“We’ve got to end it here!” Celling shouts. “Someone get those Key shards!”
The Secondborn turns and shoots at Celling. Celling dives out of the way as a spear of magical light sizzles into the wall behind him. He hears the snap as the wall splinters and breaks.
While he’s distracted, Jacob runs into the room and scoops up most of the glistening red fragments. The lady with J. V. Boonering picks up one that landed near her, as does Fansworth. J. V. Boonering himself holds one up to the light, turning it this way and that and gazing at it with wide, curious eyes.
The Secondborn advances towards Celling and Fansworth. Taking cover behind the shattered remains of the room’s wall, Celling fires a series of rapid shots. The Secondborn swats them away as if they were flies, waving his hand in front of his face and conjuring a sizzle of shielding.
Anna steps up and yanks Jacob towards her, pulling him by the shoulder. “Jacob,” she says urgently, “give me the shards.”
“You heard what he said,” Jacob says, worry filling his voice. “It’s going to kill you.”
“We have no way of knowing that!” Anna hisses. She pulls open Jacob’s fist and takes the blood-red Key shards. “He could have been lying.”
“That’s not a risk you can take!”
“That’s the only way to get David back,” Anna counters. She holds the key shards in one palm, with the other held above it, as if gripping a ball in front of her chest. "Tell... tell my grandfather I forgive him," she says.
She closes her eyes and concentrates. The Key shards begin slowly rising into the air, turning to align upright. The largest throbs with a slowly growing flare of red light, like an eye opening up after a long sleep. A transparent wave goes out from it and washes over her, distorting her features like a mirage, seeming to gray things out and drain energy from her features. Spinning slowly, the fragments align, notching faces together into a peanut-sized mass, rough around the edges. Planes of red light shine through as seams and cracks are repaired. Fansworth gapes as the shard he's holding flies out of his hands and towards Anna, rotating to fit perfectly like a key in a lock with a nook in the gently turning Key. Like a video played backwards in slow motion, fragments of glass and crimson colored dust fly up from the rubble, recombining into a perfect oval the size of a grape.
Anna’s eyes are shining subtly with red power at this point. She wheels one hand above her shoulder, balling it into a fist to the left of her head, then opens it, splaying out her fingers. She gasps and sags to the ground, knees buckling, as if being held up by the Key, which follows her fist and hovers, glowing, above her hand. It draws in space around itself, building up an aura of ruby light, before exploding outwards with tendrils of dark metal, mechanisms that knot themselves together out of nothingness, coiling around the Key and snaking down towards Anna’s hand. She closes her fist, slowly, shakingly, pulling on two twinned bands that wrapped around her fingers and closing them into a handle for the rapidly forming gauntlet in the air above her. The half-built mechanism pivots, gears ticking.
There’s a palpable shock when it finishes, seconds later - a deep thrum that runs through everyone in the room as Anna takes full control of the Key. The Secondborn feels it and wheels around to be met by a beam of red fire, projected from Anna’s outstretched right hand. Quickly, he builds shields - hemispherical arcs of light and symbols that refract and dissipate the Key’s attack. Anna switches strategies and swings the Key down while drawing her right hand behind her shoulder and letting loose with bolts of red and black thunder that drift lazily towards the Secondborn. He intercepts them with wild flashes of Protinam lightning, detonating them in dizzying flashes of light in midair.
You could conceivably get some shooting done while everyone is distracted by the psychic duel.
A: Shoot Jacob! If the Secondborn’s telling the truth Anna is dead anyway, we should take out the second rebel while we have the chance!
B: Shoot Anna! We can tip the balance of the Secondborn’s duel with her, and the Secondborn is likely easier to deal with than the rebels by a plot standpoint.
C: Shoot the Secondborn! A bit of hot lead is just the right thing to end this psychic battle, right?
D: Shoot the woman! We don’t need more third parties, and she’ll likely claim the Key.
E: What, are you crazy? Don’t shoot anyone!
(my reasons given are just sample. They may not be accurate or complete. Feel free to choose based on your own reasons.)
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13 (46.4%)
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Topic: (SG) SPAMOVERLORD: Epilogue: Guest Week (Read 290766 times)