It turned out that the ship hadn’t crashed at the stadium but instead the mall that wasn’t far from it. The entire far wall of it had been torn down, broken away by the impact. It was stuck in the ground like a stick shoved into the dirt by some kid throwing a tantrum. If people had once been there they were long gone or long dead.
Kathryn and Seth stared at it from a nearby parking deck half collapsed. A pile of concrete and cars crushed below with their alarms struggling to sound. Seth leaned forward and kicking a rock down. He watched it tumble through the air before breaking against the ground. Whistling to himself he glanced at her and then the parking lot.
There were dozens of Taq-Law around. Combinations of ones they’d seen: the ones on crab legs with the buzz saw or rifles, the ones that stood up right like they did with the bladed arms, but then there were five that they’d never seen before. It was like a cube floating in a square with a single blue eye in the center. They glided above the ground with some sort of anti-gravity energy and each one had one of the two legged Taq-Law walking with it.
“You see those?” Seth asked pointing them out.
“You mean the ones with body guards? Kinda hard to miss,” she replied and he stared back at her but he could feel her smirk. “Couldn’t resist Seth. But what do they do.”
Seth was about to give his idea but paused as the ground shook like a mini earthquake. The parking deck creaked and the pair held onto each other for balance. The cause was the five floating cubes that had suddenly sunk into the ground and were now vibrating. “Oh, great they’re doing a thing.”
“They sure fucking are,” Seth sighed and punched his fist together and let them glow to life. “Shall we go break up the party? At least until the other crashers get here.”
She pressed her hands together and called her staff to life and then broke it apart into its segments. “Just remember. I don’t need you to protect me.”
“After last night I think I need someone to protect me from you,” he laughed and jumped off the edge before she could say anything more.
Crashing into the ground Seth sprinted through the former parking lot and almost immediately got the attention of all of the Taq-Law. Jumping forward he slammed a glowing fist into the face of the Taq-Law blowing its head clean off with an explosion of purple light. Jumping off the crumbling body he ran again.
Before he could get in range of it a laser tore through the air and he threw himself to the side to avoid it. Raising both arms, he punched the air sending a pair of purple blast into another machine before it’s laser could fully charge. It whined exploding in a shower of red. Before he could power up again a spinning buzz saw slammed into his chest and pinned him to the ground.
His armor held it off but he wasn’t able to get out of its grasp. The Taq-Law raised its arm to cut off Seth’s head but the arm was smashed off. Spinning her staff around Kathryn slammed it into the Taq-Law’s leg toppling it down and finally through the head shutting it down.
She dragged him back to his feet and rolled her eyes. “Look at you, already needing me to save you.”
“Hey what can I say? I chose a great woman,” he shrugged and she hit him in the back with the staff before moving to stand at his shoulder. They had gained the attention of two of the Taq-Law guardians and their glowing knife hands were looking terrifying.
Kathryn reconnected her staff pieces and frowned, “Looks like we’ve got company.”
“You mean the thing that took five of us and some bullshit to take down? And there’s two of them,” Seth powered up raising his fist. “This will be fun.”
The first got to them and Kathryn stood in its way spinning her staff and deflecting its first attack to the ground. It followed up twisting its body around like a contortionist. Swinging the second blade at her exposed side Seth stepped in front of her catching the blade between his shields.
Its head flipped upward the laser already charging. Kathryn disconnected her staff and smashed it into the things head shooting the laser into the sky. Seth kicked it in the chest and disengaged it catching a breather. But both of them heard the other Taq-Law running their way its metal foot falls echoing on the ground.
Gunshots rang out and the Taq-Law fell to its knees, skidding across the ground. Red light flashed behind it and both its arms were chopped off electricity crackling on the air. It rotated its head around the light pulsing but a scythe blade slashed straight through its neck.
“Looks like the cavalry got here just in time,” Seth shouted as another Taq-Law whirled around leaping at them.
He blocked the flurry of attacks managing to catch the blades on his shields but one of its legs kicked at him. He caught it and turned whipping the Taq-Law across the ground. “Won’t catch me with that shit twice.”
It hit the ground and sprung to its feet its head glowing already. Kathryn shoved her staff into the ground and erected a shield in front of them sending its laser into the ground. She took a breath and sank to her knee groaning. The machine stalked forward and leaped at her thrusting both blades forward.
Before the blades connected they clanged against metal. Kathryn and Seth both stared at the pair of Cal’s in front of them holding off further assaults from the machine. A third jumped over them and carved his sword across the front plate of its head before it could even begin to charge the laser.
Stumbling as he landed he turned around to face them and held a thumbs up. “Sorry I’m late.”
“Since when can your clones do that?” Seth arched his eyebrow tapping one of them and it didn’t react.
“Since like an hour ago,” he shrugged.
But as the three of them gathered they stared at the green one of them as they approached. “It’s really you Jack?” Kathryn asked, Seth and Cal waited holding their breaths.
“It’s me in here,” he told her but watched as the Taq-Law began approaching them. “But it looks like we’ve got company on their way. You wanna do the honors Marco or can I?”
“How about together?”
They laughed walking in front of everyone. Flipping their weapons around they pointed at the Taq-Law, “Alright team. Let’s go to work.”
The Harlequin Library 