When War Calls(149)

On the ground, Jaden was in a trance, shielding all directions as he made his way north. The explosions blocked all vision of what was around him, but he could sense where they were. Whenever footsteps became too close, he sent extra waves of energy out with his hands to push them away. From the dirt beneath his feet came the most lethal energy as he called it up to him. Raquel had shown him how within the realm of the crystal, so that he did not have to rely on the endobraces entirely. It was with this energy that he was able to protect himself from the Alliance fire.

He was aware of over fifty soldiers attacking him, and he wondered at how easy it would be to take revenge on them. All it would take was a single wave, but it would need to be powerful to reach the soldiers furthest away, and he did not know if he could maintain the shield while releasing that energy.

As if by instinct, he jumped to his left where the fewest bullets were coming from and sent a powerful burst to the right. A missile had been launched, but like the grenades, it too was exploded on impact of his shield. Several more missiles were fired, and he directed his path toward a group of seven soldiers, hoping that they would not risk killing their own by attacking him with more missiles.

It worked.

No more missiles were launched, but he now felt he was losing his energy. He couldn’t maintain his concentration much longer. The fiery shield around him began to turn white, repelling the Alliance fire instead of destroying it. It was then that he noticed a second energy on his shield. It was red and half his size. Jaden lowered the energy in the shield so that it became transparent white, as if it were a dome of water around him. It was enough to protect him from minor strikes, but it allowed him to see what was beyond.

As he looked to where the new energy was coming from, he began to turn pale and his knees started shaking a little. There was a face on the other side of his shield, a familiar face he had not seen for many months. It was a face from Callibra, the face of the man he despised possibly more in this moment than he had ever despised anyone before. The face on the other side was that of Kobin Guyde, his hand raised toward Jaden, directing the red energy.

With anger, Jaden pushed his shield back to full strength and he chanced sending two waves of his own energy out, causing the closest soldiers to scream out in pain and Kobin to shield himself, jumping down and away as he did.

Jaden saw his chance then to rush at Kobin, to kill the traitor, but stopped after only several steps toward him. In the distance, Jaden saw hundreds of soldiers coming toward him, tanks rolling among them. He took another step toward Kobin, but knew he didn’t have time. He had to flee. Immediately.

Calling a final shield to rise from the earth, Jaden turned under its cover and raced into the forest behind him. The soldiers were swift in their pursuit, but Jaden used the last of his energy to sprint as fast as he could from them, passing through where he had last seen the beasts. He had felt movement in the ground and hoped that some of the beasts were still alive. If he ran through them, he could use them to slow the soldiers down, potentially even kill them.

The beasts came out as he expected, snarling and swiping at him with their long claws. But he directed them away from him with soft pulses of energy, ensuring that they could not reach him. He would not harm them. He needed them ready to fight for him as he got away. The beasts seemed to think better of following him, and screams soon sounded as guns blazed as the beasts were upon the men of the Alliance once again.

It had worked.

Jaden was out of danger now. The battle between soldier and beast raged on long enough to cause the soldiers to lose track of him, and he made his way to where Alkon said he would meet him. They had organised for Alkon to fly to the first clearing in the forest, which Jaden would mark with a beacon of blue light. Jaden had second-guessed Alkon, wondering how much he could truly trust him. He had been a traitor in the Alliance after all. He would have deceived many that had trusted him. What was to stop him betraying Jaden now? He could have flown away. Jaden would have no hope of catching up with him. But as he ignited the beacon, these fears were quickly put to rest, as it was not long before the helicopter landed in front of him, Alkon waving with a smile from inside.

As Jaden secured himself in the seat, the helicopter lifted and made its way north before Alkon turned east, and both finally sat back in relief.

‘We make quite a team,’ said Alkon triumphantly.

Jaden said nothing as he breathed heavily, holding his side.

‘Is something wrong?’ asked Alkon.

‘No,’ said Jaden, ‘just ... I feel weak.’

‘You did well to survive.’

‘I saw a man from my village,’ said Jaden, ignoring the compliment. ‘He was not a soldier. Was he the one?’