Chapter 14: Unexpected Company — Part 2

Alon touched Jun’s face, but he never took his eyes off the enemy. “They’ve herded us in like pigs.” He noted, his hammer slick with blood and oil.

Jun forced herself to stand despite the pain. “Swift must come soon.”

Her sword went up one more time, glittering with the power of her will. Glyphs of energy flowed around her as she forced herself back to standing. Jun launched herself at the enemy, ten score in front of her, determined to kill every one of them. She didn’t last long against their assault, but she did put up an horrific show of force, taking out the first five in the wave before falling once more to the onslaught. Caught in the awe of Jun’s fall, Orchid felt the pain in her gut long before she registered the knife’s owner. She looked into the eyes of her attacker and nearly cried. Jake the Butcher smiled vengefully as he twisted the knife, leaving it in the wound. He locked the blade into place and pushed his daughter aside, stepping down to take the children.

Nikkei came onto the fight scene a little late, her rage at seeing her friends injured, some close to death, bent her mind and twisted her inside. She threw her arm out and unleashed a wave of energy that smashed into the biodroids guarding Jake’s retreat and blew their circuitry to pieces. Her bender suit sparked and sizzled as she rose from the ground, trying to push back the enemy who had moved in on her kin. Metal and debris flew up around her and hit the enemy head on, forcing them back. She followed Jake, who carried Ren and Toni, and whose guard carried Kamau and Sissy, all of whom had been drugged into paralysis. Outside the manor, where three hundred troops waited around a massive gate, guarding it in organized rows, Master Yoshi stood in full golden armor, pistol in one hand, sword in the other, staring at Nikkei, looking about to gloat.

Nikkei disregarded the troops and went straight for Yoshi, hoping she could get to the Snap Gate generator and knock it off-line before the enemy could put it to use. Nikkei punched her father square in the face, knocking his teeth loose and causing him to counter violently. As they fought, Jake the Butcher slipped on through the gate with two children, and Nikkei lost her focus, now intent on getting through the gate and at Jake. She backhanded her father, that eerie tinge of will slamming into Yoshi so hard that he spun back and nearly fell off his footing. Thinking Yoshi to be stunned, Nikkei ran headlong at the gate, focused on the children.

Yoshi, however, had merely feinted into a counterstrike, and his well placed blow stopped her cold. Nikkei felt the blade rip from her back through her chest even as the pistol blast ripped into her shoulder. Yoshi tossed the pistol aside, left the sword in its wound. Nikkei’s eyes widened in surprise, knowing she could go no further. Her ability to fight faded as her blood mixed with the mud she fell onto. She struggled with her suit, willing it to fight for her, but the suit could not respond to her fading will.

“Why are you taking them?” She gasped through the gurgle of blood, somehow managing to keep her head off the ground.

Yoshi said nothing, watching her struggle to keep her head above the muck.

A soldier stepped up to Yoshi, saluting. “Sir, the Bugs approach from Snap Gates opening in the forest to all sides and the enemy has managed to raise a force field too powerful for us to knock down. Our troops cannot break the field and terminate our targets before the first Bug wave arrives.”

“Call for a retreat.” Yoshi said.

“Do we kill her, Master Yoshi?” One of the soldiers asked, readying his sword to dispatch Nikkei.

“Leave the bitch as she is, to die like a pig in the mud.”

Yoshi stepped into the gates, Nikkei being trampled and kicked about by the departing troops. One took a swipe at her face with his sword, cleaving Nikkei’s cheek open in passing. Two troops stopped only to pick up their fallen comrade, one pausing to kick Nikkei in the shoulder, knocking her back onto her face. Nikkei’s bender suit sizzled in defiance, protecting her from the remaining abuse and allowing her nose and mouth access to air even as Nikkei sunk into the mud, losing the strength to remain conscious. She felt the powerful minds of the Bugs as they closed in on the gate, remembered, vaguely, the snapping sound of the enemy gate’s collapse, and the powerful rage of the now helpless Bugs unable, apparently, to get even one of their own through the gate before it closed.