In A Universe Without Stars 1: Skyeater (26 page)

Wilker
walks toward him. “Did you really think that would work a second time?”

The
smoke explodes out as
Iseul
charges past him with an
energy sword.  A deep cut opens in Wilker’s cheek, he didn’t even feel it.

“Then
let’s escalate.”

Iseul
once again comes fast and hard.
Wilker swings his energy sword with the grace of a swan, while
Iseul
sways as abrasive as a drunk cow.

Sparks
fly as their swords meet, Wilker doesn’t make any huge moves. If he loses
concentration now he’ll lose his head. He blocks
Iseul
from the front. Another
Iseul
appears behind him, as
solid as the one in front. Wilker throws out his hand and shield blocks his
hit. It’s as solid as the one he blocks in front.

He’s
moving so fast he’s nearly in two places at once. They both attack,
synchronizing perfectly together. When
Iseul
blocks
one attack, another comes for his blind spot and Wilker blocks him.

Wilker
leaps onto the rooftops and as soon as he lands an
Iseul
meets him. They clash, rooftop to rooftop. The battle around them seems to
stop, it’s just Wilker and the multiples of
Iseul
. As
they land on another rooftop, Wilker defends himself from the onslaught of the
two
Iseul’s
when a foot rocks against his face.

Wilker
crashes into the ground. A third
Iseul
flashes in
front of him and then a forth. “When I said escalate I fucking meant it!”

An
energy sword appears in all their hands. Wilker can’t fight all of them there
are too many, he’s too fast, even with his advanced cognition. If
Iseul
isn’t going to slow down, he’s going to die.

“I
said escalate!”
Iseul
yells. Wilker jumps up as all
the
Iseuls
disappear. They swirl in a vortex around
him. Moving so fast around him he can’t concentrate.

Concentrate,
Wilker!

A
slash splits open his left arm. Then his right. Blades come from every
direction, tearing into him like he’s getting slashed by thousands of shards of
glass. Impaling into him from everywhere.

Wilker
spits out blood,
Iseul
missed all the vital points.
He’s prolonging his death. Wilker falls to the ground as he leaks. He closes
his eyes and breathes in.

I
can’t fail now.

His
wounds close but his body is slick with blood. His wounds are healed but he
doesn’t have the power yet to replenish his blood.

Iseul
stands in front of him, “Done
already, are we?”

Wilker
struggles to stand. He stares at him. He needs to end this. But how?

Iseul
splits apart again, Wilker
concentrates, his mind isn’t yet able to understand multiple things at once. So
he needs to concentrate on a single thing. On a way to defeat him. He thinks
back to their fight. On what
Iseul
moves, his natural
cadence, his fighting pattern.

He
stares at
Iseul’s
body, an incredible amount of blue
power flows through his veins. There is so much that Wilker can’t pin point
where the source is coming from. Somewhere in
Iseul’s
body the power is getting pumped through his body. A heart.

But
Wilker doesn’t have a single idea to where it is in this alien body of
Iseul’s
.

Iseul
splits in four again and approached
him. Wilker staggers forward, his sword in hand. The
Iseul’s
stop and grins.

“Oh
a final stand, I always wanted to do one!”
Iseul
says
with glee. His clones disappear. “So how are we going to do this, maybe some
kind of javelin type game? Whoever gets up first
wins.
”

“I’m
tired of playing your games,” Wilker says.

“You
really don’t have a choice, human. You and your race don’t have any choice in
your destiny or your future anymore. We will make your choices for you from now
on. And our leader says it’s your destiny to die. Now come die like a man.”

Wilker
charges him and
Iseul
charges back. Time seems to
slow for Wilker. In front of him as
Iseul
charges,
there are thousands, millions of blurry images of him approaching him.
Iseul
was never using his full power.

Iseul’s
approach is a blur to Wilker, he can
concentrate on every single
Iseul
that’s in front of
him. But he must make his move, he must decide when one to attack.

In
a flash, their swords swing and they both skid to a stop, both facing the
opposite direction. Wilker’s sword is only a single inch in width. Wilker made
his move. But so did
Iseul
. Wilker falls face first
to the ground.

