Star Force: Battlemeld (SF45) Read online

  Karen snickered. “We live here.”

  “I meant if you didn’t have other training planned.”

  “We’ll make time,” Travis promised. “I like sucking off your power reserves. Makes me feel superhuman.”

  “We are superhuman,” Karen reminded him.

  “Super Saiyan then,” he amended.

  “Tomorrow then,” Kara said, looking over at the distant control panel and telekinetically punching a few buttons that ended their current scenario and withdrew the objects into the walls, along with the hologram disappearing. “If you don’t mind clearing the deck, I need the chamber for another workout.”

  “You go girl,” Travis said as he and Karen jogged off towards the doors. Kara followed behind them at a walk and came up on the control panel once they were gone, locking the doors and bringing up a scenario she’d designed specifically for herself…and one that was too dangerous for spectators. Normally she had to work her way around others using the main chamber, but today, at least, she didn’t have to worry about that for another 45 minutes, which would be more than enough time for her 20 minute scenario. She might even go for two if she was feeling like it after the first.

  Kara tapped the start button, then immediately turned and ran away from the control panel, activating her Vorch’nas and leaping into the air after four steps, fully covered in red, dragon-like scales. She flew up to about half altitude in the room and punched a meter-wide object flung at her like a remote-control missile, knocking it aside and scoring a point as more popped out from the walls and came at her.

  Kara flew around, hitting, kicking, ramming, and dodging the objects that ranged in size from a basketball to a hovertruck, scoring points and trying not to get hit herself. This challenge wasn’t about using psionics as much as it was her getting in some flying combat practice with her armor…something she rarely got outside of real combat, for none of the standard Archon sanctums had a chamber such as this. She was lucky it had what she needed to practice, though it hadn’t been designed with her in mind.

  By the end of her first session she’d broken two of the smaller targets, hitting them so hard that the pressure sensors overloaded from the blunt trauma, and added three more in her second round. The techs would fix them up later, as they had numerous times before. She didn’t mind giving them extra work to do because they’d been a bit slow to design new targets that could hold up against her powered armor, and now they had five more reminders to get their asses in gear.

  Once completed, Kara flew back down to the floor and resumed ‘normal’ mode with her Vorch’nas retracting back into the clear crystal that rode imbedded into her left wrist like an ornament...but an ornament she could never take off. It was fused into her bone and had become a permanent part of her, which she had objected to at first, but she’d long since gotten used to it and now viewed it as another body part.

  Her score for the second round was slightly lower than the first, but that was to be expected due to fatigue. Even with the power-augmentation of the thin armor covering her body from head to toe, flying around and hitting things took a toll on her body, with a considerable amount of the power she employed coming from her own muscular strength.

  The score was acceptable, given that she hadn’t tailed off too much and it made for several more minutes of valuable experience. When she got back to the control panel and reset the room to normal, she unlocked the door and found Paul and Jason outside waiting for their reserved time slot that was still a few minutes away.

  “How many did you break this time?” Jason asked.

  “Five,” she said, walking by the pair and giving Paul a fist bump as she passed. “All yours boys.”

  They went inside and she walked on, eventually heading up to the command deck for a few laps of medium intensity running that left her dripping in sweat afterwards. She thought about heading for a shower but Kara decided against it as a thought kept tugging at the back of her mind. She took off jogging easily until she got lost in the pedestal forest and out of sight, then quietly leapt into the open air and flew up through the chamber, hanging from the jewel on her wrist.

  Quietly she ascended up to the platforms around the narrower roof where the I’rar’et and the few other flying races had some built-in perches. They had backdoor access for Zen’zat, but nobody was ever up there, giving her a quiet place to think.

  She landed Mary Poppins style, coming in over the meter high ridge/railing that separated what was essentially a series of small hangars from the drop off that would have easily killed anyone falling over the side, which was why they had the railing, she knew, to protect the Zen’zat from doing just that, either by their own stupidity or by accidentally getting knocked off by the winged creatures moving about.

  She landed just inside the ledge and looked around, seeing nothing new since the last time she’d been up here. Sooner or later she expected the techs to start annexing these areas, but apparently they hadn’t run out of room below just yet.

  Kara turned around and climbed up on the railing, then sat down on the half-meter wide stone slab and let her feet hang off the side, not fearing the height. It was odd, because before she’d always been wary of heights…and with good reason. One little ring-out and it was all over.

  But now that she could fly the only thing she worried about was falling while unconscious, meaning she wasn’t going to be taking a nap on the ledge any time soon, but just sitting here she was in no danger, for all it would take was a single thought and her jewel would levitate with her hanging from it. That gave her a freedom that she relished, especially since no one else could follow her.

  She kicked her legs a bit, pounding her heels on the outside of the ledge as she leaned back and grabbed the inner edge with her hands, then closed her eyes and focused on her handholds while letting her mind spin about, trying to get at that elusive thought that had been dancing around on the edge of her senses. As she’d done many times before, she lost herself in a wash of thoughts and didn’t pull out of it until sometime later when she got a slight telepathic tap on her ‘shoulder.’

  Kara opened her eyes and her senses returned to normal, with her feeling a presence behind her on the ‘roost.’

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t sense you coming,” Kara said, twisting her neck around as Greg walked up.

  “Am I interrupting?” he asked, coming up behind the railing on which she sat, but off center to her right.

  “Not really,” she said, glancing down at the watch on her right wrist. “I thought I had another memory resurfacing, but if I haven’t gotten it by now I’m probably not going to today. Did you need something or were you just wandering around?”

