The whole plane jostled as the destroyed attackers began to slide out the back of the plane and fall off into the endless nothing below. The wind rushed into the cargo bay and drowned out all sound. Still, the arm of his enemy held tight, though he could feel it slipping, turning him about and threatening to take him with it.
Aryu, in an action terribly similar to his friend and brother Johan, concluded the next course of action. He turned and drove the blade of the Shi Kaze into the sheer metallic wall behind him, sure to push it in sideways so as not to risk the super-sharp blade from simply slicing down to the bottom of the plane.
The idea worked and the blade held, but so did the grip on his wing. Now facing the wall, Aryu felt the massive weight of the creature of the Old pull him down as it slid until his arms locked and held them there, threatening to give under the pressure. He knew if the floor gave out much more, nothing would help him from eventually giving in to the weight and falling out into oblivion. He doubted his ability to shake the thing in time to free his wing and glide out to safety.
Nixon was now across a wide expanse where the floor had been and was still fending off his own attackers while scores more of the ones he’d defeated pelted him as they fell. Sho stood back from the hole before him, the wind catching his shield like a sail, and he fought to maintain his balance and bring himself and his mother back into the hall from which they had entered.
Crystal, while working frantically on the panel, saw Aryu and his plight.
All she did was stare at him, her beautiful pink/red eyes meeting his. Her look resolute and strong, all hints of playful passiveness gone. Determination was etched on every inch of her soft face. Aryu saw it, arms weakening, and for a moment he was lost in loathing at her inaction.
But then he understood the serious message she was attempting to convey across the gap between them. Aryu, both hands gripped around the handle of the sword he carried, tried to see beyond the crippling terror he was feeling as the floor was now nearly gone from his reach entirely and his feet began to slip away. He used whatever clarity he could muster to stare into the handle before him, with its aged wrappings and odd small latches jutting out from the bottom.
In his hands, even while it lay jabbed into the wall and useless for any kind of attack, was the weapon of his salvation, and all he needed was the clarity and truth in his mind to make it so. If he didn’t find it, he had no doubt that he’d be lost, plummeting into the water.
Despite the blinding fear, he found in the handle what he sought. The mystic feeling he always received from it was more prevalent than ever before, and at last he allowed the doubt of his abilities to leave him, and the void that was left by its passing filled with nothing but the Power, and the wrath it brought with it. He had to believe. If he didn’t, he was going to die.
That realization steeled him. He would not die like this.
His body vibrated like an electric shock, warmth and clarity coursing through every vein in his body like lifeblood. Soon, in the back of his mind’s eye, he felt every body part, cell, and iota of all that he was align and follow his mental will. There was no doubt at all now. He knew the truth. History had documented it so well, but he knew now that fear was not needed in the wake of the Power. Only respect. Respect and strength, two things Aryu O’Lung’Singh had in abundance.
He could see in his mind the thing that clung to him, yanking to pull him free. He could see the molecules that gave it existence. He could taste the air between them, swirling like water, until he channeled the power of the sword outward like a conductor and used its considerable influence to take command of things man has no right to take command over.
The winds that rushed around the two errant bodies hanging in space constricted into a single, fine line of controlled fury, and with only the smallest amount of effort on his behalf, Aryu could feel his mind reach with the formed air like a hand and pry the clasping metallic fingers from himself as if they were made of paper.
The thing that would have seen Aryu dead a moment before was lost to the gap below them and into the unseen depths.
As the clarity and truth of his actions came to the young man hanging in space, so too did the floor, and soon it met his waiting feet and began to carry him back to safety. Crystal had closed the giant door and set things right again just in time.
Once the large cargo room was restored and the party back together, Aryu looked around for any indication the others might have had of what just happened. Nixon particularly held his attention, but he saw nothing telling in the face of the phoenix.
Crystal met his eyes and smiled as they left. He could tell in that glorious look that although she couldn’t say for certain, she had a very good idea of what had just happened. The mental lock had been broken with relative (if not terrifying) ease. Still, he questioned how far he could push it before Nixon became aware of what he had just tapped. It felt like so much was at his fingertips, but in truth he knew it was just a small and simple action. He was