Iseul
turns around, but there is no smile
on his face.

“Heh,
I guess you won.” Blood explodes out of his mouth and he falls back.

Wilker
struggles to his feet, blood pours out of his stomach. He clutches it and
closes the wound. He walks over and looks at
Iseul’s
blood stained face.

“How…How
did you know how to stop me?”
Iseul
mutters through
his teeth. Wilker waves his hand around, a sword appears in his hand and
shrinks to a tenth of its size.

“Luck…I
guess. I only needed a single touch. I didn’t know at which exact point your
power flows through you but when you split again I was able to pinpoint the
general area, the heart. Even with your powers it still has to come from
somewhere. And even for heartless monsters you still have a heart. Because you
limited yourself and because of your arrogance you lost.”

Iseul
sputters blood out of his mouth while
he laughs. “That’s funny… coming from… someone like… you.”

With
a final grin the light in
Iseul’s
eyes leaves.
What
did he mean that’s funny coming from me?

He’s
been called arrogant many times before but only from someone he’s actually met
before. Not some alien who claims he knew him.

He
was lucky that it was his heart that was his source of power. They can’t just
manifest their power from nothing. He can use this.

Serena
and Noata are nowhere to be seen. He hopes they’re still safe. He looks around.
He forgot about the battle around him. It’s still raging on. He hopes the other
teams are having an easier time.

A
fist erupts out of Jake’s chest. It’s
Molotiz’s
.
Molotiz’s
face is bruised and discolored, he’s had a hard
fight, but so have the chosen.

“Now!”
Jake screams. Lawrence’s sword shears through
Molotiz’s
neck.
Molotiz’s
head plops on the ground as Jake
collapses.

“Molotiz!”
Subac yells. Lance jumps in front of him and launches a fist into his chest
hard. Subac hurls back and Lance flies for him and punches him so hard in his
face that
Subac’s
head explodes.

Lance
lands on his feet as
Subac’s
body continues to skid
some distance from him.

Holy
shit.

Lance
looks at his hands. He never thought he could punch anybody that hard. Hard
enough to blow up their head. Dirt and soot covers Lance’s body, he has a few
cuts and bruises on his face. Around him, while the Alpha’s are dead, so are
some of the chosen. Ming’s bodies lie on the ground in multiple pieces.

Travis
kneels over Jake’s dead body, his brother sacrificed himself to save them.
Everyone else on Travis’s team is dead. Lance’s team only lost Ming.

“Let’s
group up,” Lance says. He’s lucky, he didn’t lose everyone. Next time he might
not be as lucky. It’s only Him, Lawrence, Travis and Ryan left.

A
bullet wheezes past Lance’s ear. Hundreds of grunts advance up toward them, past
the air base they were defending.

“The
hell?” he mutters.

“We
can’t fight that!? We have to run.” Lawrence puts a hand on Lance’s shoulder.
“Come on!”

Julio
crashes down in the pavement as ten thin energy pillars slam into him. He
screams as they pull out. He lies bleeding out in the streets of Washington,
D.C.

His
wounds closes in a blue light. Julio slowly gets to his feet. His watch dings.
His power level drops from 20% to 10%.

Julio
feels weaker. This isn’t good.

“How
many times are you going to heal? Until you run out of power? I keep stabbing
you and stabbing you yet you keep getting up.”
Panatil
floats ahead of him, his hundred shields surrounding him. He’s right. Julio
hasn’t found a weakness in his shields.

“You
could’ve killed me already.”

“I
never said I didn’t like stabbing you over and over again like some cockroach.
It’s just surprising to me that your people are so persistent when you’re
clearly losing that you keep trying and trying. Do you really think you can
win?”

“I
won’t ever know unless I try.”

Panatil
laughs, “Well you do know that only
five Alphas are fighting in this battle but even if I lose, that there are
millions of us in this galaxy alone. You will never win.”

“I
don’t care as long as I kill you, I’ll worry about the rest later.”

“Well
then, come at me bro.”

