Rise of Shadows (37 page)

“
It appears that whoever opened the tear did not want them in our realm either, so they placed shields in the way, but as Shadow tears down the spells that are holding open the gate, they might fail and leave an opening for all of them to get into our realm
,” she sent.

“
What do we do?
” I asked.

“
We get between them and the gate, and I attempt to keep the shields up on this side while you protect me
,” she sent.

“
Right, sure
,” I sent with great trepidation.

“
We can do this, Dusty. We are survivors, you and I. Soulkin, even
,” she sent and then, before I could ask what a soulkin was, she started towards the tear.

I rushed to catch up and stay with her as she flew through the mass of foul and disgusting spirits. As we flew through them, I could feel myself being pummeled by their fear and sickness auras, but they did not seem to notice us pushing through. I guessed they just assumed we were more spirits added to the party trying to get through to the realm of the living.

Once at the tear I saw a wave of electricity ripple across the tear. “
What was that?
” I asked.

“
That was Master Shadow. He is already at work
,” she sent back. “
The shield is holding, for now. We should wait as long as we can before exposing our position here.”

“
I can wholeheartedly get behind that plan,
” I sent.

She had somehow maneuvered us so that we were in the front of all the creatures, between them and the gate. We deliberately had our backs to them, which both concerned me and brought some comfort. I was comforted by not having to see their vile forms, but concerned that I could not see what they were up to.

I do not know how long we were there for, as there was no way to tell time in that realm nor did I have any idea if time passed at the same rate there as it did back in our realm, but at random points more bolts of electricity passed over the gate. I could feel Spectra’s concern grow as each bolt passed.

“
One more bolt and that shield will fall. I need to start patching it now. Be ready for the fun to start
,” she sent with an unusual level of concern.

I turned to face the creatures behind us, putting my back directly to Spectra, completely unsure what I was going to do in her defense. We talked about what I might be able to do here, but she really did not know, as she had never attempted this before.

I felt her begin to cast behind me, and, as she did, the crowd of spirits backed up a bit, as if in surprise. Their surprise did not last long, as they soon seemed to figure out what she was up to and charged forward. I figured I needed a spell with a wide area of effect that was easy and fast to cast in response to their rush, so I cast my Frost Wind spell.

I was amazed at the difference there was here with that spell. It worked with the same gestures and words, but the results were somewhat different. A wind blew out from my position, as expected, but it was not a frosty gale; instead it was some kind of spiritual wind that pounded back the front lines of attack.

The tear was small on the scale of the attacking force, and Spectra had told me it was one-sided, so I only had to defend a fairly small area, which was a good thing because we were insanely outnumbered. As my first wind died down, I cast another to give me time to think of a better plan.

It occurred to me that if my Frost Wind had become some kind of spiritual gale, then perhaps my Ice Wall would also be altered here. Assuming it was, it could reduce the number of vectors the enemy could attack on. I quickly cast Frost Wind again to push the attackers back further, then created what I normally would have thought of as a wall of ice around our position, but here it was some bluish-green wall of energy that the spirits could not seem to penetrate. It took a few more castings of Frost Wind and Ice Wall until I had secured our position behind a dome of power.

I took a moment to look back at Spectra and could tell she was straining hard with the gate, but before I could try to help her, a crack appeared in my dome of power! I had to turn my focus back to maintaining the walls around me, as the forces outside wanted to come in and were pounding them hard. I knew it was only a matter of time before their attacks overwhelmed my ability to repair the walls. All I could hope for would be to hold out long enough for Master Shadow to get that tear closed.

I cast for all I was worth, dumping power into the walls as they cracked and bent around me. I tried everything I could think of to keep them up but, little by little, they were failing, and soon a hole opened near the top of the dome. I cast multiple Ice Bolts through the hole as fast as I could, hoping to beat back any rush long enough to get a new wall up, but my power was failing. The Ice Bolts, like my other spells, were different here. It was some kind of spirit bolt, but I did not pay much attention beyond noticing it worked. There were just too many of them coming almost as fast as I could cast, despite how tiny the openings were.

I do not know for how long I kept the walls up, or how many Ice Bolts I tossed through the holes, but eventually the walls gave out and came crashing down around us. I instinctively reached to where my pockets in my armor should have been, looking for one of Shea’s explosive potions, but as with the rest of my physical body, they were gone.

“
Spectra, I am almost defeated,”
I sent.

“
It’s okay, Dusty, you did your best,
” she sent back.

There was a deep weariness in her mental voice that scared me deeply. Through that fear I got one last push of power and screamed out a violent Ice Storm that felt as if it tore me apart to cast. It beat back the attackers, but more came, and I had no power left. I tried to warn Spectra, but before I could the darkness overtook me …

“Admiral, the pirate fleet has taken the bait,” called out my tactical officer.

“Jump in and attack!” I ordered. I was on the bridge of my command ship on the front lines of the attack at the pirate base. The stealth bombers had done their job superbly, destroying most of the battle fleets that were guarding the station and scattering the rest. Intelligence reports warned us that the pirates were amassing their forces near the station, and we expected them to jump in and counter-attack shortly after our bombing run, so we took a small force and had it chase down the ships that had survived the bombers as bait.

Just as we expected, the pirates saw the small fleet in pursuit and sent their forces to intercept. I was now leading our own counter-counter-attack against the pirate counter-attack. They were vicious in battle, but had little battle sense. They blindly charged in when they saw a weakness without ever considering the consequences, and we were finally in a position to take advantage of that foolishness.

While our fight with the pirates raged, the enemy space station stood silent. I hoped that meant that Shadow’s team was having success in taking it out, but it was impossible to tell. Right after the bombs hit, we detected a large number of explosions inside the station, but nothing since. The station’s shields held, but it did nothing else. No scans, no calls for help, nothing at all.

