Space Angels: find the Gift (complete)

ЄD0Ɲ: Ŧhe Ɗ£Ş£ŔŦ ~ Chapter Forty-Three

Seraphim Landing Zone ~ Ŧhe Ɗ£Ş£ŔŦ

43 - the Dust bomb

This was big. Seraphim had not been on this planet for millennia. Something monumental had happened and no one had told him. But then, maybe his commander did not even know. Kaleb had to reach him. To do that, he had to stay alive.

The desert heat was intense. His fellow Imps had laughed at Edon's dwarf star, they'd joked at its dim intensity compared to others in the universe. How he wished they were here now, suffering under its relentless gaze, stumbling through this uneven landscape of countless hollows and sandy knolls, with their skin hanging off them.

The Seraph brat's spears of jagged light had seared parts of his flesh to the bone or it had fallen away in chunks for the circling vultures to devour. He'd stashed a supply of qworkslime inside his echelon, and it had soothed the burning for a while, but now it was gone. All he could do was lick his wounds.

His wings, too damaged for full flight, still allowed him to dodge her white-hot javelins of energy from dune to dune. Sand grains shifted with his every hurried footfall or, whenever the intense heat of her spears exploded nearby, bubbled into rills of molten glass. She could see his every movement with her glowing eyes, and the flock that swirled and squawked in Kaleb's wake continually gave away his position as he zig-zagged between dimensions. How he hated those birds.

If she becomes invisible, I am lost. But she is a child, and inexperienced, that's to my advantage. When Kaleb noticed the next dune was much taller than the others, a plan formed in his mind.

He threw some fireballs and energy bolts over his shoulder but nothing connected with her. Child she may be, but she was fleet of wing and had the power to turn him to ashes if he lingered to take aim properly. Some of the vultures landed to feast on the bits of him that had fallen during his flight - cooked to perfection for them, he thought grimly - but more arrived to blacken the sky with their number, sensing his imminent death.

He had one chance to stop her: the dust bomb. Its use, forbidden in a populated area or in front of Edons, was acceptable in an empty wilderness like this. It was risky. He would have to surprise her, but how. His energy was low, soon his bolts would be too weak to bother with... but if he used the last of his reserves as a starburst, that would keep her busy and give him the time to make the shot count. He kept running towards the larger dune, the flock of vultures trailing in his wake.

He slipped dimensions. Grabbing the bomb from his echelon, he re-entered the desert at the top of the hill. Sliding down, he knew she'd take longer to track him because of the deep drop on the other side. He let loose his starburst.

He saw her above the brow of the tall dune, taking evasive action as the battery of tiny missiles exploded around her, the flock of vultures spiralling away leaving her open and exposed. He launched the dust bomb high into the sky with every part of his remaining strength.

It was a puff of deadly dust, taken from the hide of a dead Grimlick by the Lord himself. The moment it touched her skin she would petrify. It was then the flock of feathered scavengers wheeled back across the skyline...

"No!" Kaleb cried. Each bird turned to stone and fell to ground in rapid succession as the flock passed through the deadly cloud, their petrified bodies dropping around him like jagged boulders. One sliced off a large chunk of his wing and he yelled in agony. He rolled away exhausted. He was done. If she had escaped she would soon finish him. What am I going to do? If I could steal a body it would be a good disguise, but nothing lives in this baking desolation. Then he saw it.

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