TS6 - Chapter 18

“Are you ready Kat?”  Kaleek asked, a fist sized rock in his palm as he stood about twenty paces away from her.

She took a deep breath before closing her eyes.  Without the distraction of sight, the sphere marked by her gravity domain jumped into sharp focus.  Kat could feel the Earth itself pulling down on Kaleek in front of her as well as Whippoorwill and Heather on either side.  

Beside the three of them and the machinery mounted on tripods in front of Heather and Whip, the training gym was entirely empty.  After it had come out that Millennium was behind the attempt on Kat’s life at the coffee shop, Heather had become extra cautious.  Suddenly, Kat found herself even more isolated.  Whenever she needed to be out and about, there would be an entire team of guards and 3445 mercenaries, but none were allowed within four or five paces of her ‘just in case.’  Outside of her organization’s leadership and the aliens, she hadn’t seen anyone in person for at least a couple of weeks.

Kat exhaled, letting her breath and her concerns leave her body at the same time.  She gave Kaleek a shallow nod.

The desoph reared back, gripping the rock in both hands before throwing it as hard as possible at Kat.  Meanwhile, on either side of her, Whip and Heather activated their devices.

Tennis balls launched toward her from either side, and Kat sank even deeper into her domain.  Time seemed to fade away as she mentally located each of the three projectiles and grabbed hold of their gravity.

Mana pulsed through her body, infusing her aura.  She pulled back and down, mentally creating a vector that pointed at the feet of each of the people that had launched one of the spheres at her.

They slowed, twisted gravity stealing their momentum as Kat’s mana built more and more in the domain until you could practically feel the magic crackling through the air.  Both of the tennis balls dropped to the ground, bouncing once before they began rolling back toward Whip and Heather, but the rock had more force.

Kat felt sweat begin to bead on her forehead as she pumped even more mana into her domain.  At this point she was sure that the energy was visible to the naked eye.  She could practically feel the charge in the air around her building as her gravity clamped down on the rock.

Just as she felt like she was about to succeed, Kaleek picked up a second stone, this one about half the size as the first, and threw it at her as well.

Adrenaline pulsed through her body as Kat tried to grab hold of both rocks.  Her control over the first wobbled, and Heather fired another tennis ball at her.

Kat tried to push more mana into her domain, but she was at her limit, her aura eating almost four mana per second.  The magic had expanded its range and the force with which she could repulse the ‘attacks,’ but it did nothing to improve her control.

The second rock was just moving too fast.  Kat had already slowed the first one to the point where it was clearly going to fall short, and the tennis balls didn’t have the power or weight to properly cut through the air resistance.  It wouldn’t be that hard to apply a touch of extra gravity to it in order to stop the attack so long as Kat had a moment to focus.

But she didn’t have a moment to focus.

Just as one stone clattered to the ground, the second one hit her in the stomach, knocking the wind out of her.

Kat staggered back, reaching down to rub the rapidly growing bruise.  Her domain had slowed the rock down and shifted its trajectory enough to stop it from doing any real damage, but that didn’t mean that it didn’t hurt.

Kaleek was incredibly strong.  Now that he was in the real world, the desoph was no longer handicapped by the neutral baseline stats that the Tower of Somnus gave to every dreamer.  His race was naturally muscular, and months of constant leveling had only increased his inherent strength.

Each of the rocks was probably the equivalent of a shotgun firing beanbag rounds or a rubber bullet.  Not something that would be deadly so long as she managed to avoid taking a knock to the head, but enough to break bones and cause some serious pain if Kat didn’t manage to actually stop the attacks.

“That was pretty good!”  Kaleek called out cheerfully as he picked up another rock.  “You managed to stop one, but I think you got a bit distracted by the second stone.  I’ve seen the weapons your people use, and as good as you are, I don’t think that it’ll be enough to stop a gun at this point.  The bullets are just too fast and there are too many of them for your current skill level.”

“Of course,” He continued, eyes glinting playfully as he tossed and caught the rock, “that’s only for right now.  We can’t actually increase the range or force of your domain outside of the tower, but if we practice enough I bet we can increase your grasp on the area you can control.  The more familiar you are with your abilities, the more smoothly you’ll be able to use them in a combat scenario.”

