Chapter 322 - Beautiful Chaos

Chapter 322

Beautiful Chaos

Alexander didn’t wait for the attack to finish or for Caroline to recover. He had an entire arsenal to unleash on the woman, and only a short time to do it in.

He raced after her, diving into the lightning stream and letting it obscure his approach. As it washed over the OACS and the current bled into the suit, he seized it, routing it inward to fill every capacitor the suit had.

Something he’d forgotten to do before the fight.

Electrokinesis pulled the excess electricity into his body, cycling it through his Core and sharpening his senses, pushing his body to the absolute limit.

Caroline began to stabilize as the lightning ran its course.

Metallokinesis pulsed and he reoriented in an instant, striking her in the face feet-first at near-maximum subsonic speed. The impact sent her spinning backward through the air again, the shockwave rattling through his armor and up into his knees.

Alexander kept coming, spinning back around to face her head-on.

Caroline slowed as she reasserted control over her flight, one hand rising toward her lip.

Her fingers came away wet with blood.

He didn’t give her time to process. Both hands came up, fingers spread, before he sent two lightning bolts arcing toward her face.

Caroline’s own hands snapped up, catching both bolts. Electricity danced across her palms and between her fingers, the energy already beginning to dissipate.

Through the gaps in the lightning, Caroline was staring back at him, the beginnings of a smile stretching across her face.

Alexander threw a right hook at nothing.

To the right of Caroline’s head, a spark flickered into existence. It erupted into a bolt of lightning that struck the left side of her face. Her head snapped to the side, and she went tumbling through the air yet again.

Alexander laughed. He threw a tight left hook, and another spark flashed into existence to the left of Caroline’s head. Lightning cracked across the right side of her face this time, knocking her back the other way.

Then he threw a right uppercut, and another lightning bolt erupted beneath Caroline, sending her tumbling straight up into the air.

Mecha-Droney rocketed down to meet her.

Alexander swept his cybernetic hand downward, sending a surge of Metallokinesis to assist Mecha-Droney’s descent.

The three-meter sphere smashed into Caroline at near-supersonic speed.

A shockwave tore through the air. Caroline hit the sea hard enough to crater the surface, water erupting in every direction before rushing back in and sending a jet of water spraying into the sky.

Mecha-Droney drifted into position beside Alexander. “HA. HA. HA. MECHA. DRONEY. WINS. K. O.”

Alexander chuckled. “What else have you been watching?” He shook his head, then pulled down his visor, locking it back into place. “Anyway, I doubt we’ve done anything but make her mad so far.”

The ocean erupted again as Caroline rocketed back up toward them, hair plastered to her head, but otherwise looking completely uninjured.

Alexander watched her come. Amusement flickered across the bond, neither of them bothering to move.

Caroline closed the distance in a heartbeat and drove her fist through the air.

It passed by a full meter to Alexander’s right.

She came to an abrupt stop above them, confusion breaking her composure for a moment.

Alexander grinned. “Having trouble seeing us, Mrs. Delvane?”

Caroline’s eyes narrowed. “Holograms?”

He nodded. “Quite an extensive suite, too, though the range is still a little limited for my liking. Any further than about fifteen meters and the fidelity falls off a cliff.”

The holograms were doing two things at once. From Caroline’s angle, the space occupied by Alexander and Mecha-Droney looked like empty sky, or the ocean below now that she was hovering above them, while perfect holographic copies hovered a short distance from where they really were.

People viewing the holograms from the wrong angle would likely see through the trick, which wasn’t ideal. But it didn’t need to be perfect.

“I see.” She studied his holographic self. “I can destroy this trick of yours, of course. But it will likely involve bursting even your eardrums. Need I?”

Alexander raised both hands in mock surrender. “Let’s not.”

The corner of her mouth twitched. “At least Julia picked an intelligent one. Continue.”

“Okay.”

Mecha-Droney’s net launcher fired. A burst of Metallokinesis accelerated the weighted mesh as it expanded, then snapped it shut around Caroline before she could react. The internal barrel started spinning, twisting the net tighter around her.

A publication page maintained by the author contains this chapter; the text shown here was copied without consent, and readers there support them.

Caroline sighed. “Really?” She grabbed a section of the net with both hands and pulled.

Alexander shrugged, drifting closer to the rapidly coiling line. Metallokinesis fought to counteract the force, but the metal was already screaming in protest as Caroline stretched it beyond what it was designed to take.

“Droney insisted.” He wrapped his cybernetic hand around the line. “Do you want to know the best part, though?”

Individual sections of the net snapped one after another as Caroline overpowered his Metallokinesis and the net as though the two combined were a mere inconvenience.

“What’s that?” she asked, sounding bored.

Alexander gripped the cable tight. “Metal conducts electricity.”

Caroline’s gaze flickered to his hand on the line, then up to his face. “Don’t you d—”

Alexander unleashed Electrokinesis at full power. Lightning poured down the cable and into the net, arcing between strands of interwoven metal, swallowing Caroline in a cage of electricity.

She screamed.

More of an angry scream.

Caroline’s strength surged, and she shredded the net instantly, treating it more like paper than the extremely specialized, high-tensile alloy it actually was. She seized the capture line and yanked.

Mecha-Droney managed a brief “UH. OH.” before the entire chassis shot toward Caroline like a bullet.

