Amazon Apocalypse 6: Chapter 59

"Uh... you wouldn't happen to be able to control that one like you do Sharky?" Mimiko asked me hopefully.

She saw the enormous Void Leviathan as clearly as I did.

"That isn't Sharky. We need to get Jade back on board and get out of here. This ship can go to warp. We can outrun the thing, but she can't!"

I rushed toward Jade to take her aboard the ship, but the Void Leviathan was faster. It had eyes on both of us, and it swam between us to keep us separate. Jade must have had a different plan, because she unleashed a series of furious attacks on the Void Leviathan. Instead of eyeing the ship, the big void beast set its sights fully on Jade.

"Damn it. We need to distract it long enough to teleport Jade aboard and go to warp!" I yelled, though I was already steering the ship to swoop under the Void Leviathan's stomach. I'd spent enough time with Sharky to know his belly was just a bit more vulnerable than the rest of him.

Swooping under the Void Leviathan, I unleashed the lasers and the mining cannon. Both had been effective against A-Grade void monsters, so I had high hopes that it would split this thing's belly open. Or at least distract it for a moment.

But I'd underestimated power that surpassed A-Grade. The ship's weapons didn't seem to do anything at all. The mining cannon that could blow up asteroids with a single shot was swallowed by the underside of this mighty beast like it was sucked into a black hole. I didn't even see what happened to our attack. One moment it was there, and the next it was like it had never even existed.

The enormous Void Leviathan didn't seem to notice our attacks as it circled around us like a curious predator. Sharky sometimes did this when he was more than confident in devouring his prey and was merely looking for the best angle to take the tastiest bite.

After a lengthy trip beneath and around the Void Leviathan, I finally caught a glimpse of Jade. Though she looked the same as before, something in her demeanor had shifted. The casual air she'd gone about the previous fights with was gone now. This was the kind of foe she couldn't afford to bring anything but her best against.

Despite that, she still spared a moment of divided attention to wave at us, shooing us away with the back of her hand.

The Void Leviathan sensed that tiny moment of inattention and chose that instant to strike. Several of the tentacles cresting around its neck lashed out. Jade brought her sword up to deflect the blow, but it had been a feint. The real attack came in the form of sudden snapping jaws.

Jade vanished from where she was and teleported farther away, but the Void Leviathan turned to pursue her.

"Damn it. That was our chance to get her aboard! Hyacinth, do you have a channel to talk to her directly? Tell her to get in here so we can flee!" I looked toward Jade's assistant sitting next to me.

Her face had turned pale ever since the huge A-Grade monster had appeared. Blood was leaking from her eyes again, though we'd figured out how to get the ship to shield us from the worst of the effects of seeing these void monsters. This thing was just too powerful for the ship to counter entirely.

"I'm trying. She's not responding. Wait, I'm getting something! She's telling us to leave without her," Hyacinth said.

I cursed and wished I'd been able to put together some sort of communication system with Jade out in the void that didn't rely on cultivator magic stuck in the dark ages. It was barely any better than the Morse code sticks Galbatorix and other Dragon Lodge wizards used.

If Jade had been a System user, I'd be able to speak with her through the party interface. And if she'd been wearing a helmet, I'd have been able to give her a radio. But as things were, neither were options.

"That's out of the question. We aren't leaving without her!" I growled, then grabbed the controls for some aggressive maneuvers.

Just before the Void Leviathan was able to engage Jade fully, we soared past its three sets of glowing eyes.

"Let's see if you can shrug this off too..." I growled as I unleashed the lasers and the mining cannon at full force at the farthest of the three eyes. As before, the weapons did no visible damage, but they must have done something, because the enormous monster blinked.

Suddenly, we were back in its sights again, and instead of biting down on Jade, it turned toward us.

We saw a flash of its endless rows of teeth and a familiar shark-like grin. We were prey, and it was the predator. The only thing stopping it from chasing us down and ripping us apart was the fact that we were so small that we were hardly worth eating.

But like a fly catching the attention of a giant, it could smack us down as soon as we annoyed it. And we were starting to annoy it. I felt a wave of power similar to what the Cutholoid had done to us.

"Hurry and tell Jade to meet us at the edge of the System!" I shouted to Hyacinth.

"Ugh..." Hyacinth groaned. Blood was leaking from her eyes again.

"Mimiko!" I yelled, and she grabbed Hyacinth and pushed her out of her seat before taking her place, though I could tell Mimiko was only in slightly better shape than Hyacinth.

"I can't. We have an incoming message from her. She's telling us to run!" Mimiko shouted back.

If I'd had a spare moment to tear my hair out, I would have. Jade was only here because she was helping me. I wasn't sure if she had some other escape route planned or she really thought she could beat this thing if she went all out, but I knew what a Void Leviathan could do, and I knew what would happen to her if she was eaten. We had a safe way out of here using the ship. We just needed to use it.

