"…Um…Master Kingston?"
I was currently laying down on one of the love seats in the bottom floor of my personal Proprietor's quarters car. I had my arm draped over my eyes, my shoes kicked off, and my shirt halfway unbuttoned. For all intents and purposes I looked asleep. That didn't stop Kennedy from trying to get my attention.
"Yeah Ken-Ken?" I asked, without moving.
"What you guys said this morning…about getting attacked…how can you sleep right now?" Kennedy asked. I raised my arm slightly and saw Kennedy was standing a few feet away from me, fidgeting nervously. Groaning I sat up and turned to face Kennedy.
"I'm not sleeping. I'm resting my eyes for a minute." I replied and quickly held a hand up before he could ask another question. "And I know that doesn't answer your question. I'm pretty sure to you everyone in my main group seems too relaxed. Thing is nobody is relaxed, not in the slightest."
"What do you mean?" Kennedy asked. I patted to the seat next to me, an offer to sit down. Kennedy walked over cautiously then sat down on the love seat, albeit a good distance away from me.
"I have a true transcended liger shark that can see everything around it within nine miles. Meaning I can see inside every car on this train. Right now Jane is practicing her swordsmanship, Astrid is meditating, Alberto is cleaning his mana revolver, Baset is re-reading the same page of the book she's read for the last four hours, Grandpa Seamus is working with the control car crew to fine tune King's Glaive's systems, and Bo is studying a book." I said. Kennedy looked amazed, his mouth hanging open slightly.
"You can tell all that from here?" Kennedy asked. I nodded slowly then looked down at my farm crystal.
"We're all on edge and doing what we can to blunt it." I said then turned my head towards the door to the next car as I sensed Bo moving quickly through the cars suddenly thanks to Bone-lasher. "Well someone is getting excited."
Kennedy looked confused but that confusion ended quickly when Bo came bursting through the door into my car.
"CHASE!" Bo bellowed as he ran into the room.
"I'm right here, you don't have to yell!" I griped. Bo skidded to a stop in front of my love seat then grabbed my arm and tried to yank me to my feet.
"Yes I do! And you need to run to the control car!" Bo replied. I frowned and started to rebuke him when Gadget jumped onto Bo's shoulder and grabbed my hand. He was in his true transcended form, which only snowed how emotionally charged Bo was.
"QUICK! QUICK BIG BROTHER!" Gadget exclaimed as he pulled. I let the duo pull me to my feet but placed a restraining hand on Bo's shoulder to tone down the energy before it overwhelmed Kennedy.
"Bo, if you want me to take another step I need you to calm down and explain." I said more sternly. Bo huffed but took a deep breath.
"Okay! I think survivors of the plague of Ra will attack the King's Glaive!" Bo exclaimed. I tried my hardest to not let my skepticism show and failed miserably. "Before you say I'm being paranoid or and idiotic hear me out. Based on all of the reports Jane's gotten on plague survivors they seem to grow weird crystals on their bodies and then run off and attack people, mostly splicers."
"How would you have access to reports from Princess Jane?" Kennedy asked accusingly. My eyes landed on Gadget who suddenly became very interested in a particular spot on the ceiling.
"What makes you think they'll attack the King's Glaive or that they even can right now?" I asked.
"Gadget! Evidence!" Bo exclaimed then held his hand close to Gadget's mouth. Gadget opened his mouth and a black portal appeared inside. Bo reached his hand inside and pulled out a stack of notes then held them up like they were a revered loot drop. "All of the infected survivors started attacking people shortly after the last of the crystal formed on their bodies! The attacks seemed indiscriminate until you look at the death tolls, mostly splicers, most of them from families known for large mana pools. They're attracted to large mana pools! And who has the largest mana pool on Earth right now?"
My eyes widened as I snatched the reports from Bo's hand and quickly looked them over. The numbers were there and seemed blaring obvious now. I was running towards the control car before I realized it, and nearly knocked over two chefs as I sprinted to the control car with Bo and Kennedy on my heels.
"KING'S GLAIVE PERIMETER SCAN NOW!" I bellowed as I reached the doors to the control car.
"Commencing…" King's Glaive replied.
As soon as I stepped through the threshold a warning siren blared throughout the mana train and the globe inside the navigation column changed to show the area around the King's Glaive. A odd black sphere appeared on the map, a little over two miles away and on the ground. A strange sort of line originating from the dot and connected to the King's Glaive, getting longer as the mana train moved.
"…Abnormal gravity well detected. Magically altered gravity well detected." King's Glaive announced.
