Chapter 10-27 Take the Flame (I)

Chapter 10-27 Take the Flame (I)

You know what, soldier? Youre wasted as Regular.

I do somethin wrong, Higher?

No. Youre doing too many things right. Killing too many targets. Not dying. Hells, your Merits are through the roof. Youre making an awful lot of Instruments very happy people.

I aim to please.

Nah. You aim to kill. You love to kill. I see it. You dont need to play coy with me. But ah. Never mind. Youd make a good Clad, you know that Draus?

Dont quite know what youre spittin, sir.

Dont glower. You know Im right. There are pieces missing inside you, consang. Pieces that were never there to begin with. But hey, that just makes you perfect for this city. Listen, when this war shit is done, Im gonna recommend you for Axtraxis.

Permission to speak freely, Higher.

[Sigh] Shoot. Break my heart and tell me all you ever wanted was to fight and serve the cause

Sir, Ive seen what the Frame does to people. I see how Greatling is. I dont want it. I dont want to be them. I dont wanna burn my days killin the small. Theres no gleam in that. That aint the dream.

No gleam. Draus: Youre more than worthy and wasted as a Reg.

-Guard-Captain Winston Nicoma to First-Dragoon Jelene Draus, Fourth Guild War

10-27

Take the Flame (I)

Avo cut through the skies and the Strider followed. Draus vanished the stretch of a bridge and drones cut out after her.

Spearing through the air at one hundred and eighty miles an hour was slow for a Guild-grade aerial vehicle, but that was by necessity; the district was a hive of architecture and memetic architecture at that. Short of the Tadpole turning into a golem with control over forces, inertia still held a tax.

Something Abrel quickly discovered as she tore out from around the corner and struck the curved side of the twin-pronged tower that looked carved out of nothing but vivianite.

The drone fell like a whistling arrow at Avos command. Countless shining bridges spilled out between blocks and streets as he plummeted. Beyond the dilapidation and decay that gripped the lower Warrens, Lights End resembled a orderly nest, and its occupants were all part of the hive.Ñ00v€l--ß1n hosted the premiere release of this chapter.

Encased in rectangular glass passageways, he caught sight of countless curious bystanders as he speared past. There were thousands of them gathered behind windows and depolarizing walls. Unlike the fear and chaos that gripped the streets of Nu-Scarrowbur, he could glean no such tension brimming in their relaxed postures.

This was just a curiosity for thema break from whatever their professions demanded. They watched with the eyes of bored office workers taking in a peculiar sight rather than the leering bloodlust of a Crucible spectator.

Life and death for him and his allieswas but a passing amusement. When he crossed from sight, they would return to their stations and proceed along the railways of routine.

Essus voice bellowed out in low-pitched alarm with each pivot and turn. Avo fastened them tighter to the Tadpole. Blades of light flashed out at him just as he dipped down to sail alongside a Hypertube tunnel, glass-casings coating the gaps between the latticed tubes shrouded him from a slashing wing.

Light splashed and broke into chipped particles. It was like watching a glowing stream of blades shatter against something unbreakable. The two absolutes clashed and two canons shuddered under the weight of paradox. Reality jolted as Abrels wings sliced against mimetically guarded metal and glass. Her strokes bled blurring mirages as multiple geometries in the environment shivered.

Avo did not turn from the opportunity presented to him. The Second Circle of his Galeslither came alive in the chaos. A pocket seized the opening in the air behind him just as he turned a corner. Light flashed out off the reflections cast by the mercury gleam of an Exorcist Tadpole twisting between the latticed pathways interlacing the blocks.

He knew he succeeded when he felt his Frame rattle and all light behind him vanished. Too much paradox for Abrelshe needed to vent her Rend or switch to another

The world shook. Avos cog-feed sounded with the detection of vented Rend. From shadows and darkness flew forth swarms of darting falcons. They were not smoke-like as the ones enwreathing the Strider's arms and legs. Instead, they bore a fluid quality to them as they rushed out. Uncountable in number, they washed out from every spot of smoke or darkness around him, diving out to smear themselves against passing drones or clefts left between buildings.

There wasnt the need.

The lightrail of the hypertube was a chainlink of crystalline shards that ran twelve cars long for a total of five hundred feet. Geometries of light played across a canopy of crisscrossing beams focused through various lenses that plated the exterior of the tubing. From vicarities and taken memories, Avo recalled the locus to be at the front, and so thusly he rushed into the train.

Releasing Essus and Chambers as he arrived at the empty control nexus of the lightrail, a still locus rested around metallic rings and arm-like apparatuses that projected a grav-field to hold the mind-crystal in place.

