Quantum wrath, p.7
Quantum Wrath, page 7
Whatever the cause, this warp felt like one of the longer ones. It was impossible to say exactly how long. But the exhilaration and agony stretched on until I felt like every nerve ending in my body was fucking shredded.
Finally, I managed to land in a lopsided crouch. Lu’s wrist was still tight in my grip, but she had landed face-first on the ground with a guttural retching sound.
That was the only thing I had time to notice.
As my sense of hearing rushed in, a fucking wall of sound slammed into me. Screams, booms, crashes, and roars pummeled my eardrums mercilessly.
I jerked my gaze upward to see what the hell was going on.
“Oh, holy hell,” I snarled.
Chapter 5
My words were lost in another ear-splitting boom. It was followed by a thundering shower of rubble that crashed down around us.
The following screams swallowed up my muttered curse. I yanked Lu to her feet so she wouldn’t be trampled by the crowd of people that was now streaming past us.
Well, this was utter fucking chaos from the get-go.
A hailstorm of metallic pings and clashes rang out. A dozen people went down under jagged, softball-sized golden projectiles. Before I could blink, half of the balls had unfolded themselves into giant metallic spiders and scuttled everywhere. The others quivered furiously before splitting off into still more golden balls, which promptly unfolded into smaller spiders.
For a brief moment, I stared into a dizzying array of ruby-red eyes as the nearest one clicked toward me. Then Lu’s boot-clad foot stomped down on it with a solid crunch.
She promptly barfed all over its remains, but I didn’t have time to think about it.
Two spiders went straight for my ankles. I dealt one a savage kick and smashed the other to pieces under my boot.
A series of gasps and screams rang out in response, and I looked around to see that everyone in the vicinity was staring with bulging, terror-filled eyes. And not just at the creepy metallic spiders, they were looking at me and Lu the same way.
Which was fair. They’d just seen us materialize out of absolutely nowhere.
But at least they didn’t seem to be too stupid.
They had the look of civilians about them rather than fighters, but the ones around us seemed to take courage from our example. A skinny teenage boy jumped up and came down on a spider with both feet to crush it into splinters. Next to him, a portly woman gave one of the gleaming arachnids a hearty kick that sent it spinning and skittering into a nearby building.
Suddenly the area around us was a frenzy of people kicking and smashing the metallic beings. Some of the spiders managed to scuttle out of the way, and they backed hastily away from the people.
Then a collective shiver went through the remaining spiders, and I narrowed my eyes at the oddly in-sync reaction. After a few moments, they turned as one and scuttled away with soft clicks and pings.
On one hand, this was a good development. I had no idea what those golden pincers would’ve been capable of, but I doubted it was anything good.
But on the downside, the spiders’ group reaction spoke to them being more than just mindless killing machines.
And possibly a goddamn hive mind, which could speak volumes about the other types of technology that was used as weaponry here.
Welp. Definitely more interesting than Disneyland at least. I could work with this.
My thoughts were interrupted as the blonde woman I still had in a tight grip nearly hurled all over my boots, but I just sighed, shoved her a few inches over, and kept her upright as three more nasty heaves splashed all over the ground.
The people around us were breathing raggedly as they collected themselves and bundled into small groups. A few yanked knives and even the occasional sword from their belts, but I got the impression they had zero training with the weapons from their clumsy grips and shaking hands. The closest of them eyed me warily like they were considering latching onto me, but then they seemed to really take in the look in my black eyes and thought better of it.
I glanced around while I had the chance. We were on a paved but poorly maintained concrete road, with shoddy stone buildings around us. The hazy glow of city lights lit up the dark sky with some sort of light pollution not too far away, but that’s all I took in at the moment.
Because everyone tensed as footsteps came pounding across the pavement.
Then the fighters swept in.
No, not fighters. They were…
“What the fuck?” Lu screamed and swiped vomit from her lips.
I couldn’t help but agree.
We were being attacked by a crowd of what appeared to be statues. White marble statues that looked like they belonged in a goddamn art museum.
The statues were all identical, though: Dozens of copies of some suave, sneering dude with carved, swirling mustachios.
But their joints moved like well-oiled hinges, and they were clearly bent on killing. As I yanked out my gun, one aimed a vicious punch at a human man and caved his whole head in like it was made of aluminum foil.
I aimed a test shot at one of the statues.
My gun clicked, but nothing happened.
“Dammit.” I stuffed the pistol back into my pants. This had to be one of the dimensions where gunpowder didn’t function, for whatever reason.
I could only see one thing to do at this point.
Another statue bulldozed through the crowd. I dove for it and wrapped my hands around its legs. This thing might’ve been the size of a human, but only an average one.
Whereas I was fucking jacked.
I seized the statue’s ankles and leveraged it over my head as I rose up from my crouch. Then I brought it slamming down onto the ground.
Its head shattered like a damn watermelon, but the innards were unexpected. Gears, springs, and screws clattered everywhere.
I swung again, and its arm popped off and clattered to the ground along with another shower of metal.
