----------------------------------------
Kalon
----------------------------------------
Chapter Twenty-Four: Ikat
Galactic Quadrant: Darna Quadrant
Ruling Government: Talum Merchant Federation
Solar System: D-447
Planet: Ora
Location: Beneath the planet's surface, Naro City, Lower City Markets
----------------------------------------
Dust and frost billow around us, the blue-haired woman reaches toward the bag in my grasp.
“Ikat!” Korra yells.
Run.
My eyes glance at Arrum, a thousand words spoken without a tongue follow. He thinks we should leave the bag and Korra. My eyes tell him to take her, his jaw flexes as he grabs her shoulder and pulls her with him. At the same moment, I roll backward before the blue-haired woman’s grasp finds me. She is strong, I cannot let her grab hold of me, or it is surely over. The rope to the maintenance rafters. That is my only chance.
Air rushes as the man that travels with her slams into the wall next to me, there is a strange sound coming from him as he stands up, like his body is made of mechanical servos, whirring with his movements. He must be part machine as I guessed. If only I had some Netherium. No, focus on what you have, you are agile, and you know these markets well. Move.
He slams his fists into where I was just a moment before, the stone walls shatter like they were made of thin ice. My eyes are stunned, but my body moves on reflex as I twist backward, flipping through the air, landing on my hand, and throwing up a bag of blasting powder meant for the mines, it coats the cold air giving me a moment's respite while it clears.
The air gusts violently as the powder ignites from something. A loud ear-ringing explosion, only enough to singe eyebrows and smoke the area. I can’t hear out of my left ear for a few moments. It almost takes my balance. I slide over a box toward the wall that leads to the rope. There is another loud cracking of the air, it is a familiar one, like that of an energy weapon.
“Do not kill him.” The woman says to the man, my eyes turn and see that she grips his arm, smoke billows from where his hand should be, and the clothes near his arm are smoking as well.
“My lady, we must retrieve it…” he begins.
Looking closer I see the man’s right arm glowing, not from runes, but some kind of weapon maybe, like the barrel of a plasma rifle after firing. Is his arm a weapon? I have never seen its likeness before, but the hole near my feet that melted the metal grates to slag, that I know. Danger. I need to run.
“Enough, we are not killing anyone.” She says.
My hand grasps the rope, putting the bag’s tie strings in my mouth, I throw my blade with the other hand, cutting the other rope that holds the counterbalance in place. My body lurches upwards blowing off my face covering. The counterweight slams to the ground, but my body keeps soaring upwards, the pully breaks as I reach past the top, and a twang of the rope sends me falling back down toward the rafters. My hand barely manages to find a grip on it. Tossing the bag up, I use both hands to pull myself onto the rafters fully.
Lying for a moment to catch my breath, I grab the bag. I will have a few minutes to figure out where to go next, even enhanced they will not reach this high, the rope fell back to the ground. The bag is not extremely heavy, curiosity bids me to open it. Reaching in, I feel only one thing in it. Pulling it out now, I stare at it in confusion. It is a rock.
Rolling it over in my hand, I look for anything special, I am sure though. It is a rock. Why would they cause so much commotion for a rock? I try feeling it for any Maka, but there is nothing. Putting it back in the bag, I let out a frustrated sigh. Korra almost had Arrum and I killed for a rock.
“That woman…” I seethe, starting to share Arrum’s feelings about her.
A tremor through the rafters draws my attention. My eyes blink faster than they ever have before as I see the blue-haired woman on the other side, running toward me. Her pace is unnatural. My feet freeze, looking around quickly, she came from where I intended to exit. How could she have gotten there so fast? It doesn’t make any sense. There is no escaping her from here, nowhere soft to land, if I jump only the void awaits me. So, this is how I am to die. By a stranger’s hands, over a rock. My hand grips the railing, tightly squeezing it, anger spilling from me… no. This is not how I die. There is always a way.
This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
Closing my eyes, I feel the woman’s pounding boots growing closer, rattling the thin metal frame of the rafters. Be calm. Air fills my lungs, my mind wants to race, my heart wants to thrash, but the slow exhale presses all things from me. Until I become one with the calm. With the calm comes order in my thoughts. My hand places the bag over the edge of the railing as I open my eyes.
“Don’t!” the woman yells, her pace slowing as she puts her hands up, her voice becoming softer as she comes closer still “Wait, it doesn’t have to be like this. Just tell me what you want.”
