The First: EVO Uprising (48 page)

Sophia pulled herself off of a downed tree. Realizing what her unchecked emotions had done, she quickly pulled herself together. The first thing she had to do was save the male tourist falling from a snapped zip line and then stabilize the shaking structure attached to trees.

Her hair stood on the back of her neck as she leaped through the sky catching the screaming zipliner in midfall setting him down. She could not stop to check if he was okay as she bolted to secure the massive metal tower. She pushed it downward into the ground to secure it.

It was all for knot as an orange and red energy blast blew the top of the tower apart snapping the cables sending two suspended carts falling and crashing to the ground.

“
Noooooo!” Sophia screamed.

#3 stood sneering in the center of the chaos. With a hand gesture, she beckoned Sophia to come at her. Drenched with fury, she obliged, propelling herself toward her. It sounded like a bomb detonating as she slammed into her again driving her through the dense forest woods.

Trees shattered in half as Sophia drove her backwards through thick foliage to beat her to death in an isolated area. Ice chills ran throughout her body as she realized she was slowing down. #3 bared down, straightening her body into a slanting position, trenching the ground with her feet.

Sophia stopped her forward thrust landing on her feet. Her plan was to grab #3 by her legs lifting her up, and then go airborne again going straight up. Before she should put her plan into motion, #3 revealed that she was not only disturbingly stronger but faster than Sophia.

She leaped up before she could react and deliver a crushing elbow to the upper part of Sophia’s spine. She felt every bit of it.

Pain, in the almost seven years since her reawakening, she had not felt—the type that #3 delivered to her. Not even the Draugr’s lucky shot to the nose hurt as much. The elbow to the back felt as if her spine was shattered. She followed up with a knee to the gut that felt as if she cracked several of her ribs. So much so that she could not prepare for the earthshaking uppercut knocking her into the upper stratosphere of the planet. Blood poured and froze as it left Sophia’s mouth while her eyes witnessed literal stars and planets. The cobwebs and pain rattling her body and mind was dispersing too slowly for her to defend herself. #3 now airborne had caught up with her in a matter of seconds. This time it was her turn to deliver a swooping shoulder tackle to the gut, which hurled both women back down to Earth. Their atmospheric reentry lit up the heavens.

The material used to create Sophia’s new outfit, gifted to her by Lady Tech, held against the scorching heat of their downward angled plunge.  #3’s leather ensemble held as well, though it took more damage and abuse from the god-like roughhousing. She did not care as she cackled insanely while strafing across the skies of England looking to pay Sophia back for the Matterhorn.

The target of her aggression was innocent Big Ben.

Sophia, realizing where she was heading, fought to break from her grip, but it was too late.

The famed clock tower exploded similar to an egg in a microwave, those watching the scene in horror ran for their lives as debris from the Elizabeth Tower rained down crushing everything and everyone unfortunate to not have gotten out of the way. The rest of the tower’s now weakened structure gave way and came crashing down as well, while #3 and Sophia plowed into the Palace of Westminster.  

It went up like a lit M-80 stuffed inside of a birdhouse. Smoke bellowed everywhere as pieces of the historical structure collapsed in on itself, some of it fell outward falling into the River Thames. The seismic hit also claimed the Westminster Bridge tearing it apart; sending it into the river. The destruction and loss of life was immeasurable.

Sophia groaned as several tons of the Palace laid on top of her, while a high pitched ringing went off in her ear. She employed her eyebeams to slice a path through the rubble. With a couple of swipes and kicks she unburied herself.   

As quickly as it came, the ringing disappeared as she slowly staggered to her feet. Now filled with the sound of fire, structures crumbling, and the screams of the trapped and dying, she clutched her chest looking around at the destruction and mayhem. Black smoke blotted out the little sun that shined making it nearly impossible to see. It was hell on Earth that she was partially responsible for creating.

“
No… no… no,” Sophia coughed, close to tears.

