Homecoming | sequel of "Home" [✔️]

Chapter 8

An oxygen mask clamped itself over his mouth and nose, and his senses piqued up and greedily took in gulps of air. His eyes watered from the acid, but his lungs cleared up and his vision cleared, his sharp sight returning.

Startled, he looked up to the person in front of him, and saw Bakar now on his knees, visibly struggling with the poison. Ali shoved the mask back to him, and was silently relieved when color returned to his face, his tense muscles relaxing.

Ali wanted to cry and shake Bakar, screaming at him for being so idiotic, but he had no words. Instead, his expression returned to its stone-cold demeanor as he rose to his feet.

"You shouldn't have done that," Ali declared, staring ahead, never once looking at the man who saved his life. "This planet's air is strong enough to kill a human within a minute. You're fortunate to be alive."

Bobby stormed in front of him, grabbing his collar in fury. The blood on his palm stained Ali's jacket. "He risked his life to save yours!" he spat. "And that's the response you gave him? He's your family, and you treat him like dirt!"

Ali's cold glare stared into the Invisio agent, seeing through his anger and fear.

"'Blood of the covalent is thicker than the water of the womb,'" Ali quoted, stone-faced. "You forget that we are enemies. Family aside, we are of different sides. To show sympathy is to discard the lines between us, and chaos will arise."

Bobby growled at him, his fist rising, but an echo of laughter surprised them both, his fist never swinging down.

Ali's eyes narrowed. His hand gripped Bobby's wrist, forcing him to drop the raven-haired boy. With no movements wasted and in a fluid motion, a whip of blue energy released from its holster, and Ali stood in a battle stance, the blue ribbon of death cackling on the ground beside him.

Someone is here, Ali noted. He reprimanded himself for wasting time for the thought. A hunter, perhaps. Someone from beyond this planet. The locals were incapable of producing comprehensible noises.

He lowered his stance. If they were hostile, he would be at a disadvantage. Winning the fight would be simple in comparison to keeping two humans alive.

The ground beneath him trembled. The soft surface gurgled. It's coming, he told himself. He leaped into the air, kicking up slime and mush. Tentacles burst from the ground, each as thick as light posts.

They lashed at him, but Ali wasn't a sitting duck. Ali recovered his balance mid-air. He swung his whip like a lasso around the base of the tendrils, causing the creature to shriek. Grunting, he used his momentum to pull the monster from its hiding place, all the while sending him plummeting to the ground quicker.

As the creature was thrown into the air, Ali crashed down to the ground, splattering slime on Bobby and Bakar. He glared up to the exposed creature, which resembled a squid, however monstrous and twisted, reaching up to the size of half a football field.

There was a glowing sphere, right at its eye. Gasbot. The tracker wasn't wrong. His eyes glared forward, and looked closer to its details. In its opaque body, he saw armor, clothing, weapons; objects that weren't capable of being digested, all of which swam in its body.

This thing ate his cadets?

"Always some stupid animal getting high on cocaine!" Ali cursed loudly. He snatched his fallen whip from the ground and stood.

Bakar ran up to him, wavering concern lacing his voice. "Ali, what is that? Do you know what it is?"

Ali glanced at him, eyes tense. Not the time, really. A shadow loomed ahead, which turned Ali's attention upwards. The squid was falling straight onto them, its mouth open wide, rings and rings of sharp teeth arranged in them. He's never seen a squid up close, but he could live without the image.

They were in trouble. Its mouth was big enough to fit all three of them at once. He just prayed that it wasn't hungry for some human meat, since meant was highly digestible and full of protein. Maybe some fats this meal, too.

Reacting with lightning speed, Ali kicked Bakar out of the way and slid out before the squid fell. As soon as it touched the ground, however, it sunk its tentacles down to the dirt and slime as if it was dissolving. Green lights moved within its fleshy tendrils, leading to the power sphere, feeding it with toxic energy.

Poison powers the power sphere. It was preparing for an attack. Ali's eyes narrowed, his whip retracting and solidifying in a blade. A sword replaced the whip, the energy glaring as sharp as metal.

He sprinted towards the creature, speed completely unhuman-like, his blade held tightly by his side. The squid sensed his plan and sent its free tentacles lunging at him, but he dodged, the tentacles plunging into the ground instead.

Ali was here to stop any future tragedies from ever occurring, but it seems that he himself was going to have one in his hands.

He needed to finish this as soon as possible. His mind raced, legs tensing. His steps turned heavier and heavier, his speed slowing gradually. To outsiders, he would be seen as losing stamina. But looking closer, you could see with each step, he kicked up more and more debris, his footsteps sinking deeper into the ground, the air around him turning heavy.

Then at last, he dug his foot into the ground, the area around him bursting. With a kick, he launched himself straight to the monster, his speed unmatchable by others, his power only seen in movies.

For a moment, all he could see was a blur. His blade sliced through things even he couldn't see. The next thing he knew, his feet cut through the ground like butter, creating a trail that dug deeper than a trench. Slime and mud splattered onto his clothes, but all that mattered was that he was still breathing, that the monster was no match for him after all.

Wordlessly, he hovered out the trench, his boots still dripping with slime. Whirling around, his glowering eyes glared daggers into the creature. The gigantic squid lost half its tentacles, blue blood dripping down its severed limbs, staining the ground's mud. It rotated its body towards Ali, its movements erratic and hostile, reaching to kill.

Just what he needed. Delusional sushi after him.

If Ali didn't know any better, he would have chopped it up afterwards and served it to unsuspecting criminal scum as a treat.

Ali's studied many things after he came to space, but this thing had a body structure similar to its equivalents of Earth, which posed as an unknown factor. Ali had never passed his science subject even once; let alone remembering the biological structure of a squid. All he knew that they were best served fresh with wasabi on the side, sometimes with salad and tomato.

He rebutted himself for not paying attention in class. (He could barely believe this was coming from him.) He cursed himself for bringing those two here. He was surprised that he believed that they could survive out here that long. He was pushing both his limits and his luck.

Ali grit his teeth. He needed to end this as soon as possible.

Not looking so strong anymore, eh?

If there was anyone that would be strong, it would be him. Maybe not now, but maybe in the future. Those who looked down on him would eat their own words and choke on their tongues.

He put away his sword, the blade returning to its holster like a light sabre. The weapon was put away into his jacket, and he turned up to his opponent with his bare hands. He would prefer to keep his power's usage to a minimum, but ending this senseless battle was the only fact that mattered.

"You want strong, Agent?" Ali called, ignoring his shocked expression when he noticed Ali's capability of flight. "You want to see power?"

He turned to the monster, glaring.

"You're out of your league."