PHANTASIA (6 page)

Raven walked over to the top of the trench and took out her bow and arrow. The other team watched in wonder.
 

“S,” Raven said quietly.
 

“Already ready,” S replied. She was sitting in a meditative position that Red recognized as her healing stance. He had tried healing for himself once, but the position was too stressful. Healers were required to be so in tune with the rest of their team that they shared their pain — a way for them to efficiently recognize how their energy, or mana as it was appropriately called, should be spent. Very few people took on the position, and having a healer on their own team was one of the major reasons behind their success.
 

Raven stuck an arrow between her nocking point and pulled back stiffly, exhaling calmly as she stretched the weapon back. Red noticed the head of the arrow slightly bulging as it sparked with electricity; her cast imbued the weapon with a voltaic property. He was familiar with this cast, she had used it many times before. It required almost no energy on her part, but made the weapon much more effective. Everyone kept still as she concentrated; any disturbance to a person’s focus as they fulfilled a cast could cause their effectiveness to decline sharply and their mana to spiral out of control. The stillness was more out of habit in this case; it was only for more major casts that impeccable concentration was an absolute necessity. For someone like Raven, turning an arrow into a paralyzing shot was an effortless task.

The other team seemed to be getting more and more nervous as Raven continued aiming at the Ignot Gilas. They seemed to be unsure if this was a good idea, and exchanged anxious glances with each other. Red understood why; Raven was relying on her ability to shoot all of the Gilas down before they made it to them. The reptilian critters had a soft spot near the bottom of their bellies, a vulnerable patch of skin that covered access to several vital organs, and a place they adamantly guarded if they sensed danger. But if she missed even one or two, especially one of the larger stage 3s, she would be putting all of them in danger.
 

Finally a boy on the other team sitting at the edge of the trench spoke up. He seemed to be equipped like the girl who had flagged them down, with a long rod strapped to his back that Red recognized as a beam rifle. He was also a stalker, Red guessed.

“If I were you, I wouldn’t do that,” the boy commented.
 

“And if I were you, I wouldn’t do it either,” Raven replied politely.
 

Her fingers eased as she released the first arrow. It pierced through the air with surgical precision, looking like it was going to miss, but then curving masterfully through the air, flowing with the gradient of the wind, just as its owner had calculated, to finally find its mark on the soft tissue that composed the underbelly of an unsuspecting Gila. A reptilian screech split open the quiet of the desert, as thirteen of its comrades tried to make sense of what was happening. Their instinct, like that of any other desert creature, was to assess the situation and decide as quickly as possible whether to defend themselves or to run. While they weren’t the sharpest of creatures, they were still close to being apex predators within the desert. Still, they were well aware that the dark sands hid beasts that far eclipsed them in both size and hunger.
 

With rapid succession, she let out thirteen more shots, reaching over to her quiver and reloading her bow with a blurring speed every time. The rest of her body remained perfectly still as her arms did all the moving; her near perfect form did not go unnoticed by the other team, who weren’t as accustomed to seeing her perform. The arrows all found a Gila as a target, but not all of them hit the correct area.
She continued to fire past the necessary fourteen shots, but her accuracy diminished as the pressure mounted and the pack ran towards her in full tilt. Red got up and flexed his fingers, planting them into the ground softly. He heard the whistle of Magnus’s mallet swinging through the air as he charged its momentum.
Here it comes
he thought excitedly.

Raven continued to remain perfectly still, not flinching despite the dwindling space between herself and the Gilas. Eleven dropped, twelve dropped, thirteen dropped, but Red knew she wasn’t going to get the last one. It was one of the stage 3s; it had already taken one shot to the bottom but failed to slow down. Raven dropped her bow and arrow next to her and silently placed her hand on the hilt of the sword strapped behind her. The boy that had spoken earlier choked back a scream, imagining that Raven was either suicidal or too paralyzed to move like he was. The enormous creature in front of them, now in position to strike, launched forward with an open mouth, ready to grip its prey with the force of its hunger.

