Codename: Freedom - Book 5 - Chapter 28

What I saw below caused me to think well of the battalion in my sights. They weren’t a major player and didn’t have any rank D users, but they had two lines of men facing off against their Manticore King. The front row of forty focused their rank E psionic bolts on the creature. The row behind them was the same except they wielded modern firearms. There were a few rail rifles, but nearly half of them had laser or plasma weapons.

“They’re trying to overheat it,” Destiny said in amazement.

“Okay, that’s smart. I almost feel bad,” I replied. “Make a note of them. Maybe we can work together in the future.”

“Done.”

When the manticore charged, the front line was up and gone as if they’d practiced it a thousand times. The back row took the front during their retreat until they switched places again all while still moving backward. Talk about discipline.

It shouldn’t have worked, but the monster didn’t like the heat the lasers and plasma were causing. It was like a cat jumping up and down trying to get out of a tub of water.

The assault force moved back to a point near the tunnel entrance to which the manticore wouldn’t follow. It actually started retreating itself, returning to its original position.

“I’m not going to get a better shot,” I muttered.

The battalion’s assault force had stopped firing. Someone in charge was testing the beast to see what it would and wouldn’t do.

I hovered across the top of the wall until I passed the manticore. It was still retreating. Holding out my hand, one of my pizza shaped shadow drones flew in and placed a spear in my hand. At second thought, I grabbed another one. With the kind of firepower they were using, I wouldn’t get a second shot at this. I couldn’t exactly use psionic shielding while flying, so even though I could manage the lasers that needed time to heat up their target through evasive maneuvers, if I got tagged with a plasma canister the rest of this event was going to be excruciating with part of me melted. I’d heal what I could, but there was no time to fully recover.

Without using psionics, I dove off the side. If anything I did would grab their attention, it would be a strong psionic pulse. There was no need for that. Especially since this called for a different angle of attack. I wasn’t rounding my approach, but free falling directly at my target with only the slightest of slants to my dive. The reason was that I was attacking its back.

My weapons weren’t even normal psionic spears. These were rods of steel. I purchased hundreds of them for the event. They weren’t the kind of weapons you fought with. They were more like farm tools, but they took nice to psionic bolstering and once let go their trajectory didn’t move a lot in the air.

Covered in leather with my feet together and pointing downward, my body was an arrow. I had a spear in each hand tucked tight to either side of my chest. As I rapidly approached the manticore below, it didn’t even flitch. Only when it was about time to let go did I make some slight psionic adjustments and filled the spears with psionic bolstering. The instant before I pulled up, I extended the spears from my chest, eyeing their placement. Thrusting wasn’t necessary. With lazy finesse, I let go.

It was then that my psionics erupted from the front of my body. One moment I was moments from a head on collision with a manticore, and the next I was a mere couple of inches from bellyflopping on the ground.

Despite the g-force, I rounded my retreat. Even if they hadn’t seen me coming, they’d see me now.

I stayed low to keep the manticore’s body between me and whatever it was they were going to fire at me as I flew in the opposite direction. It was only when I neared the second stage that I started to ascend again.

“So what’s the damage?” I asked.

“As long as they don’t do anything to overly damage the wounds you left in its heart and lungs within the next twenty seconds or so, that’s two,” Destiny responded.

“They’re reaction?”

“Confusion. Until their AI have finished scanning the scene, they don’t seem to know what just happened.”

“Perfect.”

A handful of seconds later, I reached the top of the wall and looked down. The battalion I’d just stolen the manticore kill from was approaching it cautiously to make sure it was dead. It wouldn’t be long now before they joined the fray. Their direct competition? The Forefathers and Brendon Black.

There were about five different outer layer tunnels that connected to the second stage in the same maze cluster. The end of their maze all arrived at the same point. So if I killed the manticores for all of the battalions that struggled next to them, it should keep the Forefathers busy for some time. The only issue was, they weren’t the only battalions we had to worry about.

I began searching for the Forefathers’ current bearing and found them easily. They already had scouts on top of the second layer wall and were among the first. This meant a couple of things. Not only were they in a good position to compete and keep the upper ground, but they were able to look at the battalion banners and find where Prodos was.

“Where’s Brendon now?” I asked.