“You’re right,” Kat replied with a wince, rubbing the bruise again.  “The second rock got through because I was overwhelmed and distracted.  With enough practice I’ll be able to shore up those weaknesses.  Honestly?  I think this is where I should be focusing most of my waking time.  I’m pretty sure that fine tuning my domain like this all but giving me free levels in the Manipulate Aura upgrade that I keep seeing and ignoring.  I’d be foolish to ignore that sort of opportunity.”

Whippoorwill and Heather shared a look across the gymnasium.  Kat could practically hear the unspoken conversation between the two of them before Whip spoke up.

“By ‘most of my waking time’ you mean ‘a healthy amount, maybe three to four hours a day interspersed with low impact cardio and spending time with my girlfriend, friends, and family, right?”

Kat froze for a second before reaching up to scratch the back of her head sheepishly.

“Not really?”  She hazarded.  “Right now I’m in a race with Mr. Jackson, and my starting line was a league behind him.  I need to catch up, and I need to catch up fast.  Worse-”

She stopped for a second, chewing her lower lip.

“Worse, changing my skills on the fly made me weaker in the short term.  I’m worried that I won’t be able to cut it in the upcoming dungeons.  Every silver tier is a lot, and we were barely keeping our heads above water before I changed my skills-”

“Kat,” Whippoorwill said sternly, crossing her arms in front of her chest.

“We’re already rushing ahead because of me Whip,” Kat continued, shaking her head.  “Most ambitious parties stop for a couple days between dungeons at higher levels.  That gives them time to relax, gather information, and practice with their new abilities against normal enemies.  Dorrik and Kaleek are already risking so much by pushing ahead with me, and now here I am.  Slowing them down.  God, I can’t-”

“Kat,” Whip said again.  At some point she had closed the gap between them.  Her pink hair swished slightly across her shoulders as Whippoorwill put one hand on each of Kat’s arms, gripping her biceps tightly.

She blinked.  Suddenly the world was blurry with tears.

“You’re putting too much on your own shoulders again,” Whip said quietly.  “Whatever’s going on, I’m sure it’s a problem, but it’s not a problem that you’re going to solve on your own by working yourself until your fingers bleed.  You have friends.  We can help.  At a minimum, you need to take some time for yourself here and there to rest.”

“I rest plenty,” Kat mumbled.  “I’m sleeping almost ten hours a night now in order to make sure that we have time to travel to some of the more far flung dungeons.”

“That isn’t rest,” Whippoorwill replied, shaking her head.  “That’s work.  You might not be physically tired, but it’ll wear at your mind.  There’s only so long you can stay in top form day in and day out before your focus starts to slip.  Before long, you’ll find yourself making dumb mistakes.”

“I know,” she continued.  “After Xander passed, I-”  Whippoorwill stopped talking for a second.  This time, it was Kat’s turn to reach up and take hold of her girlfriend’s hands, squeezing them tightly.

When Whip started talking again, her voice was a lot quieter.  “I wanted to find out who exactly was behind his death.  I wanted to tear Milennium and the Stallesp apart, but I couldn’t bear to see anyone else.  So I locked myself away and started programming.  Stimulants would keep me awake so I could work for forty hours at a time, but past a certain point, no matter how many chemicals you consume, it won’t keep you sharp.  I started making more and more errors in my code.  By the time you pulled me out of my funk, most of the new subroutines I’d coded were practically unusable.  I had to pull them apart and start over.”

“I know what it’s like Kat,” Whippoorwill whispered, squeezing Kat’s hands back.  “That weight on your chest, the quiet desperation as you push yourself night after night to try and make the impossible possible.  I know you don’t like delegating.  Heck, neither of us do, but you’re a shareholder and you still run missions from time to time.  It’s dumb, we both know that, but you keep doing it because you’re convinced that you’re the best option available.  I understand all of that Kat, but you’ve been burning the candle at both ends.  If you aren’t careful, you’re going to crack, and then everything will truly fall apart.”

