Fredrak and Losan came out shooting. They fired jointly at a soldier on the second flight, and the heavy rifles proved a match for the heavy armour. The injured one near the bottom tried to launch himself into melee, but stumbled on his way and Losan fired straight into the front of the helmet.
The grenade went off on the staircase. The blast was more searing heat than force, but it still sufficed to launch a soldier down to the floor below. Losan shot a man on the first flight, but a personal shield crackled to life as the blast hit and saved him for the moment. Fredrak fired at the same man. The shield worked again, but died in the process. A soldier on the second flight leapt down, sword in hand, and despite the bulky armour he managed to roll into an upright position. Another leapt from the third to the second, clearly with similar plans.
Saketa met the leaper, dodged his swipe, and clove through his helmet. It wasn’t a perfect hit and he stayed on his feet for a moment. A second hit cut deeper, and down he went.
Robbed of his shield, that soldier on the first died in a downwards charge with his sword, shot five times, and finished the descent in a flopping slide to the floor. The other leaper came down, and his comrade up on the third went for his gun again.
Saketa sent her will back out and the guns fell silent. With that in action she couldn’t channel as much power into her body, and so the soldier’s elite skill sufficed to parry her attack and strike back.
Vanaka ran at his flank and swung the stick, and again her sheer strength battered him off his feet. Saketa chased after him, and stunned as he was for the moment she easily slid Nara’s blade down under the helmet and into his neck. She then kicked his sword away and left him to bleed to death.
Saketa leapt up onto the second flight. The remaining soldier had discarded his gun again and now threw a grenade her way. She ignored it, and hopped over the glowing-hot section of half-melted steps left by the previous one. The soldier threw another grenade and she batted it aside. He hefted his sword with an air of desperation, and stood his ground as she sprinted up to meet him.
This was the heart of it all; the energies the Exile had taken control of and aimed up at the sky. She doubted she could manage even the humblest of Shifts. So she simply attacked him head-on. He had quality armour, an elevated position, and good training. It bought him four seconds before Nara’s sword found his knee joint. He didn’t completely collapse, but the buckled leg let her land a severe hit on his arm. With that, she pressed up close and simply shoved him over the railing and down to the mosaic.
Saketa peeked down and saw Fredrak fling one of the frozen grenades through a doorway.
“Is that both of them?!” she shouted down.
“Yes!” the agent shouted back, and hurried away from the opening.
She released her will and the twin blasts went off.
Vanaka had run up after her, and those strange muscles let her easily clear the half-melted spot. The girl was holding it together, but all of this was obviously not her element.
“I think there are more coming!” Fredrak said.
“Hold the opening!” she shouted down at the two of them, then continued the ascent.
Each flight completely crossed the tower’s wide walls, so already at the fourth she’d reached a considerable height. Vanaka followed doggedly, but seemed to sense the need for her to keep a bit of a distance.
Saketa looked up at the seventh flight. She knew what awaited her there, even if the angle and dim lighting kept it out of sight for the moment.
“Remember what I said,” Saketa whispered, without taking her eyes off the seventh.
“Spearhead,” the girl whispered back. “Yeah.”
Saketa slowed down further, taking one step at a time, holding the sword up in a combat pose. For a few seconds the only sounds were the distant blasts of ground fighting.
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The tendril came as she reached the top of the fifth flight; loud and crude but made powerful by the location. Vanaka yelped, but Saketa defended herself with Nara’s sword.
“You are here,” Kio’s silhouette said. He was near the top of the seventh.
“I am here, yes.”
He seemed to be breathing heavily, but she couldn’t be sure. He definitely did have his axe in hand.
“Ghost of Kalero. Yo-”
“Boy, that is enough out of you!” Saketa shouted, as she continued her careful ascent. “Thousands are dying! People have died by your hand and through your inaction! People who have done you no wrong!”
“Nature…” the teenager mumbled under his breath.
“No! None of this has to do with natural predation and survival! And you overlook that kindness and love are also natural to mankind. As are the bonds of family, which you have been told to discard.”
He slowly shook his head, but Saketa kept going.
“For all his big talk about ancient enemies, Avanon skipped his chance to fight a real Kalero Warden, and he did it right before your eyes. He did it for the same reason he did not strike at the Sixth Fleet while it was above Yvenna, when two Wardens were with it. It was the same reason he sicced your comrades on me in those ruins, then stood back. And it is why you stand here in my path. It is because he is a coward.”
“The mentor is… strong,” Kio said.
“He is dangerous,” Saketa corrected him. “But he still refuses to face anyone who can pose a danger to him in turn. He is a coward, Kio. They always are, the torch-bearers of the legacy of Vartana. Because they have nothing. No ideology. Nothing to value, nothing to devote themselves to. Nothing but themselves.”
She reached the top of the sixth, the bottom of the seventh. Up above the boy waited.
“That is all that awaits you, Kio,” she said.
His face had come into full view. It looked every bit as uneasy as the breathing indicated.
“Nothing but yourself. You will be cut off from all else, utterly alone. Has any of this warmed you? Has any of this filled the holes in your spirit? Did you not prefer your companions to be alive? Did you have friends among them? A lover?”
That last point seemed to strike some soft spot, and suddenly Kio really looked his age.
“Listen,” she said. “Feel. He has stopped.”
Kio’s eyes unfocused in a moment of confusion, before it visibly dawned on him that Avanon had ceased his pulses.
“He has stopped, because he knows I am here. And the prospect of facing me has him saving all of his strength, even at this great turning point. He is hoping you will drain some of my energies before the meeting. That is all you are to him. A tool.”
She was more than halfway up the flight
“Decide, Kio,” she said. “Think for yourself. Think about all the contradictions and the hypocrisy and the cruelty. What your mentor calls weakness is your better self calling out from inside. This is the moment where you decide if it lives or dies. And decide fast, Kio. Because I have done my best to reason with you, for your mother’s sake. But I have come to accept that one’s best sometimes isn’t enough. And I can waste no more time on you. Not now. You can abandon this, or I can strike you down. Either way, I shall be at peace with my efforts. Because the choice is yours.”
Eleven steps remained between them. Ten. The boy gritted his teeth. He shook. Nine steps. Eight. Breath came out of him in a hiss, then a growl. Seven steps. Six. And Kio grunted and swung his axe. Saketa reflexively fell back and readied a guard. The axe sank into the stone wall. He yanked it out and swung it back in with a scream, cutting a deep gouge. He screamed again and swung a third time. Then he flung the weapon to the side. It hit the opposite wall and bounced from there down to the mosaic.
He punched the wall twice, doing almost as much damage. Then he simply deflated, with tears in his eyes. And when Saketa flicked the contact card at him his reflexes didn’t kick in to catch it. It dropped at his feet.
“Take it,” Saketa said. “Take it and make your way to Yvenna. Speak to Aman Kendrel at his shelter.”
He reached down and took the card with an absent air. He didn’t look at it. He looked at Saketa, then Vanaka, then Saketa again. Then he drew on power.
It gave Saketa another start, but he brought forth the haze, and then a tunnel. The boy stepped backwards into it, and vanished from sight.
Saketa turned and pointed at Vanaka.
“Go,” she said firmly. “This next part is up to me.”
“Weren’t you over feeling you had to do everything on your-”
“My aura will clash with Avanon’s, and I mean that quite literally!” Saketa said. “The energies will not be safe for you!”
From down below came the sound of gunfire. Saketa turned and started running again.
“Go! Help however you can!”