I snatched up the marble-paneled arm and tossed it to Lu. Then I seized one of the legs for myself. I used the thing like a fucking club to clear a path through the remaining statues, or robots, or whatever the hell they were. And every time the limbs shattered against their targets, I just snatched up more and kept on smashing.
The crowd was in turmoil as people battled against them with their fists, feet, and the occasional rusty knife or sword. But all those fared poorly against the marble bodies of the statues, who didn’t so much as flinch from the blows. Blades scraped dully off them without leaving a scratch, and the people were left with no time to react before a pair of marble hands closed around their throats.
What the fuck kind of place had we stumbled into?
Obviously, one where some lower class of people couldn’t afford shit for weaponry.
The one thing I could clearly tell as I looked around more carefully was that there was a glowing forest nearby, and that’s where most of the people seemed to be trying to claw their way toward. But their knives and swords were doing absolutely nothing against these killer statue robots. More and more civilians, or whoever these people were, were going down, and there were now dead bodies heaped in the street.
Lu cackled madly as she snatched up another dismembered statue arm so she now had two. She spun through the attacking statues like a raging ballerina with her arms extended, but she was moving so fast that her makeshift clubs were soon replaced by her bare fists, which she used like fucking helicopter blades clobbering the statues in their stony faces.
Cracks, snaps, and thuds split the air along with her shrieks of glee. When she was done spinning, she slammed her boot into a statue’s chest and sent it stumbling. Then she cracked another in the temple with a fresh arm-club from the ground so springs and metallic bits went bursting through the air like a firework.
This all happened within the span of about five seconds.
The people around us went from cowering to gaping in amazement as Lu made mincemeat of a whole crowd of statues.
She sent them a way-too-devious grin and let her eyes flash bright pink, and they all gasped and shrank away.
I fought the urge to roll my eyes.
“Fucking supers,” I muttered as I dealt one of the statues a head-splitting blow with a fresh leg-club.
The move knocked its head clean off. Then I seized another pair of spare legs and brought the two clubs smashing together on one of the statues like cymbals.
One of them rushed at me, but I flipped it into a bodyslam and caved its head in.
But just when I thought we might be able to sprint for the glowing tree-line, a seething band of men came thundering down the street.
They looked like mercenaries of some kind. Half of them were clad in mismatched bits of armor, some of it old-fashioned and some of it with at least some technological features involved, judging by the smattering of buttons and thin, glowing LED-style lightwork. Several wielded swords that were already slick with blood, while others carried weapons that looked like something out of a fucking sci-fi movie back in my origin time. They were like shotguns made of an almost blindingly shiny metal, and their massive barrels were comically large given the size of the grip and the guys wielding them.
As I watched, one fired out a glob of some atomic-purple, jelly-like substance.
It splatted into a man’s chest and clung there for a moment like a blob of slime. Then it stretched wider and wider, even as it spread out and dug itself into his skin like claws.
“Damn, alright.” I raised my eyebrows as I used half my focus to smash in a statue head, but I kept my eyes glued to the victim to see how this would unfold.
He finally let out a strangled scream as his flesh was torn wide open, and whatever the jelly shit had done to his sinews reminded me of an extremely cheesy pizza slice being pulled apart.
That would do.
I sprinted at one of the gun-wielding mercenaries and swung the robot’s leg at him like a baseball bat. It cracked savagely into his skull, and his body slumped to the ground so hard and fast that I knew damn well he’d never get up again.
I immediately snatched the strange gun from his slack fingers and raised it at another mercenary just as he wheeled to face me.
Then I pulled the trigger.
The jelly that shot out was an eye-watering shade of green this time. It hit the man right in the face.
But just like before, the claw-like protuberances dug into his panicked face, and they began the slimy process of shredding his head apart like a fresh-baked lasagna.
I smirked as I turned away.
When I caught sight of Lu, she was holding two of the goddamn guns and firing them at will into both the crowd of mercenaries and the civilians.
Some of the armed men had the wits to snatch onto their screaming and dying compatriots and use them as human shields. I saw the living toss swords to each other, and I could see they were getting ready to team up.
The civilians fucking fled like their asses were on fire, but several of their legs, backs, and arms got caught up in the fray.
I sighed as their limbs shredded open with every strike, and I narrowed my eyes on the blonde.
There was absolutely no finesse in this chick’s approach to things. Not even a scrap of it.
But Lu just went on firing her weapons with evil glee.
Meanwhile, one of the mercenary men edged to the side and fired a glob of toxic jelly at her, while another flung a silver knife her way. She let out an exhilarated laugh as she dodged both. Then another knife came flying at her, and she caught it– just snatched it like it was nothing.
She didn’t even notice the stray mercenary barreling toward her from behind, or maybe she just didn’t fucking care. I growled through my teeth and shot him down for her.
Spatial awareness… pretty low, too.
“Might want to pay closer fucking attention,” I hollered as I smashed the butt of my gun through an incoming statue’s chest.
Lu didn’t even flinch. She just shot me a saucy smile as she tossed the knife up and forward in a neat arc. As it thudded down into an unsuspecting man’s chest, she aimed a few test shots high up over the hiding mercenaries’ heads.