Caroline drew her arm back to strike.

Alexander was faster. “Soul Circuit: Blink.”

Mecha-Droney vanished just in time for Caroline’s fist to tear through nothing but air. The shockwave hit Alexander hard enough to blast him backward, forcing him to throw his arms up to shield his face.

Caroline clicked her tongue. “Rooke, I’m beginning to understand why so many people don’t like—”

Mecha-Droney shot Caroline from behind. A stream of white foam, flecked with silver, splattered across her shoulders and down her back.

Then it reacted with the air.

The material fizzed violently, then bubbled and expanded within a second. It spread down Caroline’s arms, wrapped around her torso, then engulfed her legs as more of it poured from Mecha-Droney.

Caroline didn’t even try to move. She just stared at Alexander, eyes narrowing slowly.

The foam kept spreading, hardening almost as quickly as it expanded, until only her face remained uncovered.

Her left eye twitched.

Alexander cleared his throat. “I, uh, have to take responsibility for this one. My understanding is that AEGIS developed this to capture superhumans without hurting them.”

Caroline exhaled. “How interesting.”

He nodded. “I did modify it a little though.”

Caroline inhaled. “Oh? How so?”

He raised a hand. “I laced it with metal.”

She closed her eyes. “Mhm. I see.”

Alexander hesitated for a moment. But just a moment. Fun outweighed fear. Metallokinesis pulsed, and the foam ball shot downward, smashing into the ocean and sinking out of sight.

Droney fed Alexander a snippet of conversation captured by the long-range audio sensors.

“He is so dead,” Annie said.

Alexander turned to look at where she stood on the cliff, one hand shielding against the sun’s glare.

Julia nodded. “Oh yeah. I bet Mom’s about to stop playing around.”

Maximilian stood beside them, looking considerably less amused. Perhaps even a little concerned. It was hard to tell, both because of the distance and the man’s usual stoicism.

Alexander cupped his hands around his mouth. “I can hear you, you know!”

Annie leaned forward and squinted. Then she shook her head. “What a perv. He must have installed spy hardware in whatever that big thing is.”

Julia nodded again. “He’s definitely a pervert.”

“I am not a pervert! And that’s Mecha-Droney!”

“What is he shouting?” Maximilian asked, shaking his head.

Alexander sighed.

Caroline’s bioelectrical signature flared bright below. The ocean shuddered in every direction, sending waves crashing against the beach and spraying the spectators gathered there.

A massive geyser of water shot into the air, engulfing him before he could react.

Then Caroline’s signature was right in front of him. Through the screen of water, Alexander saw an almost feral grin, the woman’s sudden appearance causing the suit’s proximity warning to scream in his ears.

“BLI—”

Caroline reached out and slapped his torso armor.

Alexander snapped awake with a gasp, uncertain how much time had passed. Then the proximity warning screaming in his ears turned off, replaced by a cacophony of other alarms. Technopathy swept through the suit, rebooting failed systems and intuitively reconfiguring essential bypasses.

Metallokinesis arrested his tumbling freefall, just in time to avoid rearranging part of the island.

His visor came back to life. Overhead, Caroline turned on Mecha-Droney, driving another punch toward its holographic face.

The Machine God System reacted.

Dozens of wedge-shaped drones shot in every direction as the first layer came apart around Mecha-Droney.

The shield-drones moved into a tight formation between Caroline and Droney, now protected by only its mech-suit. Layered barriers flared into existence just as her fist arrived, overlapping one another to absorb the impact.

The rest of the swarm opened fire.

Loud whumps echoed across the sky and lights flashed as a dozen railguns fired one after another, raining bolts of plasma down on Caroline from every direction. Another drone swept up over the shields and sprayed a stream of napalm directly into her face.

Precision-guided micro-missiles streaked up from below, detonating as they made contact all across her body.

Caroline shot backward through the air, arms coming up to protect her face as the barrage continued.

Four bruiser-drones hit her at once, coming at her from every direction, each one driving sharpened edges toward the parts of her body left unguarded.

Caroline clapped her hands together and the air exploded, sending a massive shockwave tearing in every direction.

Shield barriers shattered as the drones maintaining them were blasted backward. The bruisers went tumbling across the sky, hovertech fighting to regain control. Plasma bolts scattered and the stream of napalm broke apart, flaming droplets raining toward the ocean below.

For a fraction of a second, Caroline was free of the assault. She spun, wild eyes searching for the next attack.

Another drone, almost innocuous looking compared to the others, raced straight toward her. Panels across its front snapped open. The scream that followed was so high-pitched and violent that a cone of air in front of it visibly rippled.

Caroline flinched, slapping both hands over her ears.

That was all the opening the Machine God System needed. The swarm attacked again. Railguns thundered, plasma hammering her from every direction. A renewed stream of napalm joined them. Missiles curved around the other attacks as Droney adjusted their trajectories in real time, driving them through the chaos, while the bruisers circled, looking for openings.

Alexander hovered in the air, staring up at his masterpiece with a stupid grin on his face. Animachina empowered every single one of the drones dancing across the sky above, the drain barely noticeable even as the forged components drew on his soul directly to manifest napalm and micro-missiles.

He wouldn’t have cared even if it had been noticeable.

The chaos was absolutely beautiful.