Empyrean Iris Story Collection Vol. 4

Ticking Down

Ash and soot sprouted towards the sky, like the limbs of a dying tree during winter. Though the impression was gone almost as soon as it had come. And while Celex had managed to repel the artillery fire, the kinetic energy absorbed by the shield had thrown their tank like a child toy which spun, hit the light, and then tumbled across the open ground scarring the dirt as the Tank's metal frame tore massive clods from the ground.

Adam was thrown off just as the tank began its first rotation, not that he would have chosen to stay on otherwise. In the mass of spinning sky and ground, he caught only flashes of the others, as they too, were pitched from the Tank's frame. As a robotic AI, fealty was fast enough to highlight Sunny's body in green even as she tore past his eyes, but even had Adam possessed the speed required to do anything about it, his brain was too muddled to try.

She passed out of his vision, and he hit the ground hard, rolling once, then twice, then three times before slamming into something very hard.

His already cracked suit armor sent a distress signal to his HUD which blinked dramatically in shades of red and yellow.

Suit operation capacity 37%.

His body throbbed, but still, his helmet had done its job of protecting the mushy insides of his skull.

Adam staggered to his feet leaning heavily against the hard surface that had so rudely stopped his forward momentum: It was a wall, specifically the wall of the Necritorium.

They had made it to their destination.

And Nechal had already found them a way inside.

Adam was almost positive she had been aiming for the Necritorium gate; to say that the Tank's path had been fortuitous enough to crash through the massive rot iron facade simply upon the capricious whims of luck, would have been too much.

She had clearly been planning to use the tank as a battering ram either way and while flipping through the air had not been her original intention, the result was still the same.

"Over here! Hurry!" The sound of artillery fire was enough to drown out any other words she might have shouted, but Nechal's pearlescent carapace and glowing golden aura were more than enough to catch his attention as she waved him over from the broken gate.

Out in the other direction, a line of silhouettes was gathering before the horizon. The void army had broken away from their individual conflicts and was now funneling toward them in a torrent. Ignoring the urge to limp on his human leg, Adam raced along the wall and towards the gate.

Others were doing the same.

To his relief, Adam watched Sunny reach the gate first, Vaulting over the wreckage, and past Nechal, followed closely by Ramirez, who was missing good chunks of armor on his thighs and upper shoulders. Miraculously, so came everyone else, limping or bounding their way forward as the void army grew in size behind them. The tank left only a small gap in the warped gate allowing them through one at a time.

Surprisingly, through all of the odds, Krill had managed to survive, awkwardly shoving himself through the gap before Adam and after Dzara. Adam was both impressed and shocked. Kanan stayed back and climbed through last, taking Nechal's hand and squeezing tightly as he passed through the gap.

King James waited for them on the other side, golden shield dented, plume torn, red cloak hanging in tatters even as flecks of blood spattered the golden facade of his helmet.

"No time to talk, those soldiers will be here in moments, and once they spill through that gate we won't be able to stop them."

Adam knew he was right.