She giggled madly as she watched gravity take hold over the jelly-like blobs and bring them hurtling toward the men below. The mercenaries were hemmed in on all sides by both civilian and statue bodies now, so they couldn’t easily move without abandoning their human shields.
Then another handful of mercenaries came storming out from the nearest cluster of buildings.
“Shit,” I growled.
I felled two with swift shots. They dropped down screaming with globs of barbed jelly hooking itself into their flesh and carving through their armor like a hot knife through butter.
Lu let out another crazed laugh as she abandoned the men she was toying with and sprinted at her new targets. She let out piercing chirrups, squeaks, and cackles as she danced carelessly aside from their jelly projectiles.
The men were in disarray over the various vocal attacks, and they twitched and yelped in confusion. The whole display made me think of puppets being controlled by a toddler, but then a full-on scream from Blondie made the ground crack below them.
Three men were dropped into the trench beneath them, but the rest were still reeling when she looped around and sprinted at them from the side.
These people were clearly new to supers. The speed Lu moved with immediately unnerved them, and unnerving them seemed to exhilarate her beyond belief. She barreled into their midst and slammed the butt of her gun down on one man’s head while she kicked another in the gut. Another barbed jelly-bullet flew past her head before she drove the barrel of her weapon into the man’s jaw.
There were still seven other assholes around her and swiftly moving in, though. Because the genius had jumped straight into the thick of things without really taking stock of how outnumbered she was.
Experience was definitely lacking. I added it to my mental list.
Then I growled with impatience as I shot down the incoming threats she’d failed to account for.
We needed to get the hell out of here before even more mercenaries came. This wasn’t even our fight. I was just babysitting this goddamn villain while she went ham on these random people.
And ten more had just arrived to try and contain the woman.
“Lu,” I yelled. “Duck.”
At least she had the courtesy to obey.
She threw herself into a sideways roll and crouched as I mowed men down with my stolen gun.
Shreds of melted flesh went flying in all directions. Men writhed and dropped to their flayed knees as I watched gaping, goopy holes being torn open all over their bodies, and the screams of terror coming from any remaining civilians intertwined with their own dying wails of pain as they cowered around in the battle still unfolding around me.
The shredding was all over in a matter of seconds.
Then Lu whipped around with her lips pursed in a dramatic pout.
“You ruined my fun,” she complained.
“Shut up and run,” I advised her.
I yanked on her arm to drive my words home, and we sprinted toward the gleaming trees. More shouts broke out behind us in the distance, but we had already reached the treeline.
Lu’s feet hammered against the ground just behind me, and soon we were pounding over a bed of glowing pine needles. They squelched under our feet, and a faintly sulfur-like smell wafted up from them as radiant slime oozed from inside.
Gross, but okay.
I kept on sprinting forward, and I immediately noticed that vines were all swaying around us like they were being blown in a nonexistent breeze. I kept my eyes sharp just in case any of them showed signs of strangling me, but there was nothing outside the gentle swaying and rustling foliage.
As the trees thickened, I slowed slightly to keep an eye out for danger and avoid tripping over the roots, but I still drove us at a brisk pace.
“How– far–” Lu panted.
“Keep going,” I wheezed.
When the sounds of the battle had faded behind us, I slowed to a trot, and I scoured the forest with my eyes the whole time for any sign of threats.
It wasn’t until we were in total silence that I allowed us to stop.
I changed direction and took us a short way through the trees. The tree-line had seemed straight from what I could see, so this should be taking us parallel to it.
After a short while of going this way, I turned and took us back in the direction of the city, a good distance away from the point where we had entered the trees.
“Why are we going back?” Lu whispered.
“To see what the fuck is going on,” I said in a low voice. Then I rounded on her. “And while we’re talking… You need to keep your shit together from now on.”
“What?” she asked in a wounded voice. “I did great. Did you see all those guys I took down?”
“What I saw is you getting carried away and being conspicuous as hell when we should’ve been lying low,” I fumed. “Jesus Christ. Our objective should’ve been to get the hell out of there and find our bearings, not announce to the world that we’re here, superpowered, and wanting to kill.”
“But I do want to kill,” she said obstinately.
I gripped her by the shoulders and shook her. “I don’t. Fucking. Care. You can’t just pull shit like this and think you’re going to survive in any random dimension you land in.”
She actually looked taken aback by this, and a sulky look darkened her face.
“Well, sorrrr-ry,” she hissed. “I don’t exactly do this every day. If you know the ropes so well, then how about you teach me? You gunned those idiots down like it was child’s play, so don’t act like this is your first rogeo.”
“Rodeo.” I bit the word out. “If you’re gonna try and seem cultured and dig up ancient shit, get your phrasing right. They were called rodeos.”
“Rodeo, rogeo, who cares?” she scoffed and stomped her foot. “Some old-fashioned shit, I don’t know! You knew what I meant.”
I stared at her in silence for a moment. Then I turned around and kept walking.