An instant before the jaws closed around her in an atomizing bite, Butz and Red both rushed in front, bridging their arms out to hold the mouth open with their hands. The force of the impact was so charged, it pushed them a foot deeper into the sand and sent out waves of energy that visibly rippled across the air and sand around them. Screaming with effort as they wrestled to stretch the mouth open, they swung their head to the side to make space for Magnus’s mallet, which came down a second after they had shifted their weight away. A deafening thud filled the air as the weapon collided with the Gila’s skull.

“Courtesy of Butz,” the falconer said cheerfully a moment later, dropping two teeth in front of them, which he had ripped out from the Gila during the exchange.
 

“I had it,” Raven replied calmly.
 

“Sure you did,” Butz sneered. “Just remember you owe me for this, and I won’t tell anyone I had to save the invincible Raven from the cold hand of death itself,” he laughed. Linx let out a soft howl as he continued to stare at the Gila cautiously.
 

“It’s dead boy, it’s okay,” Butz said assuringly. He began walking towards the carcass in the sand, curious to know what the Gilas were trying to eat.

Just as Red was about to follow, the Gila they had thought dead sprung back to life and hurtled towards Butz at breakneck speed, its back legs granting it a final surge of strength. Butz was caught off guard, with no time to position himself appropriately, and numbed by the sight of a purple tongue whipping wildly through the air. He shuddered and rolled his shoulders instinctively while raising his hands — seeing only the moist texture of an enormous, gaping mouth before closing his eyes.

Red lifted his hands to cast anything that came to mind but was sure he was going to be too late. The scene seemed to unfold in front of him at a heightened speed, one his quickness could not catch up to. Yet at the same time, the moment seemed frozen in place, letting him contemplate forever the precarious ending of his teammate. He thought of all of his experiences with Butz, running through every memory of him in a fraction of a second.
 

He turned to look at Raven who was next to him just an instant ago to see if she had been able to do anything, but she was no longer there. Feeling like he was moving underwater, he twisted his head back around to the lunging Gila and saw Raven on the other side of it, as if she had somehow traveled back in time to change her initial location. An instant later, delayed in the same way his perception was, he heard the penetrating sound of celestial steel slicing through air and organ, in a clean yet forceful manner.

Seconds had passed before anyone dared to speak.
 

“Am… am I dead?” Butz peeped.
 

“I told you, I had it.” Raven said calmly. She was on one knee and out of breath, resting on the handle of her sword, but still maintaining the poise of her form. “Anyways, consider us even.” she added. “We should pay attention to Linx more carefully from now on, he can sense if things are actually dead or not.”
 

“That… that was amazing…you moved faster than sound…what was that?” the girl on the other team asked. The five of them seemed more dazed than even Butz after what had happened; they took a few steps back to digest the series of events.
 

Raven gave the girl an unrevealing wink and said nothing more.
 

“You blew all your energy,” S said. “Literally, I think all of it. I would’ve just let him get eaten to be honest,” she added with a sarcastic grin.
 

Raven breathed deeply, still on one knee, relaxing her muscles and trying to recuperate. Red walked up to her to share his water.
 

“That really was incredible…” He said. “Faster than sound…that’s why I saw what happened…and
then
heard it.”
 

“Mmhmm,” she nodded.
 

“I’m guessing you can only do it once, because of all the energy it takes?” Red asked.
 

“For now,” she said. “My output isn’t like yours, don’t have as much energy.”
 

“You’re fine,” Red laughed. Output, or the total amount of raw energy someone could put out, was the only thing that Red ever felt stood out about him. Still, he could never focus cleanly enough like some other people to channel it appropriately, save for when he cast anything fire related. When he would get down on himself for his inability to focus, Raven reminded him of his potential, a gesture that he always appreciated.
 