Instead of answering, Destiny placed a pillar above his head. It was then that I saw them. They were already in the maze and moving fast. They killed their manticore quicker than I anticipated, but it wasn’t really a surprise. Brendon must have suppressed his desire to fight it one on one and take the glory for himself. I didn’t know him well, but he didn’t hide his motivations at all. He needed to win this event and would do anything necessary to make it happen. It was as simple as that.

“Lucius,” Destiny said abruptly.

“Talk to me,” I replied.

“He’s traveling with the twenty-two other rank D members of his battalion.”

“All of them?”

“All of them. And several high-level rank E users.”

“So they stacked their squads. And Prodos?”

“Entering the central arena now.”

She didn’t say more but brought up a panel that showed them entering now.

***

The metacaster panel was speechless. Not only had Lucius not had any issues descending the skyscraper-sized wall, but he’d practically flown. If that was all, it would be astonishing, but he’d also happened to one-hit another Manticore King in the process. Well maybe two-hit, but he’d launched both spears at the same time.

“I was wrong,” Bolt said suddenly. “He’s easily in the top ten. As for his actual ranking, I just don’t know…”

Mr. Rachet gave the guy’s shoulder a squeeze. “I don’t see how its possible. His movement ability was already superior to everyone else’s.”

LaLisa ignored the surface level speculation and had gone straight to calculating what had just happened. Once her AI was finished, she sent a chart to Oren, who didn’t hesitate to throw it up on the screen.

“At the time he released the spears, he was traveling 210 miles per hour or 93.8 meters per second,” she reported. “And his spears, for a lack of a better word, weight approximately 20 pounds each.”

A picture of a rail rifle appeared on the screen. “The average rail rifle produces 8,000 to 10,000 joules of kinetic energy. A high-powered rifle can produce 15,000 all the way up to 20,000 joules for the most powerful sniper rifles. A few handheld rail rifles with the largest projectiles have produced 30,000, but what Major Lucius Edwards just did produced 40,000. And I don’t even know how to calculate the benefit of adding psionics to the spears.

“It’s no wonder that he was about to do that to this monster that’s practically bulletproof.”

The moment she said it an image appeared of a manticore lying on its stomach with what looked like two small spikes jutting out of its back. There were only about five to ten inches visible of the spears that were at least six feet long.

“It’s genius, really,” LaLisa added. “Even with the technique he used to kill the first manticore it might be difficult when fighting top ranked psionic users, but if he could hit them with this? He’s just using the momentum of his movement. Where did he come up with this?”

“I’ve gotten the sense from talking with him that he held a grudge against the Manticore King from the first quarterly event,” Mia said.

“And why wouldn’t he?” Mr. Rachet inserted himself. “We all saw him fight it. This is revenge at its finest.”

“They’ve reached the center arena,” Oren announced.

The wall panel cleared to show Mel at the head of Prodos’s company. After crossing the threshold into the wide-open arena that was nearly a mile to the central array of podiums and flags, Mel stopped as his men filed in. At the rear were three squads of men carrying what looked like old fashioned mortars. They were still used in military operations, but rarely.

Each squad carried five mortars, making it fifteen in total. As they started to load, Mel gave a command and every man among them attached something to their goggle-type headsets.

“What are they doing?” Bolt asked.

Before anyone could answer, the mortars began to fire. Their trajectories must have been set incorrectly, because they weren’t flying outward as much as upward. Then the projectiles burst. Clouds of gas dispersed above the area right in front of them. More mortar shells were fired. These exploded further from their position.

They kept firing. The shells exploded what seemed much higher that necessary or even practical. But by the time the gas from the first round of shells was reaching the ground, the method to their madness was revealed. Mel and some of Prodos’s best casters as well as Barrell and a few of their fastest and most skilled squads started to run. Not only were they filling the entire arena with some kind of gas, but they were using it as a smoke screen.

LeLisa was ready with an explanation. “They’re using a mixture of tear gas like substances, pepper spray, and the blinding agent their stealth team uses at times.”

“That’s nasty, but can’t they just use energy shields to protect against it?” Bolt asked.

“Some gases, yes. But both energy and psionic shields are weak against others. That’s why they’re using gas masks.”

“So that’s what they are. I get what they’re doing now, but didn’t they just waste their lead?”