"What is going on?" Yanis demanded, looking panicked by the sudden alarms. I wanted to answer her but I didn't have answers myself. I came to a stop in front of the navigation column and frowned at the display.
"Magically altered gravity well?" Bo muttered contemplatively.
"Bo, how did you expect the infected survivors to attack the King's Glaive while it was in the air?!" I demanded. Bo turned to me and started to open his mouth when the overhead lights flickered slightly and the entire train buckled and swayed.
"Warning! Warning! Mana reserves at critical levels! Mana reserves at critical levels!" King's Glaive reported.
"Holy Shit…!" Tamara exclaimed. "….Mana reserves at thirty percent and dropping!"
"Thirty?! We were at ninety-eight five minutes ago!" Ruby barked.
"Don't yell at me! I'm only reporting!" Tamara barked back.
"It's the infected survivor!" Bo exclaimed then pointed at the odd gravity dot on the map. "He's probably generating some field that's sapping all the King's Glaive's mana!"
"It's that fucking line connected to King's Glaive!" I snapped then over to the door leading outside. "'I'll disconnect it, take the King's Glaive's down to ground level!"
I pressed the button to open the door and it made a loud hiss as it slide open. A gust of wind blew into the cabin and nearly knocked me off my feet. I steadied myself then took a running start towards the door.
"Master Kingston! Are you out of your mind?!" Yanis snapped.
"He doesn't have a mind to begin with!" I heard Bo yell behind me as I jumped out the open door.
I immediately started falling as the King's Glaive passed overhead. The twenty cars passed over me before I'd even fallen five feet and as the last car passed I didn't see any sort of string or tether attached to the train.
'I thought something was attached to the train?' I thought.
I suddenly felt a crushing weight bear down on my shoulders, pulling me faster towards the ground than before. I instinctively channeled gravity attribute mana throughout my body, expecting my body to start floating like it usually does, instead I heard a sharp shattering sound; like a window breaking. Black shards became visible; shattered from whatever force kept pushing me down; and blew away before disappearing. My gravity attribute mana suddenly started working and my descent slowed to a stop.
She was fast, crossing hundreds of feet in a few seconds. I felt her hand wrap around my neck and a cold chill grip my body. I grabbed her hand in turn and yanked it off me then kicked her in the stomach. The black energy that surrounded her body and the gravity attribute mana flowing throughout my own clashed, my own mana getting canceled out this time. I felt an unimaginable pain surge through my body from my legs all the way to the top of my head.
"Magicka! Ma-gi-gika!" The woman screamed as she grabbed my leg and the icy feeling returned. My mana was being pulled from my body, siphoned out by the woman and the black energy that was wrapping around my body. My senses were becoming dull as I struggled and pushed against the woman's grip.
"GET OFF HIM!"
A blur of lightning streaked towards us from above and slammed into the infected woman, the force knocking her away. I started falling, flailing and gripping at the air helplessly hoping it'd stop my fall. My hopes were dashed.
Bellial snapped his wings open then surged towards me, quickly snatching me by the back of my shirt. He quickly leveled out and I looked down to where the woman had been knocked down to and saw Bo, wrapped in lightning and flying erratically to evade the infected woman.
"ALPA'NAGIA! EMPRESS! HELP BO BUT DON'T LET THAT WOMAN TOHCH YOU!" I bellowed as I summoned their Crystalline structures then flung them out.
Both evos emerged from their structures and immediately jumped into action. Empress engulfing herself in flames then flung flame wrapped feather at the woman. Alpa'nagia's horns glowed brightly as storm clouds formed overhead and blocked out the sun.
The infected woman dodged Empress feathers, her head jerked to look at Empress in an unnatural way. At that moment a lightning bolt struck her from the clouds.
"Got her!" I exclaimed.
The lightning bolt disappeared, or rather it was swallowed up by the black energy clinging to her body. I narrowed my eyes as Alpa'nagia sent bolt after bolt at her, each one meeting the same fate as the first.
"That energy is eating the mana that makes up spells and Alpa'nagia's lighting bolts." Bo observed. He'd floated up to where Bellial and I were, he was no longer in enveloped in lighting.
"That must be why magic doesn't work. That stuff is eating away at it." I added. "If magic won't work and she's probably draining the mana from our attacks then the best way to deal with her is to use physical attacks."
"Except guns don't work against them." Bo reminded me.
I mentally checked my mana reserves and stifled a shout when I realized I was at twenty-six percent. I shrugged that off then channeled mana into my void pocket enchanted ring then reached inside and pulled out a short sword, holding it out to Bo.
"Then we get medieval on this bitch!" I growled.