Julio
charges him, with energy swords in both hands. Thin pillars shoot pasts him as
he ducks and weaves toward
Panatil
.
Panatil
laughs as he closes in, all his shield collect in
front of him, forming a blue energy wall. A pillar pierces Julio’s left leg but
he doesn’t slow.

“Surprise,”
a voice comes from behind
Panatil
.
Panatil
glances back, Reese is behind him, with his shotgun
cocked.
Panatil
lurches forwards as the buckshot
unloads on his back.

Julio’s
sword passes through his neck.
Panatil
halts, he
sighs.

He
stands and turns to Julio.

“What
the hell!?” Julio mutters.

“Dammit,
I guess you beat me, with the same damn trick you used on Boul. This is kind of
embarrassing. I’ve should’ve killed your friend when I had a chance.”

“You
don’t have to talk like I’m not here,” Reese mentions.

Julio
waves him to be quiet. Reese’s shotgun didn’t break
Panatil’s
skin, it just staggered him enough for Julio to get the upper hand.

“How
are you still alive?”

Panatil
points to his neck, “Oh this? Well, I
guess I underestimated you, you were able to cut so fine through my skin that
my veins still pump my blood to my brain. It’s easy to separate like so.”

Panatil
pushes on his head and it slides off.
He’s body collapse to the floor. Dead. Blood spurt out of his stump.

“The
hell was that?” Reese says in shock.

“Damn,”
is all Julio can say.

The
pillar disappears from his leg. His watch dings again and he collapses to his
knees.

Reese
helps him up.

He’s
tired, he used too much energy fighting that psychotic fucker. His chest feels
heavy, his eye lids feels the weight of the world. He’s not in fight shape
anymore.

“Let’s
go.”

Julio
and Reese limp down the street off to the next battle.

“The
Eliite aren’t shit,”
Julio says as he and Reese limp down the street, they each hold each other up
as they pass all the dead in the streets.

It’s
been a long day and Julio already feels like he’s near his limit.

“Says
the guy who just got his ass kicked,” Reese says.

 “Hey,
I’ve been through a lot of shit, alright. Once we meet back with my team, we
should be good.”

He
has been through a lot, crashing a plane into a building and fighting the
alphas. He looks at Reese, he limps forwards with determination.

How
does Reese do it?

To
keep powering on when he only has the strength of a normal human being. Reese
is a stronger man than himself. Julio doesn’t think he can handle much more.
But he’s going to keep talking, because all of these dead bodies surrounding
him are getting to him.

“Run!”
Someone yells.

Lance
and the rest of his team rush down the street, past two abandoned armored
trucks. They all look like they’ve just been through a cage match.

“We
lost the Airbase we have to—“A bullet bursts out of Ryan’s chest, splattering
his insides on Julio’s face. He falls dead.

“Shit!”
Julio exclaims.

Twenty
grunts run up behind Lance and the rest. The team splits in half. Julio, Reese and
Lance run behind the armored truck on the left and the rest behind the one on
the right.

The
grunts bullets quickly chip down the truck. The chosen return fire, Julio peeks
out and fires back but they just dodge it and fire back. They’re more serious than
they were before it seems. They’re starting to show some tactics, some of them
lay cover fire while the others start to advance, this battle has just gotten a
lot harder.

Julio’s
hit in the shoulder, he yells as he flings back, blood spurts out his back.
Bullet went right through the truck, its shielding did nothing to stop the far
superior round.

In
a stadium, Thora holds Neil, who cries softly in her arms as the building
shakes from the battle outside.

Julio
lies face flat on the ground.

His
perception is lost, his world is blurry and shaky, blocking him from the battle
around him.

Lawrence
looks up from his cover and sees Julio, he runs to him as the truck explodes
behind him, killing their other teammate.

Lawrence
flips Julio over, the world comes back to him. He just wants to leave this
place and relax in a nice Jacuzzi somewhere.

He’s
tired.

Lawrence
tries to help him up, but Julio barely responds.

A
loud explosion rocks over them, Julio hazily looks up.

What
now?

