Data file R-3: The Mercenary Code

  [Unlike on Earth, mercenaries on Aljia are often not explicitly criminals, but those who operate in presumed “gray areas” of the law. The first group of people to take this path rallied behind the example of the legendary Terran Knight “Glyphwind,” and assumed his code: “The law sees black where we see color. The spectrum of life retracts for us.” This code signifies that to be a mercenary on Aljia is not to disregard the law, but to fill in the blanks and preserve life with no prior judgments. Some mercenaries today no longer hold this belief, but there are many who still do so with pride.

  Additionally, mercenaries that follow the code almost always take official bounties for their work, and the reigning monarch can issue a bounty for any mercenary operation, even after the “crime” has been committed, and render it legal. While praised by many, this power was originally put in place by Icarus Blade solely to protect the Glyphwind.]

  ***

  Rasil lifted his pistol from its holster. A flash of light emerged from the darkness as an orange bolt of energy slammed into the barrel of his gun. It burst with a sharp crackle. Rasil heard metal scraping and glanced down to realize he had skidded backwards from the force. The knockback was clearly going to make blocking ineffective, or at least inefficient. The sniper rifle was recharging, so he dashed to a corner for cover as Helios sounded the alarm.

  Searching for Alyssa, Rasil spotted her ducking beneath the balcony railing. A second bolt flew by her arm and set her glove ablaze. He started to rush over but stopped as she simply ripped off the glove, as if unfazed. She caught him staring and shrugged. “You’ve seen worse, I guess," he chuckled. A third bolt collided with the wall beside him as he shouted out, “We need better cover!”

  “No, we need to take that sniper down!” Alyssa responded.

  “Have a plan for that?” Rasil tested.

  “Better, I have you," she said.

  By that point, guards had reached the balcony, raising their shields and firing pistols into the dark. A fourth shot from the sniper indicated their failure to score a hit. Rasil recognized the time to act personally and signalled one of them to throw Alyssa a weapon. The soldier gladly complied and tossed her a pistol.

  “Give me some cover. I’ll swap in suppression fire when I’m closer," Rasil told them with a wink as he ran for the railing and jumped. Rasil internally cheered at the opportunity to test his new boots.

  Antigravity boots were standard equipment for a Terran Knight, and after ages of reliance on other similar items, Rasil had finally built a pair of his own. The power crystals in the armored shin guards glowed a deep red, then transferred the power to the antigravity cores. With a thunderous clang, the boosters fired and launched Rasil up and towards his target. A thin barrier of antigravity coursed through his whole body, similar to the flow of energy before a weapon strike. Essentially a cushion, it reduced the lashing force of inertia and kept him in a controlled jump.

  The boot soles scraped stone as Rasil met a rooftop thirty feet from the balcony. A fifth shot came, this time from much closer. The firebolt collided with his shin, which was fortunate enough to be armored currently, and ricocheted into the building below. The knockback forced his leg out from underneath him. The resulting spin caused him to fall almost on his face. Typical.

  The rifle charged again. Still lying on the roof, Rasil rolled to his left and hid behind an air vent. He sighed with mild frustration, realizing he was definitely out of practice. A creaking hiss indicated the racazoid saw the movement, but hadn’t fired yet.

  “What now, boss?” Helios whispered over the comlink. Rasil pulled his goggles from his belt and slipped them on.

  “How close am I?” He asked, letting the data from Helios’s vision appear on the display.

  “Less than twenty feet, hard to say. Target is a racazoid biter. He looks angry, maybe a bit hungry, too. He’s on the roof of the building next to you. Sniper rifle fires overcharged bolts with amplified knockback. He’s only got enough fuel for five more bolts. He likes scratching behind his left ear. He smells like oil. Elevation is thirty feet. Favors his right side.”

  “More information than I needed, Helios.”

  “I tell all the stuff, you shoot all the stuff," he replied. Rasil peeked from behind the vent and blindly fired to make an opening. Suppression shots would work now, though he still needed a close-range fight to kill the sniper. Another shot came from the racazoid.

  Rasil sprinted and vaulted to the next building's roof using the antigravity boots. Finally! He was within the range to use normal shots. “You’re finished," he muttered, charging his onslaught. The racazoid biter growled and drew a smaller firebolt pistol. Rasil lifted his own pistol and swung it with knife-like strikes, sending four shots into the biter’s arm. Metal chunks fell from the damaged appendage. It seemed that the arm was no longer a problem.

  If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

  The racazoid growled and leapt at him, swinging its intact claw. Rasil ducked defensively, hearing a yelp of shock as he kicked the biter in the face. Three more bolts struck from Rasil’s pistol, staggering the biter further. It rolled backwards, armor shedding rapidly, and Rasil leapt in for the killing blow, bringing his pistol grip down on its helmet to shatter the internal wiring. The racazoid anticipated that move, though, and a claw cut across Rasil’s wrist. Though superficial, the slice made him drop his pistol before the final blow could be dealt.

