Pride x Familiar (21 page)

I’d never seen a field so strong before.

I could hear the air crackle and the glazing
waver as the field held back Constance and her lance.

My eyes finally settled on the sight of a young
man, dressed in denim trousers, running shoes and a loose fitting
summer shirt.

A shield-blade wrapped around his right hand and
forearm.

And another shield-blade protected his left
arm.

Caelum.

Despite the pain that made the rest of my body
feel distant and numb, my mind worked well enough to recognize
him.

But it had trouble believing what I saw.

Two gauntlets. Two shield-blades. One
growing
out of each forearm.

I’d never seen the Fragment in that
configuration before. The oval shielding had split length wise
several times, and extended outwards, offering a wider area of
coverage. The sword-like blades resembled the Saracen blades of
old. And the barrier-field was stronger than any I’d ever seen
Caelum’s Fragment produce before today.

But it was the look on Caelum’s face, what
little of it I could see, that surprised me the most.

The look of pure rage and murderous intent.

A look Constance would probably remember for
many years to come.

#

(Caelum)

Ignoring the two girls splashing in the water, I
began pedaling furiously while steering for the bridge. The
electric motor that supplanted my efforts hummed loudly and the
duck swayed considerably as its feet kicked energetically below the
water.

Aiming the boat for a point under the bridge
where the duck head would come close to it, I stopped pedaling but
left the throttle on the electric motor wide open.

Then I climbed out of the cabin, and onto the
duck’s back.

Holding onto the duck’s glass fiber neck, I
stood up on the swaying boat.

The underside of the bridge was overhead
now.

I jumped up with all the strength my legs could
muster, and my fingers caught the bridge. My body swung to and fro
for a few frightful moments before I was able to get a better grip
on the bridge.

After that I hauled myself up with surprising
ease, glad that Haruka’s blood was still helping me out by having
her Symbiote lend me its strength.

Climbing over the permacrete guardrail, my feet
had no sooner touched ground when another violent crash rocked the
bridge. Landing on my hands and knees I looked toward the center of
the bridge where the two combatants clashed amidst the mist of
powdered bridge fragments. Both were moving with lightning speed.
If I wasn’t over-clocked I’d never be able to follow their
movements.

I’d have missed the moment Constance stabbed
Caprice in the chest.

In agonizing detail I saw the blade pierce her
body, emerging a foot out of her back.

In my mind, that moment lasted an eternity.

I felt an agonizing pain in my chest as surely
as though I’d been stabbed by Constance’s weapon.

Caprice flew backwards threw the air and landed
on the bridge, her body mere meters away from me. Blood spurted
from the wound in her chest.

In the next moment, my mind and vision turned
white.

When it cleared, I was on my feet and my
Fragment had manifested the shield-blade on my right arm. I kicked
off the ground, but when I did I moved with far greater speed than
ever before. I landed on the bridge at a point between Caprice and
Constance who had pushed off in an effect-field assisted leap.

Over-clocked or not, I had no time to think.

I planted myself firmly in front of Constance.
She was fixated on Caprice. She hadn’t even realized I was already
in her path. That gave her no time to make any move to avoid
me.

The right shield-blade extended laterally,
doubling its width. The barrier-field generated with milliseconds
to spare.

When Constance’s piercer-field clashed with my
barrier, I fully expected to be knocked back, but instead I felt
myself anchored to the bridge. I couldn’t understand why, until a
part of my mind told me I had a shield-blade attached to my left
forearm. That shield-blade had extended an effect-field that
anchored me to the bridge, and pushed back against Constance.

The barrier-field I’d thrown up between us
flexed and wavered but held steady.

I resolved I wouldn’t lose to her.

I was going to make Constance hurt for what
she’d done.

Blood would be paid by blood.

The moment I sensed her piercer-field weaken, I
willed my Fragment to generate a piercer-field around my right
blade.

Concentrating even harder, I pushed the image of
my intended action into my Fragment.

Then Constance’s field collapsed, and I slashed
upwards with my right shield-blade.

It was a narrow cut, but it sliced through the
protective field generated by her skinsuit.

It sliced the skinsuit, from her navel to her
left shoulder.

If not for the field protecting me, her blood
would have splashed onto my face and shirt.

As it was, the barrier-field my right gauntlet
was still producing slammed into her body, catapulting her
backwards through the air like a rag doll.

I think I might have heard a boom in the air,
but I could have been wrong. However, I did hear the sound of
rushing wind as the shockwave generated by my right shield-blade
rolled the length of the bridge.

Constance landed at the distant foot of the
bridge. Her body rolled over a number of times before coming to a
stop prone where the bridge met the bank of the water course. A
wispy black mist surrounded her and the jousting lance she’d held
onto disappeared into pocket space.

I stood up slowly, at least it felt slow
compared to my movements only heartbeats ago.

I was still over-clocked which is why I felt the
bridge a few feet ahead of me begin to break apart.

Without giving it a second thought, I turned and
ran for Caprice who’d fallen on her side.

A heartbeat later I released my mental hold on
the shield-blades adorning my left and right arms. The cold mist
enveloped my body but I kept running for Caprice. By the time I
skidded to a crouching halt beside her, my arms were free of the
gauntlets.

Caprice’s eyes moved, but they were slow to
focus on me.

I scooped her up into my arms, her body slick
with the blood that pumped feebly through her wound. I pushed off
on my bent legs, and ran for the end of the bridge. Behind me, a
large section of the bridge broke apart and collapse into the water
course. I heard the water geyser into the air but I refused to turn
as I ran for the safety of the bank. Only when I’d set foot on
firm
ground did I slow to a stop and half turn to look
behind me.