What do I want? The idea of asking for anything I want is preposterous. Especially from a stranger. Yet for some reason, I feel no deceit in her tone. Even after we have robbed her, and ransom her things, she still speaks with kindness. There is a feeling that rises in me, like I feel guilty for taking from someone so kind. My jaw flexes as I respond to her question, there is only one thing I have always desired for me and those I care for.
“Namat,” I say.
“Just wait, please.” She says, stopping only ten paces from me “I don’t know the Kuwathi language.”
“Come closer and I will drop it,” I say as she takes another step.
There are so many questions I wish to ask her. How is she so strong? I do not hear any mechanical parts from her body like the man. Nor do I feel Maka swelling in the air around her. She does not make sense to me. If she is not Arasha or Kuwathi, what is she? Who is she? The thoughts brush away as the calm fills me again.
“What do you want?” she asks, moving to take a step, my hand loosens moving my hold to the end of the strings “Okay, okay, I’m sorry.”
She backs away a pace.
“You don’t understand what is in your hand.” She says, her tone is still trying to be kind, but there is a fervent seriousness that strikes the undertone “That is not something that will bring you good fortune. It is evil and cursed. Please, give it back.”
The rock is evil and cursed? It is a rock. I am sure of it. I have seen many just like it in the mines. Why has she done so much for a…
Suddenly a loud whiz flies past my ear, then another, the platform of thin metal we stand upon groans and shakes as molten metal drips down to the perilous ground beneath us. I roll to cover my face from the splatters of plasma ripping through the structure. The woman looks down at the bag and then back to me, the rafters slam onto its lower braces as the uppers melt away. More shots come in a rain of fire.
“Slagging hells.” The woman curses, grabbing me by the arm.
I try to roll my wrist but her hands are like stone, she pulls me into her, and I try to push away but I cannot.
“Stop fighting me, I’m trying to help you.” She says, her tone is more annoyed now.
A beautiful shimmer of light erupts around her as one of the plasma bolts slams into her. The belt on her waist hums with light, and Maka swells in the air from it, rich and pure Maka, unlike what we find in the mines. As the plasma rolls off the shield made of light, the belt stops glowing, the shield disappearing back into it. I have never seen anything like it.
“Hold me tightly.” She says, releasing me “I need both hands for this.”
For what? I back away from her, the latticework of metal beginning to fold on itself, breaking free of the anchor points that hold it up. We are going to fall to our deaths. We are both going to die… for a rock.
“I said hold me!” she demands, grabbing my arm and pulling me off the edge of the metal.
The air grasps us in its embrace as we begin to fall. The woman extends a hand outwards towards the ground, it is then that I feel it. Like taking my first breath of Maka when the Sage taught me to feel it. The air around her explodes with waves of Maka, so thick it strangles the air. Runes ignite so brightly on her body that I can see them through her arm's clothing. The air quakes as the Maka begins to move, as though by some design working itself into patterns of overlapping rings—increasing in intensity until I feel a tug as our descent begins to slow.
She is using Maka to slow us… impossible. I have never heard of such usage, the control required would be unthinkable. How is she doing this? She groans over the wind loudly as the clothing around her arm begins to smoke from the heat of her runes. So much Maka. More than any shard I have felt, hidden inside her. How can this be? The ground is coming fast despite her efforts, not fast enough to kill, but my body will break. She pulls me in right before we hit it, turning her back to the ground and wrapping her arms around me.
She is trying to save me. After everything we did to her. My organs slam against my ribs as we land, the blue-haired woman taking the brunt of the fall. I am dazed for a few moments, but manage to stagger to my feet checking myself for injuries, then looking down, I see her trying to stand. I move to help her. To my disbelief she stands without me, free of injuries, save the large crack on her mask and the tears in her clothes. What is she? Who is she?
She turns to look at me, even with the crack in her tinted mask I can’t make out her face. She looks at the stolen bag on the ground between us. Then back at me. My jaw flexes. I cannot take it now, not after she has saved me.
“Take it.” I say, giving her a small bow, shame building in me for causing her so much trouble “Thank you.”
She nods to me, picking it up.
“Good luck to you.” She says sincerely.
Her words spur greater shame in me, not only did she save me after we stole, but now she wishes me luck. If there were more time, I would ask her many questions, about the Sage, about how she is so strong, about how she controls Maka like that. There is no time for questions though, I hear metal boots echoing around us in the frost and dust-coated air. I do not want to be here when they arrive, so I slip into the walkway near us, leaving the blue-haired woman behind. Racing now toward where Korra left the dead man. That is where she and Arrum will probably be, where they must be. Worry rises in me, wondering if they made it out with Korra’s injuries.