Alec crouched in the final stretch of the ramp and peeked up over the

  edge. The platform itself was guarded, but every eye was turned to the battle towards the train yard. Tucked just in the front were the four Apocalypse riders, each scanning the vehicle approach. From his vantage point on the small service ramp, Alec could see that the platform itself was covered in crates that emitted a soft purple glow. The rest was littered with Earth Prime’s soldiers wearing the branding of many smaller houses. The baron was exchanging Aamaranth for military support, and by the looks of what was on the platform, he had many waiting in reserve. Alec was glad they had decided to strike tonight. The rift-station gate stood silent as he waved Preacher and T’sala to him.

  He indicated a collection of Sapper tubes to the left of the ramp. The tubes were designed to withstand the harshest of conditions on many planets. They would protect them from the initial follies of Energon and Slugs that the group would throw at them. The challenge would be the sheer numbers, and of course, the four elite single-minded riders.

  “New plan,” Alec whispered as he looked at T’sala. “Set up there and aim at the deck, take as many of those soldiers as you can, but…” He looked intensely at T’sala, “Do not hit any crates. It looks like the barons got crates all around the gate itself. It’ll do us a favour when it’s time to blow it sky high, but for now we don’t want it crashing down on us.”

  Preacher cut it,” Plus darling look…” They indicated the flashing ready light at the top of the gateway. “Station’s still primed, I don’t think the Smudge and Maywil have found success yet. If we do this too early, we all go in a glorious rift-storm.”

  “Right.” Alec turned his eyes from Preacher’s to T’sala’s once more. “That’s important, T’sala. The people need to make it away with the kids first. Quip’s waiting to take groups out of danger, but it looks like the baron’s got reinforcements.” He breathed a calming breath, “We knew this was inevitable.” He placed his hand on T’salas and Preachers in return. He recalled an old line from a poem he thought may serve as both inspiration and eulogy. Either way, it seemed appropriate here. “With the fury of a thousand suns!”

  T’sala took two Teretha with her to her cover with speed and stealth. All three blended like darkness in shadow. Preacher and the remaining Teretha left with urgency. Preacher's boots did not fall as light as the Teretha, and Alec knew he had moments before they drew attention. Alec did not like to split up like this; he wanted to stay near T’sala, and if he was honest, the lack of an impact suit had him searching for hope in allies. He mustered his strength and pushed Aamaranth into his veins. Whichever way this went, he would make sure it landed in the legends of either side. Alec jumped high into the air with the silence of an owl in flight. With his focus at full, the movements of the troops below seemed stuck in time. Alec whistled low with eight tones for his right-hand revolver. The one on his left, he did not indicate any target. It had a greater purpose.

  He landed where he intended, where no one in their right mind with a life to lose would land. The metal of his spurs rang out in momentary, silenced shock as his leap left him standing directly in the middle of the four apocalypse riders. With his right hand, Alec fired directly up into the air. The whistlers knew their intended targets, the ones most likely to successfully target T’sala. With his left hand, untargetted Alec unloaded all eight whistlers into one of the Apocalypse rider’s faces. Glass exploded from the visor the elite soldier wore, and Alec’s rounds exposed the rider's face, skull, then brain. The apocalypse riders all flinched; one fell dead to the floor. Three remained standing, targeting their deadly energon weapons at Alec.

  In an instant, the platform became a battlefield. Preacher struck from the left. Again, no weapon in hand, they began to dance through soldiers, punching and swinging their hardened synth skin limbs into soft, fleshy humans. The Teretha opened covering fire from behind another collection of sappers. The soldiers fired back, and Alec could see the bright purple arcs of the enhanced energon that had left his impact suit limp and short-circuiting. T’sala was in more danger here than he had anticipated. He wondered how the baron had managed to craft so many of the special weapons in such a short time. Then it all clicked for Alec. The crates on the deck were not just Aamaranth; they were filled with Aamaranth-powered rifles. Enough to win a coup of the baronhood magistrate on earth's prime. All the houses represented here were surely allies of the Sinclair Baronhood, called upon as allies to prove their allegiance before the true prize. The thought of a man like Baron von Sinclair ruling the baronhood horrified even Alec. The man had proven himself to be a true mastermind of vicious strategy.

  A large boom interrupted Alecs's thought as a round from his bloodfire rifle rang out. T’sala took a group of 12 near the far edge of the platform in a fireball of purple and viscera. It drew the attention of the nearest soldiers, who opened fire. One caught a Tereatha to T’sala’s right, and they went down in a pool of blood. T’sala was new to the impact suit and did not yet know of the limiting capacity of the Aamaranth-laced ammunition. One was caught by the suit near her left elbow, and she called out in frustration as the bloodfire rifle fell from her grasp. Alec wanted to run to her side, but he was now engaged in the fight of his life with the remaining three apocalypse riders. They were extending their long energon whips as Alec analyzed the space around him. There was no more room to run or leap. Preacher and T’sala, like the many Teretha engaged in the fight of their lives, would need to save themselves.

  Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

  Alec spun and slid under and around two whip cracks. The other rider dug in a metal-bound boot and threw something to the place where Alec would be. The first two attacks Alec felt so confident about avoiding were merely corralling him to the right spot. A dagger sunk into some flesh that still bound his shoulder to the Aamaranth in his arm. He called out in pain and pushed extra Aamaranth to the spot as he pulled out the dagger. The wound stitched itself together as the blade left. It had taken a decent amount of Aamaranth, but it served two purposes. The first, of course, was healing. Alec needed both arms firing and moving if he was going to survive this. The second was to strike some fear into the riders, help them embrace the ethos of the immortal and watch them flee.