Oren brought another panel up that showed Brendon Black just moments away from reaching the arena.

As if to answer his question, someone from the already quickly advancing Prodos darted out ahead of rest of them using the same push technique that gave him superior speed to the rest of psionic users of the same rank.

“Lucius joined them?” Mia asked, sitting forward in her seat.

A close up appeared of the person in question. It was not who they expected it to be. Mel was hovering a few feet off the ground as he rocketed toward the center while wearing his gasmask.

Mia burst out laughing. “Not only is he using Lucius’s technique, but he had rank D psionics. At this speed, Prodos is going to be the first to capture a flag.”

Mel was already halfway there when the Forefathers were the second battalion to reach the central arena. There were about forty of them in total. They had others not far behind, but those were setting up sniper nests on the walls above the maze and in select positions below to secure the area.

Once they drew near, the Forefathers saw the gas and only a few of their rank E users ran into the to test it out. One had their psionic shield covering their body while the other was using an e-field. The man using the e-field started coughing first. He turned around as quickly as he could. The man using his psionic shield also coughed and shook his head, but he didn’t retreat. After another ten seconds, he gave the man leading the Forefathers a sharp nod.

Brendon Black stepped out of the maze into the wide arena wearing a crimson red ballistic suit and had his greasy black hair cut short. His green rank D shield simmered around him. He sniffed at the air filtering through his psionic shielding then rounded his neck before waving the rest of his men to follow.

He gave his men a moment to get used to the gaseous area, then started to move.

“So that gas doesn’t work?” Bolt asked. “Then why bother?”

“What do you mean?” Mr. Rachet countered. “If they have to keep their psionic shields active then they can’t switch to their auras to move at their fastest speed. It’s kind of a cheap trick by Prodos, but they’re not using mustard gas or anything. It could be considered more crowd control than a chemical weapon.”

“I guess. But why are they moving in that direction? Can they not see it? It’s not even close to the flags.”

Mia noticed it too but found it difficult to speak.

LeLisa patted her hand under the table and said, “They aren’t headed for the flags. They’re headed for Prodos. Brendon Black said he was going after Lucius first…”

“That’s stupid,” Bolt objected. “Don’t they know they have to get a flag first before any bonus points start counting?”

“They will count after they get ahold of a flag,” Mr. Rachet corrected. “Whether they do it now or have to attack another battalion later, they’re confident that they can get one anytime they want it. So they’ve decided to take out some of their competition first.”

“But Lucius isn’t even there.”

“They don’t know that?” Mia said, finally finding the strength to speak.

“Then are they cheating? How do they know where Prodos is?”

“The banners. The developers made sure that everyone would know where everyone else was.”

“Oh crap,” Bolt said, slumping back in his seat. Then he sat up again as an idea struck him. “But if they are limited to using their shields, doesn’t Prodos have a chance?”

“Brendon Black isn’t stupid. He’ll enter the maze and kill as many people from Prodos as possible where he doesn’t need his shielding. With so many rank D users, there will be nothing they can do. Then he’ll wait at the outer layer, blocking them from being able to capture their flag.”

“Victoria will contact Lucius, right?” LeLisa of all people asked.

“She has to, right?”

“You’re forgetting something,” Mr. Rachet said excitedly. “Mel is able to use Lucius’s movement technique. Even if the Forefathers block the way, do you think they can stop him from reaching their base?”

Mia snapped. “They’re going to lose the majority of their most skilled people.”

“Yes,” he replied knowingly. “But that doesn’t mean it’s over.”

Mia summoned her psionic aura, but she was no fighter. She released it a second later and stuck out her tongue at him.

***

Another Manticore King was in my sights. This battalion was even more tentative in their approach than the last. Releasing both spears, I resisted the urge to celebrate as I stopped my descent and darted away.

Destiny waited until I’d reached my perch on a wall overlooking the coliseum to give me an update. She didn’t hold back. Mel had almost made it to the flag and everything was going as plan, but Brendon Black had made an unexpected move. He was headed for Prodos.

I rebuked myself. I should’ve known he’d pull something like this.

“They aren’t unprepared for this,” Destiny asserted.

“Let’s pick the next one nearby, just in case,” I suggested.

“Very well.”