“She’s right Kat,” Kaleek rumbled softly.  “Neither Dorrik nor I have called you weak, and there’s a reason for that.  Your current skillset makes you a bad match for a ranged fight with an ephemeral or nonsolid opponent so you got roughed up in our most recent fight.”

He shrugged before breaking into a self depreciating chuckle.

“I would’ve been an even worse matchup for that slime Kat.  There’s no way for me to reach the ceiling and it just would’ve pelted me with those little bombs until it slowly shredded my armor.  Sure it probably would’ve taken it an hour to kill me, but it would’ve killed me.”

“Think about the same fight,” he continued, “but what would happen if the monster only had twenty or so paces of range on its attacks.  How would you have responded?”

Kat thought for a moment, some of her gloom clearing up as she mentally worked her way back through the battle.

“I would’ve immediately ripped it off of the ceiling and used its own weight to spike it into the dungeon floor like a football,” she said slowly.  “If it managed to survive, I would’ve pounced on it and used Blade Burst until it stopped moving.  I didn’t get a chance to see if it had any special abilities, but I’d be surprised if the entire fight lasted more than fifteen seconds.”

“Exactly,” Kaleek said.  “I’ll be honest, Kat.  I wouldn’t like to fight you either.  Some of my skills could keep me in it, but I’ve seen what your gravity domain can do to a person sized opponent.  You’d juggle me through the air while you cut me apart.  I might get lucky tanking a hit with Adamant Body long enough for a counter attack, but hitting someone as shifty as you is hard even when ‘down’ isn’t spinning wildly the entire time.”

“Nah,” he finished.  “I’d be more likely to throw up on you than kill you.  Seriously Kat.  Don’t think of yourself as weak and never think of yourself as a burden.  You’re a friend.”

Emotions welled up inside of her and Kat wasn’t sure how to respond.  Part of her wanted to cry.  Another part wanted to laugh.  A final part just wanted to collapse, releasing all of the stress that was weighing down on her as she slumped into a boneless heap.

Instead, she released Whip’s hand and leaned over to punch the desoph in his shoulder, burying her fist almost up to the wrist in his fur.

“Of course we’re friends, you big idiot,” she said with a laugh.  “Why else would I hang out with someone like you?  It certainly isn’t your moral character.  You literally just tried to smuggle drugs onto my planet after all!”

“Well as my grandpa always said: one man’s illegal smuggling is another man’s importing a prohibited substance without notice or license in order to fill a vital spike in consumer demand,” Kaleek replied, winking at her.  “Of course, that was before he had to spend two years in jail for brewing ruusht wine without paying taxes on it and selling the product to some of our area’s dodgier taverns.”

“Aren’t you a physicist or something?” Kat asked, squinting at Kaleek.  “Honestly, between Dorrik and I you always seemed to be the one of us that had the most normal life.  Now I’m finding out that your grandpa was a bootlegger or something?”

“Well,” Kaleek said unapologetically, “He was a scientist too, but a man needs some hobbies.  Skirting the law is an enjoyable and time honored tradition.  There are entire desoph pods that engage in ritual piracy against other pods.  So long as they pay for the stuff the stole after the fact, no one complains too much, especially if they buy the sore losers a couple of beers.  When grandpa was in jail, he spent the entire time working.  Paid his fine off in the first couple of months.  After that they let him out on the weekends.  Honestly?  I don’t think his life changed all that much while he was imprisoned other than that they didn’t let him brew anymore unlicensed ruusht wine.  He complained about that a lot.”

“Don’t worry so much about Kaleek,” Whippoorwill said, reaching up to wipe her eyes with the back of a hand.  “I think he’s a bit crazy by any normal standards, just remember that he’s making a point.  Everyone needs a hobby.  If you only focus on training and developing your skills twenty hours a day, you’ll go mad.  Heather and I can work on finding a way to come up with new exercises for maximizing your skill growth.”

“And we’re already working on tracking down Mr. Jackson,” Heather chimed in as she walked toward the three of them.  “Sorry for not speaking up earlier, I felt like I was intruding.”

Kat nodded at her, urging her security chief to continue.

