The Gathering Continues

As the last of the fleeing adults fade, he catches from the edge of his vision an old man duck beyond the stone pillars of a hidden entrance. The man moved with surprising speed and nimbleness, for one carrying the burden of a massive scepter made of pure gold. Suddenly, approaching debris as the two of the men come into arms length, their Psi Swords cutting at the space between them. Intuition kicks in as he dodges and parries the advancements, the air around him fills with the scent of burnt ozone and Karma. One of the men pushes outward his shield hand and manages to telekinetically push him backward into the waiting jabs of the third men’s Psi Sword. The tip of the blade catches him in the lower thigh and sears as it enters. “God!” He curses as the edge pulls out and the man swings again. Deano reaches out and catches his extended arm within clawed fingers and twists. The bones snap as he steps into the man, his back toward the man’s face and kicks as the first. The blade fades from the hand of the one whose arm he broke as the second parries his kick with the shield. He steps back again, lashing his head in a butt onto the bridge of the one he holds, the nose shatters sending a mist of blood into the air. The man screams from the pain where his legs buckle and Deano feels him go limp behind him. The other two men come in swinging their swords proficiently attacking him from two fronts. He leaps backwards, landing behind the fallen and kicks his head with the flat of his foot. The neck shatters with the head falling off, hanging from a flesh thread of the throat. The body falls, tripping one of the remaining two.

Chapter Forty-One

The one-ton boulder has no weight in her hands as she picks it up, over her head and launches it toward the huddling children. With a defiant scream she tears out as the weight leaves her hands. The boulder lands, the children barely avoiding it as it thunders and quakes upon its impact. The massive quake suddenly trips some of the younger children. They rush to the ground where their hands not fast enough to catch them. The impact knocks the breath from their lungs and light from their eyes, she was not about to murder children, no matter how misguided they are.

Sam rushes to his feet, using a break dance move he learnt in his juicer days and lets loose into foot twirls that cut the air with cracks of rushing wind. He kicks and steps, kicks and steps, edging closer to Kurse, with his feet continuing to blaze through the air with blinding speed. “Be... ware - Be... are... ten.” Kurse’s voice booms as one arm outstretches to hold her back.

Chapter Forty-Two

As the one who tripped gets up, the second leaps toward Deano, his blade swinging before him with the shield sheltering him from any counter attack. They have learnt well not to underestimate their opponent. The first suddenly launches the body of the fallen brother toward Deano, catching the impish alien off guard and taking his legs out from under him. As he falls, the second man delivers a devastating downward strike that severs his brother’s dead body, just missing Deano’s leg with the swoop. Deano kicks out, smashing into the energy shield with a solid smack, pushing back the wielder with the force of a rushing train. Deano frees his pinned leg and falls into a backward somersault to both put him on his feet and distance himself from the oncoming mad men.

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Chapter Forty-Three

Carter attempts to look past the mist, the light haze carpet that blankets the land as the morning greets the night’s thaw. She felt, for a moment a single snowflake hit her cheek and melt from her warmth, to drip down toward her chin. The stars begin to fade from under the umbra of deep purple and strolling clouds. The nonexistent moon brings a sense of urgency where its absence creates a want, a desire to gaze upward and look upon something that no man has ever seen up close before. The moon is virgin territory where humans are decades away from the technology to ever visit, that is if they even have the desire. She ponders and loses herself in thought as the flame in her lower abdomen subsides with a brief pinch of discomfort.

Be’areten’s hands suddenly glow under rapture, where they connect with Kurse’s back. The blue hue quickly feeds into him, mixing with his existing karma as his back ignites anew, consistently, continuously. His lower claws, miniature hands off crippled arms dance and weave the air and aura into a fine silver thread web, where his two upper arms continue to parry and abate Sam’s assault. His kicks and punches manage to push them back, slapping off flesh and solid armor like plates off clinging flaps of tissue from his arms, torso and legs. Boil bubbles and blood bruises detonate with his barrages, filling the air with reek and caustic spores that dust and burn his flesh. Be’areten screams from the burn as her energy transfer subsides and she falls to the ground, Kurse trampling her as Sam continues to attack. Sam coils and leaps to deliver a kick to Kurse’s head and falls into a black void, where Kurse stood. He lands and finds himself in a totally different location from where he fought. However, he can still hear the pyre pulse within his perspective. He is not far, only relocated. He assumes this a prelude for Kurse to heal. He is getting to him and the gift will be his, even if he has to beat it from the crippled god.

Chapter Forty-Four

At his foot lies a small fist size stone, debris left over from his assault earlier against Samiari-Roth. He quickly cups the stone within his foot and kicks it toward the farthest of the men. The man attempts to dodge the acceleration as he steps into his nearest opponent and entangles his sword hand in his and body flips him into the other. The two men collide. Both falling to the ground with a concussion packed force. Deano’s rage boils beyond the point of rational as his claws dig into his palms releasing the pressure of his alien blood to drip to the dying stone altar. He rushes over toward the entangled men and kicks the one laying at the top in the abdomen. His body crumbles, doubling over as ribs and innards shatter and erupt. He kicks again, launching him into the massive, supernatural pyre that continued to burn despite the lack of human fuel that fed it. The man curses as his flesh evaporates and turns into a fine, black mist. Deano reaches down and grabs the last of the men by his neck, claws digging though a solid sheath of invisible energy, quickly bypassing its presence and digs into soft flesh. “You will realize the horror you’ve brought upon these people. Remember me well when you traverse to the other side, and hope that I never join you.” He curses, with the snap of the man’s neck. The body falls limp and to the ground, blood forming a pool to halo his hair under crimson. A moment passes for reflection, as he looks around, upon his carnage and the death, wondering the need for such senseless murder. Then the memory of the old man, as he disappeared beyond the darkness of a hidden entrance that led to the under belly of the massive stone altar. He rushes over toward the small, barely man-size entrance and finds the withered body of Samiari-Roth laying on the ground, dead with a gaping wound to his chest. Another moment of reflection and he disappears into the dark confines of the unknown.