Until We Break (12 page)

Without warning, the plane’s lights flickered, and a dying hum sounded. “What was that?” Jaysin said.

“Probably nothing,” Brandon replied.

He returned to the cockpit, and Maya followed him. “It’s not nothing, is it?”

After examining the instrument panel for a moment, he said, “The cloaking device isn’t working.”

“That’s bad.”

“Return to your seat. We’re aborting.”

But from up ahead, a ball of light flew at them at unbelievable speed. “What the—?”

She wasn’t able to finish that thought before it slammed into the underside of the plane.

* * *

At first, Jaysin’s brain couldn’t process what was happening. One minute the plane was intact, and then it wasn’t. The right side of the plane disappeared in an instant, replaced by an indescribable heat and flames. It was as if a science fiction death ray had vaporized the plane, not leaving even a trace of the students that had been sitting there.

Next came the sudden drop as what was left of the plane fell out of the sky like a meteor. Jaysin ripped out his seat belt and staggered forward through fire and smoke, looking for Deep and Sahara, who had been sitting only a few rows ahead of him. He shouted for them, but his voice couldn’t break through the scream of the falling plane.

In a few moments it was all over.

Chapter IX

Maya opened her eyes. She had had a horrific nightmare about being on a burning plane. And then it all came back to her, and with a shudder, she realized it was no dream.

Something incredibly hot lay on top of her. She pushed it off her; it was a flaming piece of fuselage. Her head was killing her and she wiped blood from her brow before willing her body to heal itself.

She looked around. Smoking wreckage was strewn over a wide area. She stood up, intending to look for survivors.

A moan behind her led her to Brandon who lay on a bent piece of metal about the size of a refrigerator door. She helped him to his feet. “Are you all right?” he asked her.

She nodded. “But everyone else…”

“We’ve got to find them.”

The wind kicked up, assaulting her with hot air and sand. For the first time since they crashed, she looked beyond the debris field to Durydu proper. They were on a wide boulevard lined with large pyramids and a few square buildings. Massive sand dunes could be seen peaking over a giant wall on the city’s outer edge. Durydu was in the middle of a desert.

Tall aqueducts pumped water in from somewhere outside the city, meaning there must be an oasis or underwater repository not far from here. However, at least one of the aqueducts had been broken in half, probably by Zero Grade. As she looked further, she noticed more signs of battle; chunks taken off pyramids, holes in the ground, burn marks, etc. No, “battle” was probably the wrong word. More likely Zero Grade had flexed their muscles here to scare the citizens into compliance, and it may have worked. No one had yet come out to investigate the plane crash.

Maya and Brandon began turning over wreckage, looking for their comrades. It wasn’t long before they found someone.

“Jaysin!” Maya yelled. The aspiring god of money lay face-down, blood oozing from his head, his clothes burned and ripped.

Upon being shook, he groaned and opened his eyes. “M-Maya?”

An enormous sense of relief flooded through her. “Thank Bethos you’re all right.”

He sat up gingerly. “Unh. Wouldn’t exactly say that, but I’m alive.”

She applied healing to his head. “Just take it easy. You’ll be all right, but you need to rest for a moment. We’ll go look for the others.”

The wound closed, and he looked pleased with her work. “Appreciated. But I’ll be fine. You need all the help you can get, and I’m not sitting around while people could be dying.” The defiant young man joined them as they searched for more survivors.

A piece of wreckage moved up ahead, and they ran to it. Upon shoving it aside, they found Deep and Sahara, huddled together. Both were bleeding pretty bad, but divine first-aid from Maya helped them to recover.

“Thanks,” Deep said.

Sahara got her first good look at the carnage. “Dear Bethos,” she said softly. “What happened to us?”

Maya explained, “The cloaking device failed, and we were attacked.”

Deep was struggling to get his breathing under control. “It was bad. Everyone just got vaporized in an instant. The only reason we survived is because we didn’t get hit directly.”

“We have to get out of here,” Brandon said dejectedly. “This mission’s a failure.” They could all hear the utter despondency in his voice; he wanted to retake Durydu as much as anyone, and now his side was being dealt another crushing defeat.

But, without warning, a massive sandstorm suddenly kicked up outside the city. It quickly grew until all of Durydu was surrounded by a violent maelstrom.

An imposing voice called out, “You’re not going anywhere, Divine Protector Academy!”

They focused their attention to the end of the boulevard where the largest pyramid stood. On top of it was a lone figure. He was half-naked, with blue armbands around his biceps and wrists, and what looked like a brown skirt around his waist. To their surprise, he had the head of some sort of predatory bird.

“Ra,” Brandon said.

“Ra?” Maya replied.