“We’ve been making good progress since the party,” Heather said.  “Honestly?  I think we all expected him to be in Antarctica or the Bahamas or something, but he’s close.  It’s hard to tell exactly where he is at any point in time, but he seems to be spending most of his time nearby.  Like, within a couple hundred leagues nearby.”

“In Grocorp territory then,” Kat replied with a frown.  “Do you think any of the other shareholders are hiding him?  We had that happen once before.”

Heather shook her head.  “First, we don’t know if it's his only base.  Second, the amount of time and money Millennium spent on building safehouses and shell mercenary groups working under them is astounding.  Frankly, I think they’ve been aiming toward some brand of world domination for years now.  There’s no way they would build up an organization this robust or secretive without some sort of intention of challenging the megacorps.  Finally, the other shareholders don’t exactly love you, but they don’t like an organization that tried to financially cripple Grocorp as part of a plot to assassinate you even more.  Executives and vice presidents are allowed to kill each other in order to claw their way to the top, but shareholders are supposed to be sacrosanct.  At least according to the other shareholders.”

“When you say that Millennium was ‘robust and secretive,’ how bad was it?”  Kat questioned.  “We’ve had worldwide agreements to dismantle them two to three times now, and despite everything, they seem to still be alive and kicking.

“I mean,” Heather responded, voice turning thoughtful, “I haven’t exactly seen their profit loss sheet or anything, but I’m pretty sure their size and strength probably rivaled that of a megacorp if you included all of their subsidiaries.”

“How did they turn a profit then?”  Kat asked, brow furrowing.  “Everyone needed mercenaries, but that was usually a couple samurai teams here and there.  I could see corporations needing hundreds of samurai, but you’re making it sound like there were thousands upon thousands of soldiers that they kept in hiding.”

“There were,” Heather replied.  “Not anymore, we’ve managed to hunt down most of them, and more than a couple were using stallesp derived technology to hide from mundane searches so it's not terribly surprising that they managed to linger until we put some serious effort into tracking them down.  Enough soldiers to fight a megacorp in the open or execute lightning strikes on the leadership of all of them simultaneously without any clear means of supporting that many elite soldiers.  I can’t explain it without pointing to outside influence, but we already know that there was outside influence.”

She took a deep breath, fixing her gaze on Heather.

“Can we take them?” Kat asked.  “If we can actually track Mr. Jackson down, will our security forces be able to bring him down or will he slip away from us again?”

“Maybe?” Heather replied.  “If Mr. Jackson stays in our territory, probably.  If he leaves?  God knows.  I’m sure we can put together a strike with the 3445, but I can’t promise that it will actually catch him.  The man’s as slippery as an eel.  Until I know precisely what I’m working with, I can’t give you any promises.”

Kat nodded.  As unsatisfying as the answer was, she couldn’t argue with it.  Mr. Jackson was like a phantom, and he’d been haunting her, and by extension Grocorp for almost a year now.  Army after army had ‘almost’ caught him only for the mercenary to escape. She needed him dead, either in the tower or in reality, but neither was easy.

She took a deep breath.  There wasn’t any purpose in wallowing in her anxiety and stress.  Whippoorwill was right.  Kat couldn’t burn herself out practicing, but at the same time, collapsing face first on a couch and not moving wouldn’t make anything better either.  All she could do was identify the options available to her and try to pick the best of them.

“Find him,” Kat said.  “When the time comes, I’m not going to care about a surgical strike.  If he’s in Grocorp territory?  We have the army to root him out.  If he’s somewhere else?  I’m fine with strategic weaponry.  Get one of the plasma cannons on the stallesp battlecruiser working.  We can radiation proof the hover tanks and the APEX armor so that the 3445 can operate safely on any sort of clean up missions.”

“But what if he’s in a city?”  Whippoorwill asked quietly.  “I’ve seen some of the mockups of what those plasma cannons can do.  One shot would glass most of a suburb unless there was some serious shielding and armor.”

Kat winced, showing a flash of emotion before she steeled herself.

“The entire planet is at stake.  I hope it doesn’t come to that, but we need Mr. Jackson dead.  If that means using a weapon of mass destruction in another corporation’s territory-”

She didn’t finish the sentence.  She didn’t need to.  Everyone knew the grim truth of the situation.

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