  The signature crushing jaws of the racazoid biter lunged for Rasil’s face. He threw himself backwards on the ground, retaliating by slamming a knee into the biter’s damaged arm. It screeched and swung one last time before Rasil grabbed his pistol again and blasted three shots into its face, killing it.

  Relieved, Rasil stood up and checked his wrist. The gauntlet was messed up, its plating dented and gashed, but the arm underneath was fine. Rasil thanked his luck as he heard Alyssa approach from behind.

  “Well, you didn’t seem to need my help," she shrugged as she kicked the biter’s dead body. Rasil turned and gave a smug look, which she returned.

  “How did you get here so fast?” he asked. She pointed down at a pair of silver-colored ankle boots she now wore, antigravity humming from them. Right, he should’ve guessed that. He looked back to the wrecked racazoid sniper and remarked, “Weird that Gears didn’t spot this thing sooner.”

  “Likely, I would say. He had a large area to cover, and people don’t usually attack my dad’s buildings.” The moment she said the words, she flinched, grimacing and visibly hoping he wouldn’t notice.

  “This was pretty far away from the perimeter, and—wait. Your dad, you said?”

  “Yeah...” Alyssa clarified. She nervously gripped her hands together.

  “You’re Alyssa Jones?”

  “Yeah..."

  Rasil squinted, thinking over her previous words, her acknowledgement that her dad was a spy, her being dragged to the party unwillingly, and all manner of hints. The only thing that didn’t line up was “Ghost” having taken bounties against the Shining Forge, but there was likely a more complicated, family-related explanation.

  As they were talking, a purple glow resonated from the broken head of the racazoid biter. Alyssa stepped toward Rasil and watched as the biter stood up, as if alive!

  It limped to its feet lifelessly, the motors and wires of the head falling out. The movement was impossible based on the damage, yet it happened anyway. Its eyes had a glowing, purple haze surrounding them.

  The two quickly fired at the dead racazoid as it charged, dropping more pieces of its body and screaming with rage. Rasil ran toward it and swung his pistol horizontally, firing a burst of bullets from the barrel. The attack splintered the spine and cut the biter in half at the waist. Alyssa blasted the remaining torso to pieces with her own pistol.

  The purple glow disappeared, and the biter died, again. Rasil knelt down and directly melted its core with his gun to ensure it stayed that way. Alyssa gazed at him, horrified at the display of resurrection, and whispered, “What was that?” Lord Flameye’s monologues echoed through Rasil’s mind again as he remembered the energy from the Shadowbane Amulet. Flameye had used it, he realized, to bring a racazoid back to life in that outpost.

  “That,” Rasil answered, remembering Flameye’s name for the energy, “was chimera.”

  “Indeed,” a menacing voice interrupted from the shadows. Alyssa and Rasil spun towards the sound and watched as a tall, cloaked figure emerged from the darkness. A purple mist poured from his feet. His hands were sticking out from underneath the cloak, exposing their metal talons. Rasil stepped back, a sudden fear overtaking him as the cloak’s hood dropped, revealing those familiar, burning, penetrating eyes. Though a sinister violet color now, they still shone with the same malice. Before them, somehow, stood Lord Flameye.

  “How are you still alive?” Rasil shuddered. The anger in him almost rose beyond control, but he had matured. He patiently waited for an answer, hand on his pistol’s holster.

  “Wait, what do you mean?” Alyssa asked him.

  “You must be new," Flameye scoffed at her. “But if you must know, Rasil here killed me.”

  “Yes, I did," Rasil affirmed. Alyssa gave another confused look. She had only heard the official military report of the battle, which stated Flameye simply went down along with his warship, no confirmed death.

  “Did you not see?” Flameye asked, stepping forward and raising his monstrous wings, “Did you not touch the Amulet?”

  “I did," Rasil answered as he fired his pistol at Flameye twice.

  The bullets bounced off Flameye’s armor, and he continued, “With power of time comes power over life and death. Time is the bridge between life and death, young knight, time is their master!”

  “You’re insane," Rasil told him.

  “Really? Then how do I stand before you now? How can your eyes and heart both be true?” he growled curiously. He stepped forward again and roared, “I die eternally, now resurrected every moment by the power of the Shadowbane Amulet. Death is not the end of my torment, and death will not be the end of yours! Gaze upon the power I sought, the power I have obtained!”

  Flameye clawed at Rasil, his claws igniting with purple fire; Rasil ducked and jumped back, dodging back out of Flameye’s reach. Flameye snarled as Rasil signalled to Alyssa, and they both jumped off the roof. Rasil grabbed the wall with his glove and slid down, while Alyssa caught herself with an antigravity grapple maneuver and stomped to the ground. Flameye looked over the rooftop’s edge as Alyssa and Rasil both ran back to Slick Jones’s abode.

  Rasil then holstered his pistol and tried not to listen as he heard Flameye screech from behind them, “Run for now, Rasil! I will win next time, and you will feel my pain!”