“The Egyptian god of the sun. Egypt was a country in the previous universe, and Ra was one of the gods they worshipped. This guy’s no joke.”

“Is that his head?” Deep asked.

“Yeah, he has the head of a falcon.” Brandon then added, “That was a bird in the previous universe.”

“What are his powers?” Sahara said.

Brandon gestured to the tempest that was raging outside the city. “He can control sand. I’m not really sure what else he’s got since I’ve never actually fought him before. Stay on your guard. Looks like we have to beat him to get out of here.”

“You really think you stand a chance against me, Ares?” Ra boomed, utilizing Brandon’s true name. His voice had no trouble projecting out to them. “There’s a reason Zero Grade sent me here instead of the other Ultimus Points. The sun shines brightest in this part of the world, and the sand is abundant. Observe.”

He waved his arms, and the sandstorm flew towards them, smothering the buildings and everything else in its path. Upon its arrival, it pounded them with unrivaled ferocity, battering one another in the roiling tempest.

“Everyone, huddle together!” Brandon yelled. They wasted no time linking up, with their backs to the sandstorm.

Soon, the storm subsided, leaving a thousand pounds of sand to bury the boulevard. “Is it over?” Sahara asked.

“Not even close,” Brandon replied.

“You’re right about that,” Ra said. “The attack has only just begun. Watch.” He snapped his fingers, and the sand abruptly rose up, taking on human shapes. More specifically, a hundred sand Ras appeared, each one bearing an eerie resemblance to the Egyptian god. “Kill them!”

The expressionless dolls advanced on them bearing sand spears. “Don’t take them lightly!” Brandon warned. The students nodded grimly, accepting the battle they were now faced with.

Maya unloaded ice arrows into the nearest sand Ras, freezing them in place and leaving them open for Deep and Sahara to shatter with physical strikes. Despite being relatively new students, they had taken quickly to Atlas’ self-defense program, picking up respectable martial arts skills.

Jaysin summoned his staff and proceeded to smash the doppelgangers with a fluid series of attacks. He downed one after the other with impeccable grace, showing his dedication to his chosen weapon.

But it was veteran god Brandon who proved the most effective at dispatching Ra’s impromptu army. He got fired up and unleashed an inferno upon their attackers, incinerating hundreds in an instant.

When it was over, he shouted to Ra, “Is that all you got? Your lackeys are a joke!”

From atop the pyramid, Ra replied, “You think you’ve defeated them? Think again.” He snapped his fingers and the countless particles of sand reformed. In an instant, his army was reborn and once again on the attack. Brandon blew them away with his fire, but each time he did, Ra simply resurrected them.

“What are we going to do?” Maya said. “At this rate, they’ll wear us down before we even get to Ra.”

Brandon said, “I have an idea. As soon as I down the next wave, everyone rush him before he has time to rebuild his clones.”

He unleashed another wave of fire, wiping out the expressionless dolls. He and the students quickly flew in and up the main pyramid.

However, a massive wall of sand appeared before them and knocked them back to the ground. “It’s pointless,” Ra said. “There’s an endless supply of sand at my disposal in this city. Wherever you go, the sand will be there to stop you.”

“Then I’ll just keep burning it up,” Brandon said from the base of the pyramid.

Ra pondered that for a second. “You’re probably right. As it stands now, killing you will take too long. I’ll just have to speed things up.” He spread his hands out before him, and a small but very bright ball appeared in them. “Witness my Solar Bomb!” As he focused on the ball, it increased in size, not unlike Atlas’ boulder. But this was no rock; it was a miniature sun—and it was getting bigger!

When it was about the size of the pyramid, Ra hurled it down upon them with blinding speed. There was no time to get out of the way.

This was the end.

Surprisingly, though, while everyone else looked on with fear and awe, Jaysin stood firm. Readying his staff, he positioned it mere inches above the ground. The small sun bore down on them, its heat their own personal hell. Flames licked at their clothing as it approached.

Yet when it was right on top of them, Jaysin struck the ground with his staff. Abruptly, the sun reversed course and headed back at Ra with even greater speed than it had when it came at them.

“Wha—?” Ra yelled. He couldn’t even finish that one word before the sun hit him, vaporizing his entire being in an instant. Having destroyed the top half of the pyramid as well, it kept rocketing through the sky, gradually dissipating the farther it went, until it burned out entirely.

When everyone’s faculties returned, they wasted no time congratulating Jaysin on his amazing save. “How did you know that would work?” Maya asked.

He shrugged. “I didn’t. Honestly, I thought it would kill us before it got close enough for me to reverse its gravity. Lucky thing it didn’t, huh?” He laughed sheepishly.