Chapter Twenty-Three
Aric
He only waited long enough for the impact of his words to register on his mate’s face. That instance of wonder and delight was the last image of her he would take into the fiercest battle of his life. It buoyed his spirits and made him long to be back there, to scoop her up into his arms once more.
If there had only been time he would have done so, kissing her hard, giving her something to remember him by in case the worst were to happen. There just wasn’t time for him to do that, though. The pain in his heart at being ripped away from her without a parting kiss screamed at him to go back, to rectify that mistake, but he couldn’t. It would be the wrong move.
The soldiers wouldn’t have come and found him if it weren’t urgent. The situation was dire. Nobody had expected the Outsiders to come back to the portal so soon, if at all. All the brainstorming had given them days, if not weeks while the alien creatures skulked around, collected intelligence and formulated a plan. It was the smart thing to do.
It was what a human would do.
They’d failed to realize this wasn’t a human, nor even a shapeshifter from earth. This was an alien, and they thought in alien ways.
It doesn’t matter how they think. All that matters is stopping them.
Aric knew that was partially flawed logic. If he could understand how it thought, he could find a way to beat it. The Outsiders didn’t leave much in the way of…well, anything, besides their exoskeletons and the purple goo that as far as anyone could tell was the Outsider, some sort of protoplasm-being that science couldn’t understand.
Either way, they could be killed, and Aric needed to do just that. He increased his speed though the tunnel, catching up and passing the soldier. He didn’t apologize for leaving him behind. The base was low on the battlesuits built to combat the aliens, and they had no dragons left behind either. All of them were out combing the countryside for the other escapees, trying to stop them before they did too much damage.
It would be up to Aric and whatever handful of suits and brave unarmored soldiers they had left.
He reached the tunnel and skidded to a halt, listening. From much farther up the shaft he heard the staccato of gunfire, automatic weapons firing in short bursts, interspersed with the shouts of officers, and the occasional scream. He wasn’t too late.
Aric started heading up the slope, drawing power to him as he went. Several other soldiers formed up around him, though they stayed several paces behind after the first surge of electricity flowed out from him into the nearby metal support ring. It wasn’t intentional, but he was carrying a lot of power in him just now.
The energy began to manifest across his fingers, jumping between them and his palm as he continued to suck in all that his body could handle. His biggest weapon strike was only available to him when he was outside under the open sky, but that didn’t mean he was helpless. Far from it in fact.
Deep footsteps thundered behind him as the ready suits from the portal below formed up on his guard detail. Their heavy weapons would be more than welcome in helping him exploit any weakness in the creature’s armor.
Up ahead the raging battle came into view as men fell back from the oncoming creature in a steady rhythm while hitting it with everything they had. Aric didn’t see a single scratch on them.
“Order them to the sides on my command.” He spoke with complete authority, trusting that someone in his group could get through to the dozen or so men doing their best to slow the creature down.
Bringing his hands together in front of him Aric set his feet, pressing them deep into the ground. Energy arced between his fingers and jumped from one hand to another. He fed some of the overcharge he’d sucked into him into the space between his palms and a blue ball appeared and began to glow. His hands shook violently. Up ahead a man screamed as he didn’t get out of the way in time, his life ending in a split second as the Outsider drained him of his lifeforce.
Aric fed the pain of the loss of another brave soldier into his brewing maelstrom, as well as his fear for Kaitlyn and everyone else he’d ever known. Then he added his own fear, that he might not be strong enough to stop the Outsider and they would all be doomed because of him.
“Now,” he whispered, the strain of holding the energy nearly rendering him incapable of speech. His arms trembled, but he held on, using the mighty strength of his dragon for all it was worth.
Something was said, a soldier screamed, and suddenly there was nothing between Aric and the oncoming nightmare.
“VRAAAAAA!” The garbled scream ripped from his throat as he unleashed the thunderous bolt of energy, trying to take full advantage of his powers in defeating the enemy before anyone else died.
Light filled the perpetually dim tunnel, forcing soldiers to shield their eyes lest they go blind as an azure bolt of pure electricity momentarily joined his hands and the Outsider.
The shockwave flung everyone down. Soldiers were picked up and tossed into the tunnel walls. Loose equipment transformed into flying debris. Aric flew back twenty feet, scraping his arms nearly raw as he tried to stop his momentum.
Picking himself up, he blinked rapidly, trying to get a fix on the Outsider. The temporary blindness from the attack faded, and he saw the creature farther up the tunnel. It had been blasted a good fifty feet.
But it was still standing.
“That’s impossible,” he whispered, tossing another blast, though this one was only deigned to slow it down and buy the soldiers more time to recover. He directed a third at the roof, showering the Outsider with debris.
“EVERYONE BACK!” a suit shouted, using an external speaker to amplify its voice. “Retreat to the main cavern.”
The unarmored soldiers did as they were ordered. The suits stayed. So did Aric.
He lifted his hands again, the energy crossbow forming. Although it wasn’t necessary for him to use that to fling energy, by having a repetitive form, it became easier and quicker. It also helped him channel his powers better. This time though, it wasn’t enough. He spent a few seconds focusing, and the crossbow grew in size rapidly.
“What the hell is that?” a soldier in a nearby suit of armor asked.
“In the old days, they called it a ballista,” Aric explained, aiming the bolt of energy within at the oncoming Outsider. It sizzled and crackled, the tip a brilliant blue-white, where all the force of the impact would be concentrated.
He waited until the creature was no more than twenty feet away before pulling the trigger.
A six-foot-long lance of energy shot out. The Outsider tried to jump to the side, and the bolt creased along the armor in what would be the armpit of a human.
“You hurt it,” one of the suits said as the creature came upright.
Aric looked closely and saw what he meant. A thin line of purple goo trickled down the armor. A wound. It was possible. Almost immediately it closed, but it didn’t matter. Aric knew he could hurt the thing now. Hopefully he could kill it.
“I need more time,” he said, backing up, trying to figure out his next attack.
Two suits stepped forward without hesitation. Flaps on their feet fell down, digging into the dirt, turning the suits into reinforced weapons platforms.
A high-pitched whine reached his ears a moment before streams of yellow spat out from both arms of the suits, intersecting right on the surface of the black exoskeleton armor.
Brass shells filled the air as the suits sent hundreds of rounds at the creature, staggering it and rocking it back. Aric watched in horror as the creature brought up an arm. Strands of armor rippled and shot up and out, weaving together in a near living display as the arm reformed into a shield, angled to deflect the bullets away from its body.
Then it started forward again.
Missiles spat out, erupting at the feet of the creature. In response it widened its feet, giving it a sturdy platform to weather the explosions.
“Fall back,” he said, and together the three of them, along with the two other suits that watched their back, slowly retreated back toward the cavern far below, where the soldiers were probably hastily setting up more heavy weapons or some sort of other nasty surprise.
They would be ineffective. He knew that now. Only Aric had the power to stop the creature. Maybe.
Around him the hallway grew brighter. It was a gradual thing, and he didn’t realize it until they passed the first of the doors into side tunnels.
Like the one that Kaitlyn was in.