“Your actions have already done that,” Thorne said. “How do you not see it? The Party is built on violence. Upheld by abuse, injustice. You encourage people like Werner. Bullies and sadists propped up by the very system you cherish.”
“Werner is a useful tool. A hammer, say. Crude, perhaps, but effective.” Moran paused then and scowled. “We could debate these points ad infinitum, I fear, and never see eye to eye. You just don’t understand. Thorne, I thought you did. I thought the Test had shown you the hard truths of our world. I see now that I was mistaken. You don’t see reality. But I do. And I’ll do whatever I must in order to protect it.”
“He’s stalling,” Kaiden said. The thought hit him like a freight train. Of course he was. Did Moran believe what he was saying? Was he really that deluded? It didn’t matter. They were on the clock and every moment they spent debating him was a moment lost. A moment closer to Killswitch taking Nova offline.
Twenty-seven minutes on the timer…
“You’re buying time for Killswitch to complete,” Kaiden said, and for the first time since the conversation had begun, Moran looked surprised.
“Maybe there’s more to you than I thought,” he said.
“Let’s find out,” Kaiden said.
“Let’s.” Moran waved his hand in the air. A door in the wall that Kaiden hadn’t noticed slid open and a dozen max-level wardens strode out, hammers raised and shields on.
“Shit,” Thorne said, backing up a pace and setting her feet in a combat stance.
Kaiden’s heart fell through his stomach, but there wasn’t time to worry. Only time to act. The battle had just become unwinnable. They needed a new plan, and fast.
“I let Werner have his moment,” Moran said. “But he screwed it up. I’ll be doing no such thing.” He gave a signal and the wardens charged.
Something exploded behind Kaiden and he spun to find more wardens behind them.
“Behind us, too!” he shouted, but something was wrong. The wardens charging down the tunnel weren’t looking at them. They were focused on Moran and his men. And their armor was bent and bloodied, as if they’d just fought through hell itself. Which they had, Kaiden realized as he recognized the two wardens leading the charge.
“Dawson! Sola!”
“Got a bit delayed up top,” Dawson grunted.
“Better late than never, though, right?” Sola flashed past, Lightspeed active. The rest of the rebel wardens followed her and the room exploded into chaos. Abilities fired off on all sides and it was all Kaiden could do to usher Zelda out of the line of fire.
“This is our chance,” he said, eyes fixed on the console in the side room. “Get to the console!”
Thorne and Titus followed as the previously dark cavern blossomed with explosions and laser fire such that it was bright as day. But the wardens were too busy focusing on each other. An initial volley of Improved Kinetic Grenades and Improved Warden’s Bolts had filled the cavern with fire and dust and particle effects so much that it looked more like a rave than a fight to the death.
“Go, go!” Kaiden shouted, ducking through the chaos then sprinting toward the console room. Zelda slipped in first but Kaiden was a step behind. Then Thorne, then Titus.
“Send the message, quick!” Kaiden shouted, then positioned himself next to Titus. “We’ll keep you covered.”
“Don’t waste your effort,” a voice said.
Kaiden squinted into the smoking mess of explosions and debris as a figure strode forth.
Moran.
Kaiden retreated a step as the warden hierarch reached the doorway. Moran tossed a look over his shoulder, and when he turned back to Kaiden there was doubt in his eyes.
“What, not liking the changing odds?” Kaiden asked.
“No.” Moran pressed a button on his armor and the ceiling rumbled. A thick steel door descended just behind him and before Kaiden could react it’d cut them off from the battle raging without. They were left alone in the console room with Moran.
“These odds, on the other hand, are much better.”
Chapter Sixty-Three
“All right,” Kaiden said, switching to group comms. “This guy’s like some sort of souped-up power warden, right?”
From his appearance, that was the best he could figure. Moran didn’t have the massive shield of a shield warden, nor the sleekness of an enhanced warden, and definitely not the hammer-gun of a blast warden. That just left power warden. Power warden with a small hammer, maybe, but Kaiden wasn’t under the illusion that it took a big hammer to do big damage.
“We’ll deal with this asshole like we would any other high-level enemy. Titus, try to tank his attacks. Thorne, deal all the damage you can. I’ll harass him. And Zelda…”
“Charge up and hit him with everything I got. I know the drill,” she said, then fell back toward the rear of the room. It was a relatively small space, no more than twenty paces across, and Moran watched her as she went.
Eyes over here! Kaiden darted in, hammer raised. He went in fast, sprinting with everything he had and everything his stamina would allow. Moran turned to face him just as Kaiden brought his hammer down on the man’s head. Except – no. The attack had missed?
Moran was a step to the side. Kaiden swung again. Another miss. Moran had moved again. He’d waited until the last possible moment, then simply stepped out of the way of the attack.
“How high is this guy’s dex stat?”
Kaiden didn’t have long to ponder the question as Moran lashed back with a hammer strike. The blow slammed into Kaiden’s Intangible Defense bubble and shattered it. Kaiden’s health was spared, though – right up until Moran’s second attack