Avo was about to connect to the locus when he suddenly froze, tendril an inch away from touching its structure. He had no idea how deep the Low Masters subversion of the local Nether ran. But if he lingered, he faced fatal odds.

Growling, he took the plunge and connected to the locus and dived. A simulated lobby began to boot and glitch behind his eyes. The world dissolved and immediately he felt his wards rattle. The first structures that manifested next to him were twisted in sequence and memory. From memory, most public system loci ran on simply palaces and lobbies. Bland, grey rooms with simple shapes and doorways for easy accessibility.

What he saw were mutations. Faces and traumas and fire and other places fissured around the empty expanse he was in. Mem-cons lined every sequence he could behold. If this place was a body, every sinew would be infected, and the bones would be rotten to the core. He was at the base of a tree and even the roots were trying to bite into him.

His Quicksand cracked slightly before it adjusted. The next few impacts broke against him as he surveyed extent of the affliction, trying to find the root phantasmics governing this place. The more he studied, the wider his insides chasmed.

Perhaps he could clean the locus out if he had eighty tons of mass accelerating his thoughts, but right now he had but a short window. Jacking out, he could hear a torrent of water crashing just outside.

He didnt have the time. He needed some means of accessing the system fast and ignoring the mem-cons and traumas outright. Something to punch right through without destroying all the sequences. Maybe if there was someone expendablehe should have kept that Exorcist with

Avo paused. He snapped around, eyes fixed on Chambers.

Mem-cons, he said, inspiration striking him. Expendable. Durable. He grinned.

Chambers took a step back, lip quivering. Consang, please

Avo stung the mans mind with a thread of blood and fused it to the locus. Chambers cried out in surprise as he toppled back onto a flower-petaled seat blooming with foam cushions. Error codes burst in front of him as a holoprojector failed to receive any resources from the locus.

Start the train. Avo said, hoping that his gambit would work.

Just just start the train?

Water slouched close. Something unbolted outside. Now, Avo growled.

Chambers whimpered and his face scrunched with concentration. A current of ghosts flowed through the link. In the nexus, the locus rose and began to gleam. Suddenly, the doors all snapped shut as an upbeat tune began to play. The exterior walls along the train depolarized and the outside world turned transparent.

A flood of water smashed into the lightrail. Just as the train thrummed. Light speared down from the various lenses placed across the room. Light peeled away the outer skin of the train as the exterior world suddenly turned into a pale stream. Only a whine gave away the fact that they were traveling. The train didnt shake, didnt bounce, didnt even groan upon metal plates.

Being injected across a concentrated beam of light did not have anything to do with sound, after all.

+Welcome aboard Line Thirteen of the Easterly light expanse. Please ensure all thaumic devices are switched off. Affecting the domains of Light and Space are strictly prohibited+

A chuckle came from Chambers. He pointed to his link. I I did it! I fuckin did it! He threw his hands up and his coat opened. He exposed himself to the group as he let out an incoherent shout of triumph. Fuck yeah! Whose the best half-strand in

A loud crack rattled from the back of the train car. Past countless light-dappled doorways separating each shard, a figure crawled out from a puddle of water, and behind them followed another.

WARNING: HIGH REND SIGNATURE DETECTED

WARNING: HIGH REND SIGNATURE DETECTED

Rising from pools of water, Abrel Greatling emerged from the shallow film of water like it was a deep pool. She planted bare leg roped with wired musclejust regrown from the regenerative properties of the midnight rains. A single member of her cadre followed her, coughing as he tore his cracked helmet free from his head.

His skin was copper while his eyes shone pale blue. He lacked an inch of height next to Abrel, but his bulk more than enshadowed hers. Basked in the light of the traveling train, the Greatling collapsed her own helmet. For a heartbeat, she stood there, eyes bloodshot, face contorted in palpable fury. Her lips peeled back as she bared her perfect teeth. An inhuman noise of primal hatred escaped from her.

She let out a breath.

She took a step forward.

Behind, her only accompanying ally followed.

Avo let his Echoheads rattle and growled. Fine. Two. He could deal with two. He still had his Heaven. He still had his ghosts. He still had Draus. He cast out a tendril of blood and connected to her. +Going to draw their attention. Shoot them when I+

She strode next to him and flexed her wings. +We rupture the inside of the train and we all die. I know how it works.+

Avo paused. +So. We do this the ugly way.+

He felt her narrowed gaze glance up at him through her helmet. +You tryin to sound disappointed?+

He grunted a laugh. +No.+ Abrel Greatlings footsteps rose to an uneven sprint. He walked out to meet her. +Looks like Im going to get to taste more Guilder flesh after all.+