  “No, I just sensed someone up here and came looking. The door was locked, so I didn’t know if you wanted to be alone or not.”

  “I came up this way. I never use the door.”

  “Quite the view,” Greg said, leaning over the edge carefully to halfway look over the drop-off.

  “Care to join me?”

  “I’m fine standing, thanks.”

  “Relax, I’ll catch you if you fall.”

  “Didn’t think you were that fast.”

  Kara looked down past her feet. “Fast enough. Pick something up and chuck it over the edge if you want to test me,” she said, half expecting him to say ‘don’t bother,’ but to his credit he slipped off his own watch and casually tossed it over.

  Kara pulled with her legs and pushed with her jewel’s anti-grav, sliding her off the edge and dropping her out of sight. Greg didn’t lean over to watch, but some 8 seconds later her wrist came back into view, dragging her arm and body underneath it until she got her feet on the ledge and sat back down in her original position. Then, without a word, she held up his watch in her right palm.

  He picked it up and slid it back on his wrist, then carefully sat up on top next to her crosslegged, feeling a little wobbly but resisting the urge to grab the back edge.

  Kara laughed. “It’s ok. I ne
ver liked heights either.”

  “I’ll manage,” Greg said, sticking with it. “I heard you’re working out with the twins?”

  “Yeah, but just with the three-way meld. They’re not that powerful, but their coordination is amazing. Second only to you know who.”

  “I’m surprised you can stand them.”

  “Well, I’m second gen, so it’s not quite the same. Their feud with you guys doesn’t seem to include me, so we get along for the most part…once you accept that they’ve got a chip on their shoulder that’s driving their arrogance. They’re still barely more than kids, so I cut them a bit of slack. Though they do push the boundaries every now and then.”

  “Funny, I thought we adopted you?”

  Kara smiled. “Apparently they don’t see it that way…and they didn’t break any of my records.”

  “You have records?”

  “No…which is why there’s less conflict there, I suppose.”

  “Paul and Jason are still ticked about that, but mainly because the twins are being jerks and poking the tiger on purpose. Do that and you’re going to get the claws.”

  “As they should,” Kara agreed. “They just don’t feel like poking me for some reason.”

  “Then they’re finally starting to show some wisdom.”

  “They have an ability that they didn’t have to earn, and it makes them think they’re higher rank than they really are. That doesn’t excuse their arrogance, but it’s the source…and the fact that they keep accessing new abilities before Paul and Jason is only feeding it. If they’d had a full smackdown I think they’d learn quicker, but as long as they’ve got an edge on them they’re going to put their stock in that and continue this feud.”

  “I just wish they’d leave the fantasy out of it,” Greg said.

  “I think they’re learning that through me. Sharing a battlemeld has a way of opening one’s eyes.”

  “That trinket doesn’t hurt either.”

  Kara held up her jewel and looked at it. “Kind of surprised they don’t react harsher to me because of it.”

  “They can’t compete with it and they know it. But they’re stupid enough to think they can best us in psionics. You said something about more memories?”

  “Yeah, happens every now and then. Some just come out without me trying and others nibble away until I dig them out. Felt one earlier when I was running, but haven’t been able to get at it.”

  “You remember something special about the three-way melds?”

  “Meaning is that why I’m putting up with Prick and Pam? Maybe some truth to that. I do have some memories, but they’re incomplete. Shielding things I’m not ready to know yet, I’d guess. I do know that during the war Zak’de’ron Zen’zat would form hunting parties to go after stronger opponents, be that other Zen’zat or the larger races. We made a lot of takedowns that way until the V’kit’no’sat got wise to it and adjusted their tactics.”

  “So they do know of the battlemeld?”

  “They know the Zak’de’ron used it in their Zen’zat, but I don’t think they ever knew they had the potential themselves.”

  “They thought the dragons made extra enhancements?”

  “Seems like it, because we never saw the battlemeld used against us.”

  “I keep thinking, with all these defensive abilities that we keep finding, might not there be a more offensive set? Kara’s Jumat is, I know, but that’s just knocking things around. We know the Hjar’at have an energy weapon built into their biology. Might not the dragons have included one for the Zen’zat too?”

  “A good question, and I…” Kara cut off as something flashed into her mind.”

  “What is it?”

  Hold on, she said, chasing it. The memory didn’t want to be found, darting here and there like trying to catch a bug, but she’d had enough practice by this point that she eventually pinned it down and forced it into the conscious portion of her mind.

  When she did it almost hurt, like she was forcing something into place that wasn’t meant to be there…or wasn’t meant to be there that soon, for as she did, some of those blocks on the psionic abilities dissipated, letting memories arise that had been previously shrouded in mental fog.

  When it did she held her mind motionless, fearing that it might whip away as soon as it arrived, as had happened a few times in the past, but as she waited and let it soak in she got a memory of a very specific ability, a tier 4 psionic with its battlemeld counterpart, that literally made her jaw drop.

  “Holy shit,” she said, looking down at the palm of her right hand.

  “You remembered something?” Greg asked.

  Kara nodded. “Now I know why we have Rensiek. It’s a precursor to something a lot more powerful. A tier 4 called ‘Choratrik.’”

  “What is it?” Greg asked excitedly.

  “Something I saw firsthand from the Dragon,” she said, remembering him arch his neck back towards the ceiling and spew a plume of white fire that melted the material of the chamber she’d found him in. “It translates as ‘bioplasma.’”

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