Dawn of the Epoch

Chapter XCVII - The Epoch Begins?

At the end of a long hallway, Hunter dropped his shoulder and hit the double doors hard. As they swung open, they revealed an enormous warehouse. At the center was a large, round seal. Hunter was on a plateau far above the floor. There were many shelves on his level. All of them were stocked with meticulously labeled boxes. Mechanical parts covered in multicolored wires were lying naked on the shelves. Hunter made for the stairs. Before he reached the top stair, however, he heard a loud whooshing sound, then a thud. The seal in the center of the floor shook. Smoke billowed out around the edges of it.

“Oh no!” Hunter exclaimed.

His eyes rolled back into his head and he became Dahjaat. His consciousness wandered the void for a few seconds before returning to his giant body. He had shifted in the nick of time. The seal had popped off like a cork coming out of a champagne bottle. A column of thick smoke rocketed toward the roof. Smoke filled the room. The roof exploded in the center and the column rose higher and higher into the heavens. Then, Hunter heard a loud creaking sound. The roof was collapsing. The ground beneath his feet shook like an earthquake.

“Tiyana!” He screamed.

As he turned, he saw one of the rafters falling toward them. He grabbed his wife and leapt off of the plateau. He hit the ground hard and absorbed most of the impact as he dropped his wife carefully onto her feet. He looked up and saw that Virgil had vanished. Hongo had managed to dive underneath one of the fallen shelves. The thick metal rafter rested on top of the pile. Hongo was struggling to get out.

“Hold on Hongo. I’m coming.”

Hunter winced as he bounded up the rubble to the plateau where Hongo was pinned down. Virgil was nowhere to be seen. When Hunter reached the shelves, he bent his knees and lifted the shelf pinning Hongo down. The big Kenyan crawled out.

“I am fine Hunter. What about Tiyana?”

Hunter looked back down at her. He could barely see her through the smoke. He blinked and raised his index and middle fingers to his third eye. He pressed the bulb and felt sound waves bouncing off of everything in the room. A large metal truss was falling.

“Not again.” He muttered.

Exhausted and injured from the fall, he bounded back down the pile of rubble to Tiyana’s position. He picked her up, draped her over his shoulder, and ran for the door. The crumbling roof had bent the large sliding door out of shape. Hunter saw an opening. He bolted for it. Rubble rained down on top of him. He protected Tiyana as best as he could and kept running. He was screaming. He tapped his third eye again and became aware of someone running behind him. It was Hongo. They reached the crack in the bent door as the door and part of the wall collapsed. Hunter, Tiyana, and Hongo dove through the crack as the building collapsed inward. Covered in soot and dust, they crawled away from the wreckage. The giant smokestack still billowed into the sky. It seemed to be accumulating in the low-hanging clouds.

“Ma Ang’o!” Hongo exclaimed. “What is that?”

“Ghaelvord.” Hunter said. “This must be his plan.”

“But what is it?” Tiyana said.

“You know what it is.” Tiyana heard Virgil’s voice.

She turned and saw him, unscathed, standing behind them.

“How...?” She started, “You know what? Forget it.”

“He knows how to do it. He is doing it.” Virgil was saying, “He needs mass to become a Titan and he will take it from the field.”

“Is this what you were talking about before?” Hunter asked Tiyana.

Tiyana nodded.

“There’s something about the synchrotron.” She said. “He used it to channel energy from… I can’t say it.” She shook her head.