  They did not flee, but they did hesitate. In unison, connected through their hive mind, the two cracked whips again, moving Alec to a new position. The other took another dagger and threw. At the last second, Alec embraced one of the enegon whips. He swallowed the hot electric pain and used the momentum to exchange places with the Rider. The blade landed true where Alec’s heart should have been. It was not his, however, but that of the rider that met the blade, and the body went limp. Alec let it fall but held on to the whip. He cracked it twice, warding off the two remaining riders back. He could see information flash in their digital eye coverings. He took the needed moment to assess the battlefield.

  T’sala was nowhere near her cover; two Teretha bodies lay there, one still struggling while bleeding out. The baron’s soldiers were searching the space. Preacher had lost one of their troupe but had not stopped momentum. The soldiers closest were taking fearful steps backwards, but Alec could see many holes riddled through synthflesh. Preacher better hope the soldiers didn’t hit any vital systems. Above Alec, a blaring alarm rang out, and large forty-foot letters began broadcasting a countdown. High up above in a control tower, Alec could see the silhouette of the baron. He was activating the rift. Alec swallowed and begged the universe to aid Maywil, Smudge and Doc on their mission to take the power out. He tried to look down to the utility building where they should be, but a purple flash interrupted his vision. One of the riders nearly took his nose off.

  Alec pushed more Aamaranth into speed and focus; it took him down to a remaining thirty percent in this vial. He couldn’t afford to push at this rate. Another whip cracked, this time nearly taking his hand at the wrist. He also couldn’t afford to. Push. Dodge. Then again. The dance with these riders was not getting easier, even with two of their number down. It was a matter of computing power, with the quantum neuro-net that kept them connected, able to allocate more power to individuals; the challenge only got harder. Alec saw a flash of information on both visors, and in unison, the riders cast their whips and threw the daggers from their boots. It was inevitable that Alec would be hit by one of the directed attacks as they came in from all angles. He chose to push and twist in a mid-air jump to take a dagger to the forearm. In the same movement, he cast out his hand with the reflexors jumping to life. In an instant, he entwined the two ends of the energon whips together. The flash of raw energy was astounding, and in a purple shower of sparks, one of the rider's arms was removed.

  Both mimed pain, and Alec did not take the time to look this time. He continued his motion, taking up the arm that still held the whip alongside the one he had taken. With the momentum he had, Alec slid to his knees under the stumbling amputated Apocalypse rider. Both whips snaked around his torso like angry vipers, and Alec tugged hard. The rider was quartered in a violent display of purple, bone and blood. Alec popped his elbow and drew a new Aamaranth vial with his other arm. The empty launched free, and the new one fell into place with a click. Push. Dodge and slam. Alec was in front of the last rider in a moment. He had dropped his revolvers for the whips, which now lay in the pool that was the other rider.

  Alec had nothing but rage and his empty hands. Combined, they were just what he needed. Well, that and a shot of Aamaranth into his strength. He had caught the surprised remaining rider by his slack-jawed mouth. Alec needed to act quick before the full computing power kicked into this one’s quantum processor. Alec pulled and flexed the muscles in his arms and hands. He felt the teeth crack first, then the jaw, then slowly the rest gave way until Alec stood in the centre of the battlefield with the top part of a skull and the spine that came with it in one hand and the twitching body in the other. There was a roaring in Alec's ears as he took this moment to analyze the field.

  The soldiers closest to Alec stood in horrified awe, as if a demon stood among them. Some had dropped weapons entirely out of fear of the carnage that Alec personified. Across the platform, Preacher was alone, the final Teretha lying dead paces behind them. They were covered in human and showed no signs of exhaustion or slowing. Above him, numbers hit a countdown, and lights began blaring. Down the street, an explosion rang out, and Alec thought he saw the shapes of Maywill and Doc running in retreat. In the distance, Alec could see Quip pulling a hover-transport; the shapes clinging on were small. The children had been retrieved. That part was successful. Now, to bring this thing home. Alec picked up a revolver and looked around, finally for T’sala. He spotted her glow climbing a ladder in the distance. It was on the exterior of the control tower that the baron was in. She had spotted him and abandoned her post for her own revenge. Alec’s heart sank and then jumped into his throat as a familiar sound rang out.

  A whooshing and thrumming with an unmistakable crackle of energy. The rift had opened. Alec turned to see it take nearly twenty of the barons' men as it expanded out, stopping just shy of the spot Preacher was wreaking havoc. A small grounder crew took off from the platform through the rift. Alec fired at them but didn’t have time to tag them; he hoped his whistlers had found purchase on the other side. A milky vision resolved as the rift steadied. A body lay where Alec had fired, but an entire grounder crew on the other side had resolved the tuning. Through the portal, Alec saw two battalions of Empire Elite soldiers marching towards the gate. Each group was followed by an Apocalypse crew, but that did not worry Alec as much as what he saw behind the army marching towards them in the rift.

  It was a Dreadnaught, Leviathan Class. Alec had seen these in the capital square of the baronhood alone. Twenty feet high, armoured to withstand an Aamaranth blast and piloted by a crew of six, these large mech-bots were planet killers. The scourge of anything living that would dare take up arms against the wealthy baronhood. All the fury in every sun of the universe would not save them from this. If the dreadnaught made it through the rift gate, the battle would be lost.