The bridge was split in two.

A ragged section that could have been many
meters across had crashed into the water.

I realized it was fortunate that no one had been
anywhere near it at the time.

Then I remembered the Countess and Prissila whom
I’d left in the water.

Despite holding onto Caprice, I looked about for
the two girls in the direction where I most expected them to have
swum ashore.

I guessed right and I saw them running toward
me.

But they came to a sudden stop, spying something
or someone behind me.

With Caprice in my arms, I half turned and saw
hundreds of people lining the bank of the water course. Hundreds
more watched from the opposite shore.

And dozens of security guards stood with stun
batons raised, uncertain of what to do next.

I understood why.

All of them were terrified. They were terrified
of me.

Warm droplets splashed on my cheek.

Caprice coughed up blood and her body shivered
violently.

I swallowed and turned to Simone and
Prissila.

I dropped to my knees with the girl that until
moments ago had never felt so precious to me.

A girl I’d taken for granted for the past seven
months.

“Please…help me…help me save her!”

I fought back against the despair tearing into
my heart.

I lost.

“Someone—please save her!”

Considering how powerful Fragments and Artifacts
are, why did the Prides assign them to Familiars?

That being asked, not all Familiars are
entrusted with a Fragment or Artifact.

The few that are – which I know to be a minority
of Familiars– are labeled as Specials.

Within that classification are additional ranks
and classes.

A Familiars overall rank is a based on a
combination of their Fragment or Artifact, and how well they can
use it.

So why entrust powerful weapons to a select
few?

Well, because only a Familiar can fight a
Familiar.

And because the Prides felt Familiars were ably
suited to do their dirty work.

Assassination, covert operations, infiltration
and wholesale destruction.

Familiars did it best.

Also, Crimson Crescent wasn’t the only adversary
the Prides faced. There were a host of other organizations both big
and small that made trouble for the Aventis upper echelons, and
most of them had Familiars with Fragments in their ranks.

That was something the Powers-that-be kept from
the average Jane and Joe.

It was something I had no idea about during my
early days as a Familiar.

What is surprising to many is the fact the
Prides took no special precautions to prevent their Specials from
betraying them. There were no implanted micro-bombs, no lethal
viruses, and no exploding collars around their necks.

One reason is that the Symbiote tends to attack
such foreign objects inside a host’s body. As such, these internal
restraints where cleansed whenever a Familiar was boosted by a
Symbiote. I did learn this cleansing didn’t always work out well
and the Symbiote had been known to trigger a micro-bomb or two with
harmful results.

External restraints such as explosive chokers
and collars didn’t fare much better. A skilled Familiar can remove
many attached devices by using a Fragment or Artifact to throw them
into Pocket Space, thus making short work them.

So the Prides relied on another age old method
for control – mental conditioning.

For the most part it was highly effective and
successful.

Sad to say, most Specials – myself included –
may have suspected this was the case yet we had no supporting
evidence.

Then again, we were being
conditioned
not
to worry about being
conditioned
.

In hindsight, it may have been a reason why I
stopped despising and resenting the Aventis as much as I did. My
hatred for them was slowly eroded by the conditioning.

But that wasn’t the conditioning’s focus.

It didn’t stop us outright from being prejudiced
against the Aventis.

It stopped us from harboring thoughts of
betraying them.

Suffice to say, it didn’t always work, and
Crimson Crescent was a perfect case in point.

(Caelum)

Caprice and Constance were taken to hospital by
aerial ambulance.

I wasn’t there to witness the ambulances land
and depart.

I was handcuffed, and a security collar was
snapped around my neck.

If I tried to resist the Enforcers that
surrounded me I would receive a very, very painful shock. The
collar was likely to fry my nervous system, and I would require
medical attention in order to survive let alone recover.

I wasn’t in the mood to give anyone any
trouble.

Every little bit of strength and defiance I
possessed was long gone.

All I could think of was Caprice and the warmth
of her blood when it splattered on my face.

It was still on my cheeks, having dried into red
crusts on my skin.

The Enforcers hadn’t even allowed me to wipe it
off.

Then again they didn’t remove my handcuffs even
after I was brought to the Mobile Enforcement Vehicle. The lev
capable vehicle was a cross between a shuttle and a bus. It was
pressurized and able to travel between the Islands without the need
to board a transport train like the majority of the vehicles that
travelled within Pharos.

I was left alone in the small interrogation room
inside the MEV, seated on a chair with my hands cuffed behind my
back. They hadn’t tried removing my Fragment bracelet. Putting the
collar on me was probably enough to satisfy their sense of
security.

After an hour, maybe less, a tall man in his
late twenties entered the room. He introduced himself as Alessandro
Alucard Raynar. I learnt he was in charge of the Enforcer division
responsible for handling matters relating to Familiars within
Island Three. As an added courtesy he told me Simone Alucard was
his niece.

I was asked the usual questions regarding my
identity. I answered those without hesitation, but when he began to
question my actions at the bridge, I refused to answer any
questions unless I was in the presence of a Lanfear representative.
And then I clammed up, completely refusing to answer any questions
he threw my way, no matter how polite and innocent they may have
seemed.

I had no experience dealing with a situation
like this, so I decided to rely on what I’d seen in holovid
dramas.

Alessandro Alucard tried to coerce me to speak
up. He even said it would help Caprice’s situation.

I just stared at him with my mouth firmly
shut.

He left the room not long afterwards. Before
leaving, he made show and dance about how generous he’d tried to
be, hoping to resolve the situation before charges could be
laid.

I just stared at him with my mouth firmly
shut.

Then I stared at the one way window facing me on
the opposite side of the room.