“Jumping now, sir!” came the reply from my navigator as our massive command ship entered jump space. Once we cleared jump space I gave the orders to deploy the fleet and attack. Soon our naval forces were completely engaged and pushing back the Scorpion Gang’s fleet. Our stealth bombers tore up the rear of their lines, while our heavy assault craft pushed hard at their front lines. They were trapped and faring very poorly, but they continued to fight on with the dedication and viciousness they were known for. None of them would ever surrender; they would die fighting. The battle would only be over when the last one of them was dead, and not an instant before. It was a terrible waste of life and skill, and I once again wished I could get them to switch sides instead of having to slaughter them all.

“Tactical, anything on that station yet?” I asked. It was the one wild card in play that had me concerned. If Shadow’s team failed and that station came online, we would have to retreat. The firepower it had the potential to pack was far more than we could handle, and we lacked the muscle to break through its massive shields.

“Sir, the shields on it are fluctuating,” he said.

“Take a guess, and tell me what is happening,” I said.

“Sir, I am not really sure. I would expect this behavior if the station was suddenly running low on power, but there is still no indication that anything is going on over there,” he said.

I just smiled at that. That had to be Shadow’s team. The station was probably much too big for them to take out alone, so they would be trying to cut off its power supply. If they succeeded in taking out its primary generators, it would be helpless.

I turned my attention back on the battle before me and saw that we were winning on every front. The pirates were being eliminated slowly but surely in the jaws of our trap, and no help would be coming for them this time. I was proud of my navy; we were finally working as a solid team. Each division was using its strengths to balance the weaknesses of the others. Plans and maneuvers were being executed with great precision. Skill would win the battle this day, a skill that was won on the front lines of years of combat. We were not a green navy anymore; we had finally cut our teeth and come into our own.

“Keep pushing the fight away from that station. We don’t need any surprises,” I ordered.

I knew if there was any way that the station could be removed from the fight, Shadow would find it, but I could not risk it. We had too many eggs in this basket. A win here should completely break the back of the pirates and reopen the trade routes. Then we could start getting supplies again and quickly build up our navy to the level it needed to be, but a loss here would devastate our forces and possibly cost us the entire sector.

“Any word yet from Alpha Academy?” I asked.

“Nothing, sir. We are monitoring the command channels we gave them, but they are running silent,” responded my comm officer.

I had to remind myself that Shadow was running the Dust Dragon like a stealth vessel, and silence was to be expected until their mission was complete. Their detection could spell disaster for them, so it was not worth the risk of sending any messages, but my baby sister was out there fighting, and in all likelihood by his side right now in the heat of the battle.

It was impossible to imagine her in combat, as I have never seen her in action. The only images I have of her are as a young, naive girl pushing herself too hard for her next gymnastics trophy. I had no doubt that that Patty would be dead out here, but Patty was long gone, and Flame was in her place. I did not know this Flame, this woman that trains in hand-to-hand combat with her husband, wields fire like a child’s toy, bends light to her whim, works out with the Special Forces when visiting secret military bases, and pilots extremely sophisticated killing machines. No, this Flame was a stranger to me, and I wanted desperately to get to know her, to see her in action.

“Focus, Shadow,” I said to myself as I continued to pull apart the spells that held the tear open. I was concerned because I could sense that Spectra and Dusty were in big trouble on the other side of the tear, and I wanted to go and help them, but I could not. I had to get this tear closed or all would be lost. If I did not get this tear sealed, all kinds of vile creatures would pour into the realm from the spirit world. Spectra warned me that if the spirits on the other side had any opening, any at all, they would pour through it like water and overwhelm our position here. I could not risk letting that happen, even if I had to give my life to stem the tide.

Phoenix was still beside me, maintaining the shields around us, and for the most part we were safe. No one had found us in here yet. I lost all track of time as I continued to unfold the bands of power that were pulling the tear open, knowing that once I got enough of them off, the tear would snap shut, breaking the rest of the spells itself.

“
Alert!
” sent Phoenix.

A group of sorcerers appeared in the room and were immediately assaulted by the chaotic lightning that filled the chamber. One of them died quickly, but the others managed to get shields in place and then turned their attention on us.

“
Phoenix, I dare not stop now. You need to keep them off me,”
I sent.

“
I’ve got this
,” he sent back. There was no fear in his mental voice this time. He had learned to slip into that cold, warrior state where killing is all business. The child in him had truly died and would be missed.

Soon a great battle broke out between them. Fire leapt from our shielded position and pounded on their shields, while several different kinds of mage bolts were fired back. Phoenix could not spare enough power to break their shields and still maintain ours, but he did not let them know that. He lowered his staff and sent a great arc of fire through the space between the sorcerers and us, slamming hard into their shields and knocking them back.

The attack proved to be too much for another of them, as his shields weakened just for a brief moment, and in that moment lightning from the tear arced through the shields and killed him. The remaining sorcerers paid no attention to the death of their teammate and pressed back the attack. One of them left his secure perch on a nearby ledge and dove towards us. I do not know what he planned to do, but Phoenix was ready for him. He tossed one of Shea’s explosion potions directly into the sorcerer’s path, and the resulting blast sent him tumbling into the tear itself and out of sight forever.

I desperately wanted to help Phoenix fight, but I had to keep working on the tear. Time was running out for all of us. I redoubled my efforts on the bands, but it was still a long and strenuous task to pull each one off.

Seeing their fellow sorcerer fail in his dive attack told the others to try something different, so they summoned demons to do their dirty work, but this proved to be a bad plan, as most were quickly destroyed by the lightning, and those that were not were sucked into the tear and lost. I worried that that meant that Dusty and Spectra would now have to deal with them, but I pushed the thoughts from my mind, as I needed to maintain my focus on the job at hand.