“Guys…you won’t believe this,” S yelled from ahead of them. She had walked to the carcass buried in the sand, and started uncovering it. Red ran over with everyone else, paying extra attention to Linx in case any of the other Gilas were still alive. He did a double-take when he finally arrived at the creature.
 

“It’s a…” Red began, but couldn’t find the words to finish.
 

“A dragon,” Butz whispered reverently. He seemed to have regained his color after his near death experience. Linx purred softly next to him, examining the dead creature with equal regard.
   

“It’s an Emerald Thornback,” Magnus interjected.
 

Even while it lay dead and half-buried in the sand, the dragon exuded a look of majesty. Its green hide shimmered beautifully under the bed of wisp and sand that accumulated around it. Its body was enormous, one of the largest creatures Red had ever seen. Spread around its skin were tiny bristles that looked like hair but far too acuminous. Red stretched out his hand and reached over to gently touch the creature. Blood leaked out almost instantly upon contact as one of the bristles smoothly vivisected the glove of his suit and cut his skin underneath. He yelped in pain and jumped back, surprised at how sharp the bristles were.
I don’t think I even touched it
he thought scornfully.

S reacted almost immediately, taking his hand and beginning to heal the cut. Tiny pink waves travelled from the tip of her hands to inside the wound, wrapping around the blood and soothing the lesion. It was a cool and tingly sensation, but was quickly overcome by a burning feeling after Magnus began rubbing a small tube of gel over it.

“Some of the bristles were covered in Gila saliva — can’t risk an infection,” Magnus said as Red breathed deeply to absorb the sting of the gel. The idea of an infection hadn’t even occurred to him. He was suddenly greatly appreciative that Magnus had paid attention in class while he dozed off.
 

“Mmhmm,” Red replied. He inhaled sharply as the gel seemed to have activated; the burning sensation increased to a peak around the tip of the cut.
 

“We should pick off some of these bristles and collect the saliva. If we coat them and stick them to arrow heads, we’d have a pretty lethal weapon,” Butz suggested.
 

“Good idea,” S said as she continued to nurse the cut.
 

“Look at it’s eyes,” someone on the other team yelled. They walked over to the head of the dragon just as Raven had finally joined them.

“All black…” Red whispered.
 

“No way…it was meta-conditioned?” Butz asked.
 

“Impossible,” Magnus replied. “You hear about it a lot in the political world, or at least I do, but it rarely happens. Too difficult of a technique to pull off. You’d be surprised how hard it would be for us to meta-condition something even as simple as an insect. A dragon would be impossible.”
 

“But look, it’s eyes,” Butz protested. They were empty vessels, cloudy and black. Unmistakable signs of meta-conditioning as they had been taught — the binding control of one will over another. Red had learned about meta-conditioning in a class on psykinesthetics, or mental warfare. At the end of the class, all the students were required to try it on each other. Meta-conditioning someone felt like running through their thoughts over and over again, while fighting every little impulse their mind and body produced. It felt impossible for Red; he could barely control his own impulses, let alone someone else’s. Because psykinesthetics were ineffective against Xenosite, the subject was not heavily taught. There was no classification for people adept at it, although healers picked it up quickly, as their training already required them to be comfortable with establishing connections with other people’s minds. Besides meta-conditioning, skills related to psykinesthetics included occular manipulation, or the ability to read and control someone’s dreams, id-speech, or the ability to verbally mimic the sound of someone’s conscience by recognizing their voice patterns to give them commands they believe they gave themselves, and myodistortion, or altering someone’s perception of reality by inducing visual or auditory hallucinations. Most techniques under psykinesthetics were rarely executed, more so because they always left tell-tale signs of their practice than because they were exceptionally difficult to perform.
 

“Magnus is right,” Raven replied. “It has to be something else. Dragons are among the most powerful creatures in existence, fully sentient and arguably more intelligent and shrewd than humans. It would be impossible to meta-condition one,” she added firmly.