Activating my rocket pack, I flew toward them as Jaclyn raced across the ground, moving slower and more carefully than usual to avoid launching herself into the ceiling.

I’d done the same with the rockets without thought.

The Xiniti implants helped with that, implanting that skill along with all the other knowledge we had available.

As good as that was, it meant we weren’t moving as quickly as we could on Earth, giving us time to watch the inevitable.

Victor’s arm moved faster than we did, hitting Marcus in the middle of his chest and going through. With anyone else, blood and organs would have been shooting out the other side, but with Marcus it was different.

Victor’s hand exited the other side surrounded by gray strands, but no blood.

He blinked, staring as Marcus moved sideways, freeing himself from being pierced by Victor’s arm by sliding around it with Marcus’ armor doing the same.

As happy as I was that Marcus’ powers (like Jaclyn’s) worked within Victor’s purple glow, I couldn’t help but feel relief to see that his suit stayed on and moved with him.

Making an armored suit that could adjust and move with a shapeshifter whose basic form was practically liquid had been an interesting challenge. Nanotech made it easier, but not trivial. I’d learned things.

What I didn’t anticipate as part of my design was the Victor might freak out. Seeing the gray strands, he pulled back his hand to scream, “Abominator!”

His eyes were as wide as the first character in a horror movie that finds the monster. His body trembled.

That’s the point at which his right hand glowed a brighter purple tinged with white. Though I was closing, I knew he’d be able to hit Marcus long before I or one of my bots knocked him out of reach.

That’s when Jaclyn hit him. I didn’t do the math, but my gut feeling was that she hit him with everything she had and didn’t hold back. Why? Because I heard her punch hit his diaphragm. More than that, it registered in my HUD as an area of effect attack.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

Victor shot backward, taking a shot at her with his glowing hand, leaving silver-white sparkles in his wake—which seemed a bit more Disney princess than I expected.

He missed. He wouldn’t have, but Jaclyn moved her head back as her fist drove him backward.

The problem with teleporting opponents is that they don’t have to keep on going in the direction you sent them. Victor disappeared, reappearing to the side of her, still flying backward with the momentum she’d given him.

This time he hit her. He didn’t hit her hard. He flipped over in the air, catching her shoulder with a finger. It couldn’t have hurt, but a purple glow surrounded her and she disappeared.

Wondering where she’d gone prompted my implant to answer. She was twenty miles away on the moon’s surface, but that’s as far as I got.

I’d fired off a few bots while flying toward Victor. They had to redirect after Jaclyn hit him and he teleported, but they hit him as Jaclyn disappeared, all three exploding, knocking him back—except the killbot.

Instead of cutting into him with monomolecular blades, he pointed his hand at it and it burned out before it reached him—which made me optimistic. He’d have ignored it if it couldn’t hurt him.

Despite the explosions from the boombots, he had enough presence of mind to teleport again, this time next to me. I saw his right hand coming and blocked with my left forearm, stopping his hand from touching me.

He grunted as he hit my arm and now that he was within a couple feet of me, I could tell that we were hurting him. A red imprint of Jaclyn’s fist swelled on his stomach, bleeding in a few spots. Red spots on the exposed skin of his face and chest might have come from being burnt, but my boombots were more likely.

I’d already started throwing a punch at him when I blocked his arm, barraging him with the sonics at the same time. At least I tried to.

Despite cringing at the sound from the sonics, his right arm flared. I’d been able to block teleports by tapping Artificer abilities the last time I fought Victor, but couldn’t feel them now.

I found myself alone in the air above the moon, aware of what was happening inside the Abominator base only because our comms were still in range and Cassie and Marcus broadcast it to our HUDs.

My first image from Cassie showed her firing her gun’s white beam at Victor, hitting him and making him screech. The beam left charred skin on his chest and arm.

His face tight and eyes wide, Victor teleported to Marcus his screech of pain turning into, “There’s Abominator in you,” and grabbing for Marcus’ shoulder. Victor’s hand shot forward with enough strength and speed that his fingers sank three inches deep into Marcus’ shoulder.

Before Marcus could turn liquid and slip out of Victor’s grip, Victor’s hand flared again and the two of them disappeared, reappearing out on the surface of the Moon.

I checked the distance. They were more than 80 miles away. Jaclyn and I might be able to make it, but realistically Marcus was on his own.