Mimiko was scrambling to get a message across. Meanwhile, Hyacinth was on the deck on her hands and knees as she tried to choke down several cultivator healing and stimulant pills so she could get back on her feet.

Jade started leading the Void Leviathan farther toward the star and away from us, which would make escaping with her impossible.

There was only one last thing I could try. It was a risky move, but it was the same thing that had gotten me out of a bind when Vayly Vaust and Jade had been fighting and I'd been caught in the middle.

I needed to trigger Living Paradox. My precious life-saving ability would put this situation in the System's hands, which could search through countless possible futures and find the one where we all made it out of here in one piece. I just hoped it would rescue us in the way I wanted.

The Void Leviathan opened its gaping maw, and I flew straight into it.

I sent a mental plea to the System, all my points in luck, and the very Kindling Dimension itself. I wasn't very good at the latter yet, but I could feel a twinge of something up there reaching down to give me a helping hand.

"Get us out of here in one piece..."

Then I mentally let go of control, and Living Paradox took over. I floated over my own shoulder like a ghostly apparition. Meanwhile, my body moved on its own.

My shoulders straightened, my arms relaxed. The tension I'd had was gone and replaced by machine-like precision. My hands flew over the controls, activating consoles and buttons I hadn't been able to figure out even with Jade's help. Perhaps this alternate version of me was a simulation of me if I'd done nothing but study the Architect language and machines for days on end. Or perhaps it was merely based on a future projection of me with a few decades of experience using this thing.

Regardless of the System's exact means or reasoning, my body operated the spaceship with the skill of an expert. Just before we were swallowed whole, my body activated a series of previously unknown weapons inside the Void Leviathan's mouth.

I felt mana leave my body as the strange weapons powered up, and for a moment all the lights aboard the ship turned off as the power for everything was redirected to weapons systems.

A burst of white light blinded me, and even the pitch-black mouth of the Void Leviathan was bright for a moment. All I could see were rows of teeth stretching for miles.

Then my body activated the warp drive, and we shot straight through the Void Leviathan's body to wind up on the other side near the star, where Jade was waiting.

The ship came to a brisk stop beside Jade. Behind us, a massive explosion shook the void, centered in the Void Leviathan's mouth. I wasn't sure what I had just unleashed, but it seemed that for an instant this ship was capable of dishing out a blow surpassing the peak of A-Grade.

But I received no notification of the Void Leviathan dying. Nor did I expect to put it down that easily. Sharky could take more blows than that and keep fighting. Still, it distracted the beast for a moment, and a moment was all I needed. Living Paradox came to an end, and the rest was in my hands.

I activated the teleporter and pulled Jade aboard.

"You should have left!" Jade said.

"Not without you. We're leaving now," I said. I'd watched how my body had been able to activate the warp drive remotely without leaving the pilot's console, and I repeated the feat to send us hurtling off into the void.

We traveled fast this time, and I pushed the ship to as much acceleration as Mimiko and Hyacinth could take in their wounded state. Hyacinth had just barely managed to crawl into a seat with Mimiko's help, and they were both pressed in place.
I was still sitting comfortably, and Jade only needed to put a hand on my shoulder for support while she stood behind me.

Was she glaring at me? I wasn't sure I'd ever seen her angry before.

"Why didn't you leave immediately?" Jade asked.

"I wasn't going to leave you to be eaten," I replied.

"I've fought worse things and escaped alive. I may not be as fast as this ship, but I am confident I would have been fast enough to escape. More likely, I would have merely battled it for a while before either driving it back into the void," Jade replied icily.

"Void Leviathans are pretty powerful. More so than other void beasts of the same level. Don't be mad at me, Jade, I just wanted to make sure you got away safe," I said.

"And I wanted the same for you. You should have listened to me."

"I did listen. I'll always listen. But that doesn't mean I'll obey," I replied.

Jade let out a cold harrumph. "If a disciple of the Eternal Spring Sect were in your place—"

She never finished speaking, though, because a wordless roar screamed through the void. It was the kind of noise we thought we'd left behind in the last star system.
"Oh shit..." I cursed.

Jade flipped through the console and brought up the ship's rear cameras, which revealed exactly what I feared I would see. We hadn't escaped the Void Leviathan. It had followed us into warp space.

"Does this ship go any faster?" Jade asked. She took a seat next to me, and her fingers glided across the consoles as she looked for anything that would help us get out of our predicament.

"This is already as fast as I can get it. And that thing is still gaining on us!"

It was beginning to look like we'd have no other choice but to turn around and fight this thing. I knew now for sure that the idea Jade could outrun the Void Leviathan was just wishful thinking, but maybe she could still fight it off. Hopefully.

Jade wore a grimace.

"How confident are you in beating that thing?" I asked.

"If I were fully recovered from my fight against Vayly Vaust? Eighty percent. As things stand, I should still be strong enough to force it to return to the void." Her words held an uncertain edge I wasn't fond of.