A
bright blue light streaks across the gray sky. Is it another omen or finally a
blessing? He doesn’t have enough faith to believe in miracles.

Just
chances.

Orbs
spinning around the light like a turbine.

Another
weapon.

It
skips to the ground in a flash. It sporadically goes across the battlefield. It
travels between skirmishes in an instant. A delayed sonic boom echoes across
the city as it moves, moving closer to Julio.

It
approaches Julio. He hopes it makes his death quick. He stares directly at it
until it just disappears. Right as it gets over them. Back in the sky it hovers
over them. A strong sudden gust of wind hits them.

Nothing
else happens.

But
as the grunts are hit, they are ripped into the sky. Julio stares up in awe as
the grunts disappear into the sky.

A
miracle it is.

Cole
hovers in the sky, he feels alive again. This power is amazing. He can stop
this war. He can stop murder, muggings, almost every crime, hell maybe even
world hunger.

He
can do anything he wants.

He
got the
enemies
ship’s attention. They’re ahead of
him.

Exactly
what he wanted. He’s going to take care of them once and for all.

His
spheres continue to spin around him, from what he understands, they are him. He
can feel the wind caress each individual orb as they spin around him. It’s a strange
sensation feeling something like that, yet it not being physically connected to
his body.

A
trail of grunts finally come twisting up from below. He moves slightly forward
as the grunts fly over him. He simply watches them, screaming and falling back
below to their deaths.

He
smiles.

Let’s
do this.

Ahead
of him, hundreds of Peons fly toward him. He puts out his hands, a group of
spheres spin around his hands. He points and shoots them forward, spinning in a
controlled manner until—

The
spheres hit the first Peon and immediately explode out. The spheres bounce ship
to ship, tracking like a ping pong ball and destroy every ship in its immediate
vicinity.

On
top of his concrete pillar, Ulbe lurches to his feet. He stares at the ruin and
destruction above. He felt each and every single one of their deaths. Shock,
curiosity, fury, and hate all sweep across his face as he grimaces at the
destruction of—

“My
CHILDREN!!”

The
roar is heard across all of Washington.

Ping!
A bullet bounces of his skin, he’s shot at from below.

It’s
a team of titans, two women and three men, five of them, unbroken, unhurt.
Ants! Down below they continue to fire until—

The
Damon disappears.

The
titans look around.

“I
told you this was a bad idea, we should’ve stayed hidden,” one of them says. He
decides to walk forward and—

Ulbe
lands directly on top of him, his limbs explode off his body and into the air.
The team staggers back.

How
could they call themselves titans if they cower back like this?!

Ulbe
steps forward and pulsates, an invisible force comes off him and hits one of
the titans.

His
eyes roll to the back of his head as he spits up blood. As he collapses, Ulbe
grabs his legs and swings him into one of the titans to his left. The third
titan starts to run.

Coward
.

Ulbe
opens his mouth and shoots off a beam of energy, blowing off her top half. He
turns to the last titan standing.

The
titan staggers back and pisses himself.

Fitting
end for a human.

Ulbe
grabs him with both hands and squeezes, the titans screams.

“YOU’RE
ALL JUST ANTS!” The Damon yells. He squeezes harder and harder until—

The
titan pops like a grape. His guts splatters across
Ulbe’s
pissed off face.

Cole
continues the fight above. This is absolutely nothing to him. Two faires come at
him from below. He flies down. His spheres pool to both of his arms and twirl
around them. They go back and forth as he speeds for the faires.

The
first faire fires at him. Cole thrust his left hand forwards and a force field
blocks it. The spheres circle around his left hand and spins fast as hell as—

He
unleashes a volley of energy blast, like a mini gun. Hundreds and hundreds of
projectiles shoot out to destroy the first faire.

The
second faire comes quickly.

Cole
shoots head first into it and rips right through it.

The
faire explodes behind him.

This
is way too easy for him, he almost feels bad for them.

Almost
.

He
sees the ground, he slows and lands gently in front of the Washington Memorial.

