner is broken. And this is something far bigger than I’ve ever attempted before.
Turning to Jackknife, I motion to my chest harness. “If there’s anything left, tap this button.”
Jackknife gives me a wild look. “You can’t. They’ll melt you with pulse fire.”
“Then I’m going to have to be fast.”
Roxi jerks toward me, her tablet in her hands. Armor stops her. Her eyes fill with desperation. “Fracture, don’t. There has to be another way. Just let me keep working!”
“For freedom… For all of our Brothers… We don’t have time.”
Jackknife gives me a solemn nod. I am the only atomorph inside. It’s up to me.
I steal one last look at Roxi’s beautiful gold eyes, like warm summer suns, and tap the button. My husk disintegrates into a cloud of pieces that hum and carry fragments of my thoughts, my recordings, and my power. But this time, I have a unified purpose.
Destroy the gravity net to free Roxi, a Creator, the most important thing to us…
To me.