I would have been very nervous even about a twenty percent failure chance, and I had a hunch that Jade was being generous with her estimates. But I could tell she was prepared to fight anyway.

"What if there were two of you? Would you be able to drive this thing off then? Even if both of you were wounded?" I asked.

"Yes. With coordination from someone else at my level, the battle would be far safer. We might not be able to kill it, but we could certainly drive it away," Jade replied.

I nodded, suddenly realizing what we needed to do. The Oraculum was a beautiful ship during this brief time it had been mine, but one way or another I was losing it today.

My backup plan had been to flee back to Crownhill through Sanctum. I doubted Jade would be able to come to Crownhill under the System’s watch that way, but I could find a safe place to let her out eventually. This plan was riskier, but it salvaged certain plans for the future I was already counting on.

Besides, I doubted the great houses that remained of the Architects were all that happy with me if they discovered what role I'd played in the destruction of the Vaust family citadel. Having someone who owed me among my number might help smooth things over before they could begin, especially if Vayly Vaust herself managed to survive her wounds.

"You're thinking of something. Have you been concealing your true power all this time, and only now will reveal it to me?" Jade asked.

At first, I thought she was making a joke, despite the seriousness of our situation. But when I turned to look at her, she seemed hopeful I was about to answer positively. Mentally, I put the odds of Jade winning alone even lower if that was the kind of thing she was pinning her hopes on.

"I'm not hiding my true power, but I think I can get another A-Grade in on this fight. Just promise to play nice, at least until this is all over."

Jade nodded and agreed. I hoped Seraphyne would do the same.

***

The Void Leviathan continued to gain on us. Mimiko steered while I rushed to Seraphyne's chambers. I kicked open the door to find the lifepod blinking. Perhaps it was a good thing I'd decided to wake her up here and now, because something had already disturbed her slumber. The power interruption from my intense maneuvers while fighting the Void Leviathan had probably reset the lifepod's computer.

I fiddled with the interface and accelerated the process even further before opening the lid again. Once more, I took in the otherworldly, imperious beauty that was the sleeping Seraphyne of House Nemaryth. I wasn't sure who she was or what her house was, but just looking at her I could see this proud beauty waking up and expecting to find an army of servants waiting for her, not just me. Hopefully her personality was at least tolerable. It wasn't like all Architects could be as demanding as Vayly Vaust.

Her eyelids fluttered, and I stepped back as I waited for the peak A-Grade to wake up. She stirred for a moment, then seemed to settle back into slumber. I frowned. Right when I needed her to wake up, she was suddenly sleepy again. That wouldn't do.

I looked over her body, which had healed further. I'd cured the catastrophic problems that had kept her on the edge of death for who knew how long, which had given her body the breathing room to work on actual repairs. Now all she was missing were the final touches, but there was no reason she couldn't be on her feet right away.

I rummaged through my bag of holding for something. I should have asked Hyacinth for some of those stimulants she was constantly choking down. Eventually, I found a cup of Bridget's strongest espresso. It was powerful enough to give even me a kick. Hopefully that was still true at A-Grade.

I held Seraphyne's mouth open and poured the cup down her throat a sip at a time. I was trying to figure out if there was a faster way to wake her up when she suddenly choked, coughed, and sat up.

"Status report," she said, blearily. Her voice was sweeter than I expected, given her intimidating appearance.

"The original crew is dead, thousands of years have passed while you were in stasis, and there's a Void Leviathan about to eat us any minute now," I answered briskly.

Seraphyne rubbed her eyes, took a few breaths, then turned to me, her gaze focusing until she stopped looking through me and started looking at me.

"I don't know you." Seraphyne blinked at me, still groggy and dreamy.

"I don't expect you would. I found your ship by chance and have been patching you up. But we should really save the questions for later, when we're no longer in danger of being eaten by a giant void monster."

Then, as if to punctuate my point, a terrifying and hungry howl rang through the void and shook the ship. Minutes had turned to moments, and if Seraphyne didn't agree to help Jade fight this thing off here and now, we were as good as done for.

Seraphyne heaved herself out of the lifepod and climbed to shaky feet. She towered over me now, every bit as tall as Jade. She tore open a nearby wardrobe, slapped her palm against it, and in a moment the ragged outfit she was wearing was replaced by a similar but intact one.

In a flash of blue light, a slender rapier-like sword appeared at her hip, and a small, elegant magical focus formed in her other hand. It would be a staff for most people, but it looked more like a large wand for her.

"Bridge," she said, and then vanished in a burst of light. I cursed, knowing Jade was up there.

<Note>

Thanks for reading, as always. You all rock. Next chapter we finally get a real fight with a mature Sharky, and for once Carter is not the star of the show. After that, Carter will be juggling two hostile A-Grades. There’s no way that could go badly, right?