Before
he has a chance to account for his surroundings, Ulbe lands in front of him. A
powerful energy comes off of Ulbe. Wings rips from his back and spans out fifty
feet each.

Now
this is what Cole wanted.

“My
name is Ulbe, you will pay dearly for your sins against my children ascended.”

Cole
smiles.

Finally,
a challenge to see how powerful he has become.

Julio
and his team cheer as they stare into the now empty sky. The tides are turning,
it’s about fucking time. There are only three of his teammates left, Lance,
himself, Lawrence and of course Reese.

“I
don’t know what the hell that was but let’s hope it stays on our side,” Julio
says. The blue thing in the sky felt kind of familiar, maybe it’s that thing
that Jahum told him about.

A
new hope.

A
weapon.

“I
don’t know about you guys but I’d like to peace out or better yet get the fuck
out of here. No matter if we are winning or not,” Reese says.

“We
can’t. There’s some kind of instant death zone nobody bothered fully explaining
to us,” Julio says. Although he kind of gets it, it’s some kind of invisible
electric fence but he’s too tired to explain it.

“Jahum
said it would be lifted at the end of the battle, win or lose,” Lawrence says.

“If
you just tell me where it is, I’ll just chill outside of it until the end.”

“I
can take you. We’re close to the river, if you don’t cross it you should be
fine,” Lance says.

“No!
I’m tired of us splitting up, there’s only three of us left. We need to go
together or—
“ Lawrence
pauses.

Blood
bursts out his mouth. A jagged piece of metal pokes out two feet from his
chest. He falls dead.

“Make
that two,” Kabus says.

Lance
runs to Lawrence but pauses when he looks down the street.

“Shit,”
Julio says.

Kabus
stands in the middle of the street, standing at only seven feet tall.

An
alpha.

The
white house bunker is setup as a control room. Monitors, computers, and maps
take up most of the room. Generals and the remaining world leaders command the
battle from this safe haven.

Off
to the side is the fake oval office for the president speech. In the middle of
it all, the president sits in his chair, overlooking the situation. But he’s
really lingering in thought, thinking.

Acting
as if he’s watching the monitors, thinking of a world-saving strategy.

It’s
just a play from his many years as a politician. He isn’t doing any of those
things, he knows how hopeless it is.

This
meaningless war.

 No
matter what he thinks of, they are all out of options. No nukes, no secret
world saving technology and now he has to give his promised speech to the
remainder of his people.

Is
he going to give them useless hope? So when the ceiling comes down on them they
could at least have one last good blissful final thought. Or is he going to
tell them to give one final prayer to their gods. Or whichever god is watching over
them.

His
secretary walks up next to him.

“We
have taken control of most of the radio and television signals, we are ready
for you, sir.”

Thora
sits alone in her bed in the stadium, her head in her knees. Everyone surrounds
a television at the other end of the stadium. Arnold is with them too, with
Neil. Awaiting the impending conference. The president isn’t going to save
them. She puts her head back down and rocks the night away.

Ulbe
and Cole continue to stare at each other, who is going to make the first move.
His spheres spin around him excitedly.

Ulbe
swings at Cole, Cole moves fast, his force field pops up.
Ulbe’s
fist breaks through it and lands into Cole. Cole hurls into a building.

Kabus
slowly walks toward Julio, Lance and Reese in a playful manner. He knows how
weak they are.

“Reese!
Run for it!!” Julio yells. Reese runs into an alley to the left.

“Long
time no see,” Kabus says with a toothy grin.

Julio
flings an energy blast at him, Kabus simply swats it away.

“You’re
going to have to try harder than that.”

“Kill
him!” Julio yells, they need to take care of him quick, before he can attack.

Both
Julio and Lance charge, Kabus smiles and fires at them, energy projectiles
slung at them. Lance dodges them but Julio is hit hard, it explodes when it
hits his chest and he flies back. Lance leaps toward Kabus and –

In
a flash, Kabus jumps and kicks Lance impossibly fast in the chest and sends him
into the air. It was so fast Lance doesn’t know what just happened. Julio comes
from his right swinging hard, but none of them hit. Kabus dodges stupidly fast.