Her ears also picked up another sound through the madness. It was the insane laughter of joy.

“
Whooooo! That shit was hot!” howled #3. “Nothing like a bit of mass destruction to make you feel more alive!”
 

Her bright-yellow glowing eyes, and ear-to-ear grin, made her look more monstrous as she stood basking amongst the ruin.

“
What did you do?” a male voice screamed. “What did you fucking cunts do?”

Both women turned to see five mortified superhumans dressed in colorful British flag like attire and body armor; the UK’s superhuman military unit known as the Lions of Elizabeth.

Their leader, who went by the name Knight Light, was a powerful Apollo class EVO and one of the few to channel and manipulate photon energy on a destructive level.  He was the only one hovering above his team adorned in a bodysuit that was styled with a star on his chest and forearms, and the Union Jack flag over the entire bodysuit. Similar to Sophia and other energy wielders of the solar and electrical spectrum, his eyes glowed a yellowish-white. He was also the one who addressed them in a crude manner.

“
Look around “bright boy, what you think happened?” #3 callously gestured. “My girl and I happened to be roughhousing and did a little remodeling of this piece of shit country of yours. Fuck you very much. Now piss off, before you piss me off.”

“
Take them!” he howled at his team. “Dead or alive, take them both!”

“
No wait… I’m not with…” Sophia help a hand up.

Her attempt to reason with them was cut short by a furious gust of water capable of punching a hole through a brick wall. She could have powered through it if she was not caught off guard. Instead, she was blasted a good thirty feet by the team’s water wielder codenamed the Lady of the Lake.

She quickly recovered, rolling to her feet, only to be set upon by the water wielder and the team Mercurian speedster, Sir William Swift.

His Union Jack bodysuit was styled with a flashy wind pattern design. He also wore a ballistics mask that carried the same pattern to hide his identity. Furiously he circled Sophia moving six times the speed of sound. He moved in and out of his circular running pattern to get close enough to strike her with a right cross that could remove a human head at the velocity he was running. The act was nothing but annoying to her, and she would have grabbed him had it not been for the Lady of the Lake slamming her repeatedly with typhoon salvos of water. An impressive technique they both mastered.

Through the blur and the water pelting Sophia could see that Knight Light and the rest of his team consisting of Jack the Giant, a Titan class EVO, and Foundation, a female Elemental EVO with abilities similar to Adrian, attempting a triple team #3.

It was going worse than she feared.

Knight Light’s powerful photon blast capable of cutting an aircraft carrier in half did not even singe her skin. Sophia had a gut feeling it was also strengthening her. The woman known as Foundation placed her hand on a broken column of the Palace transforming her body into its properties. She then grasped the fifteen ton column breaking it off to use it as a blunt object.

Jack the Giant attempted a Mixed Martial Art shoot on her to tackle her to the ground, but a far more powerful and skilled #3 stuffed his attempted and upended him with a knee that lifted him off his feet.

Unlike Sophia, who only expelled a couple trickles of blood, Jack the Giant found himself on his knees clutching his gut. His body violently trembled from the devastating hit as he threw up blood and bile.

Sophia had to remove her before she caused more senseless deaths. In one swift move she extended her arm clotheslining  Sir William Swift out of his running pattern and into a painful tailspin. She made sure to strike him in the solid upper part of his chest as opposed to his neck to avoid beheading him. He hit the floor brutally hard but would recover in a matter of minutes.

She then powered through the Lady of the Lakes powerful hydro stream blasts grabbing both of her arms. She applied enough pressure to stop her from channeling anymore water molecules.

“
Ow! Ow! Ow!” she screamed.

Sophia could see both the anger and tears in her eyes mixed with fear.

“
I’m not the enemy, so stop hitting me with water,” Sophia said sternly, “You and your fast friend over there need to focus on putting out these fires and helping the wounded. I’ll deal with that mad woman before she hurts or kills anyone else. Understood?”

