{Enki | Pantheon}

“Well, fuck.”

Kyle appreciated his influence on Silence’s vocabulary, and he appreciated that Tameka apparently gave her an earpiece along with the two Gargantuan Lyriks, who shared an “oh shit” look. Like seriously. What kind of warning was that? With drizzle glistening in his hair, Andrew communicated wordlessly with Lucas, trying to keep Remorse and Bol from noticing. Unfortunately, the two Primaries were glaring at Silence after her outburst.

With the villain’s backs turned to her, Sagan drank her vessel of Rayne’s blood.

Through the rain, Kyle reached out his hand to Silence, for all the life in him trying to convey with his eyes, “Hang. On.” Shit. Primary Rem saw everything.

“What do you think you’re doing?” His voice boomed the question throughout the Pantheon, disrupting the surrounding droplets.

Diverting his attention, Tumu asked, “Have you forgotten what comfort and warmth look like, Remorse?”

Primary Rem humphed. “This looks more like fear to me. Fear of what—”

“Remorse.” An enormous three-dimensional projection of a man who could only be Razor appeared in the sky, wearing a fancy suit and a cavalier expression. Despite the lack of a corporeal body, rain poured from the brim of his top hat.

With relief in his deafening voice, the evil Primary asked, “Razor, is the conduit ready?”

Razor cocked his head to the side, staring at the Tritan with his bizarre eyes, remote. “There’s been an unforeseeable delay.”

Kyle’s mouth fell open. Was this for real?

Remorse sounded disappointed, but not surprised. “Ah. The Seamswalker got to you, didn’t she, son?”

The Last Aegis tapped his cane on an invisible surface, splashing a puddle. He lowered his head until the brim of his hat hid his eyes, considering. “‘Son.’ A word with so much significance. With that one word, you destroyed the last vestiges of my relationship with the Exalted, my people. With it, you convinced a child to condemn himself to a lifetime as your Weapon, so he could grow strong enough to protect the family you and I ruined. Now, you call your malleable grandchild ‘son,’ scheming to turn the boy against his father. Well, old friend, I don’t see that in your future. I see the end.” With that, Razor neatly tucked his cane under his arm and opened an umbrella. “This time, the flood comes for you.”

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Lightning fast, Tumu snatched Primary Bol’s robes and headbutted the bastard. The Gargantuan enemy went down, unmoving.

Kyle whooped, grinning until he saw the look on Silence’s face. She was staring at him with so much… sorrow. Blazing like a beacon, she soared into the fray.

“Silence!” Kyle wanted to know what the look meant. Wanted to know how close she was to the final stage of her nacre’s expiration date. But Andrew grabbed his arm, while Lucas and Smith formed a blockade. All three faces were grim.

No.

Kyle wasn’t having it. “What’s she doing?!”

Smith answered, “Her job.”

Silence flitted into Primary Rem’s face and knocked the monster a good one in the temple with a satisfying crack.

Meanwhile, Bones flew in and activated Tumu’s compression orb, since the big guy was staggering between Aria and Torch after the noggin knocker. On the wet ground, Lamassau swept his damsel in distress into his arms and made for one of the many evacuation conduits. The two Gargantuan Lyriks compressed without orbs as far as Kyle could see, and followed the other Tritans through an octagon of conduits. Sagan was really pressing her advantage with Rayne’s blood. And there. The sweeping conduit scooped troops and Gait’s Children alike into an energy net, transporting them presumably to Ishkur.

After listening to his earpiece, Andrew tied back his drenched hair, muttering, “Sagan’s coming to get us next.”

“But Silence…” Kyle watched her battle the man responsible for so much pain her in life, delivering skull-shattering blows and working through some trauma in time to the lightning strobing the dark sky. “How will Sagan snatch her without grabbing Remorse?”

Lucas and Smith shared a look before the golden-eyed Icarus assured, “We won’t leave without the Mother. We’ll stay by her side.”

Kyle didn’t like the sound of that. Like they planned to stay back and die with her to keep Remorse pinned to some invisible target, but even as he considered it, the pair hovered away, giving space for—

The Seam, all purple and happy—Then rolling onto a glass gangway over—

Whoa.

The swirling black flames below flashed Kyle back to the epic swirly from his first solo Icarus fight on Invasion Day, but on a much less survivable scale. Travel by rolling conduit sucked. It left his stomach with the same feeling as driving too fast down a hill. He groaned—

Someone pulled him to his feet with ease.

“Hey.” It was Tameka. “Welcome to Ishkur boys.”

Andrew asked before Kyle got the words out, “What about Lucas, Silence, and Smith?”

Tameka frowned, puzzled. “What about them?”

Kyle said, “I think they’re on some suicide mission. They stayed behind, fighting Remorse.”

Xelan was beyond Tameka, playing with Pax and settling people into the new Sphere. Tameka turned and gazed at them. Kyle feared she was soaking them in. When she faced Andrew and Kyle again, Tameka’s eyes were fierce. “I promise. I’ll bring her back.” She stepped through a permanent conduit leading to an identical platform. Through it, Kyle heard Tameka say, “Razor, open a conduit back to the Pantheon.”

“Fury, I can’t guarantee your survival.”

“Oh, you’d just love that, wouldn’t you?”

Then the future Empress of the Vast Collective stepped through a conduit to save the Mother of the galaxy without informing her husband, her son, or even her best friends.

Andrew was so helpful. “Xelan will be pissed at you if she dies, dude.” And so right.

“Shit.”