The Lady of the Lake frantically nodded that she would comply. Sophia released her long enough to see #3 standing punt Jack the Giant through an already broken wall structure and smash the column Foundation attempted to used as a club into rubble with a swat of her forearm. With blinding speed she grabbed her by her throat lifting her off her feet forcing Knight Light to end his futile photon barrages in fear of hitting his teammate.

#3 grinned as she prepared to crush her marble stone neck popping her head off.

Sophia blindsiding her with another shoulder tackle, whisked her into the air, saving Foundation from the gruesome death. She hit the floor hard. Clutching her throat, she was visibly shaken, even in her transformed state. Knight Light landed running to her side to check on her. He briefly turned, looking up at the sky with rage and sadness in his eyes.

Several thousand miles up the two women, cursed, screamed, clawed, punched, kneed, and kicked at each other at unimaginable speeds. Neither one of them paid attention to their flight pattern as they now flew over the Sahara.

 
#3 executed a Judo Tomeo-nage or Circle throw in midair hurling her off. Before Sophia hit the sand she was able to grab a handful of #3’s blonde dreads. #3 screamed as she pulled slinging her downward by her hair. She tore through a sand dune and kept tumbling while Sophia impacted the sand, sliding across it at high speeds, spraying sand everywhere before stopping. She spat up a mouthful of sand that she ate as she slowly rose to her feet.

As the blazing sun beat down on her, there was not an innocent soul in sight. Her ears propped up to the sound of foul language. Slowly she turned to see the person she had been trying to kill for the second time in the past forty-five minutes dusting herself off.  

“
Asshole!” she screamed with a snarl on her face. “If you wanted to get me alone to talk all you had to do was ask! I swear if you pulled out one dread.”

As #3 checked her hair to ensure none was ripped out, a blindly enraged Sophia attempted to rush her again. Two feet away from closing the gap, #3 extended her right hand charging an orange and red soccer ball size of energy stopping her in her tracks.

“
Careful!” she warned. “You know how one of these works once I let it fly. How many towns do you think I can destroy in a single blast before you get to me? Now are we going to talk like adults or make more bodies to bury?”

“
How are you still alive?!” screamed Sophia.

“
Search your thoughts Luke…” sneered #3. “After the trouncing you gave me, before you kamikazed me into that nuke, which let me go on record to say was way over the fucking line to anything I’ve ever done to you. I should have been dead. Blow to bits, atomized ashes, so what did you do to ensure my survival?”

Sophia began searching her memory, fast forwarding, freezing, and analyzing their one-sided battle before their supposed nuclear end almost seven years ago.

“
I’ll give you a hint,” said #3. “It was before you said… “That’s… for Charlie.”

Sophia staggered backwards shaking her head as her memory fell on that one moment before her remark.

“
No.” She shook her head.

“
Oh yeah,” #3 grinned, “your knack for being a petty little bitch is what saved my ass. My already enhanced cells combined with your blood allowed me to heal and adapt faster than you. Mind you, it wasn’t enough juice to even the odds against you in our first scuffle, but it was enough to open my cells up and absorb the energies from the nuke that engulfed us both. Kind of makes you wish you had blown me to ashes like you did #1.”

Her words took some of the fight out of Sophia, allowing her to ease up and power down the crackling pulsating ball of death she held.

“
By the way I go by the name ‘Peace’ now,” she announced. “#3 is my slave name.”

“
Where…” Sophia fought to get her focus.

“
You mean, where I’ve been hiding?” chuckled Peace,
“off planet!”
 

“
Off planet?” Sophia stood stunned. “You mean space?”

“
Shit!” Peace scoffed. “I mean I traveled to Mars, Saturn, and then I backtracked to Venus, which is like a twenty-four-seven acid trip! After that, I spent like a month and a half on Mercury! Let me tell you girl! Clothing is not optional! The upside is no tan lines!”