Escape From Sanctuary
The Guardians, Dey, Alexi, and Courtney had found Harmony and Drax but they weren't out of the woods yet. Following not far behind the Guardian and the wind element were close to 500 Sakaaran guards being lead by a girl made of metal. "Don't let them get away!" She screeched. "Take the three elements alive and eliminate the others!"
"Guys I think we need to go!" Peter shouted. The group turned and fled in the other direction from which they had come. "Who is that girl?" Peter called to Harmony and Drax.
"That's Titanium!" Harmony shouted back. A dagger went hurtling by and nearly missed her face. "She can control metal." Harmony yelped. All of a sudden Alexi ground to a halt, her fiery tendrils licking at the walls around her.
"What are you doing?" Rocket shouted as Alexi turned around to face the oncoming hoard of soldiers. Alexi let her fire curl outwards so it formed a barrier between them and the guards. Titanium ground to a halt before the blockade and all the soldiers stopped behind her.
"Don't you remember that presentation Dey gave us on these elements?" Alexi asked. "Titanium can't go near fire." She smiled. "And I just so happen to be fire." The Sakaaran soldiers tried to get past Alexi's blaze but only succeeded in getting burned to a crisp. Titanium roared in anger as her spikes disintegrated into metallic puddles when they touched Alexi's barrier.
"Wait!" Courtney exclaimed. "Harmony, you're a wind element. You can boost Alexi's power." Harmony looked at the two with shock.
"I can do what now?" She asked. Courtney explained about the flowchart Dey had provided on the elements and how they each gained a boost and a decrease from each other. Then she explained who Dey was. Then she explained who the Novacore were. Then Courtney gave up explaining things to Harmony and yelled at her to become the wind sprite and boost Alexi's wall so they could escape. Harmony closed her eyes and the Guardians watched as her hair became a wild tumble of black curls and her whole body dissolved into a whirling spiral of wind.
Harmony flung out what used to be her hand, but now was nothing more than a mini tornado, and hit Alexi's wall with a blast of wind. The oxygen boost from her wind fed the roaring fire so much that the tips of the flames licked the 15 ft high ceiling. The walls were scorched into a brown crisp as the extensive heat of the fire burned anyone who came within 2 feet of it.
"I think now would be a good time to go!" Dey shouted. The others agreed and quickly sped back down the hallway to where they had been brought in by the guards. The twisted hallways suddenly seemed less confusing as the three elements led the Guardians and Dey to safety. Some guards tried to come around and drive them back but they were quickly sent the opposite way by either a wave from Courtney or a wind spiral from Harmony. Finally the group left the steel walls of Sanctuary behind and emerged onto the port where the rubble of the Nova ship lay.
"How are we gonna get out of here?" Drax asked Peter. Everyone turned to look at him, awaiting what the Guardians' leader would have in mind this time. Peter swiveled his head around looking at all his limited options.
"Maybe we could-" He was cut off by an enraged shout from the door. There stood Titanium, seething with anger. She had doubled back and around Alexi's fire, easily following their trail of dead or unconscious soldiers.
"You stupid elementals won't escape me this time!" She roared. She raised her hands above her head and the whole plate they were on shook. Metallic pieces from the very rock beneath their feet rose up at Titanium's call. Spikes protruded from the metal covering her body and more spikes flew out of Sanctuary to hover near her head. Everything stood very still, as though everyone was awaiting some kind of order to move.
"Get to a Sakaaran ship now!" Peter shouted. Whatever pitiful excuse for a war cry that was, it worked. Everyone flew into a flurry of activity. The Guardians and Dey charging over spikes that popped out of the ground at random heading towards the nearest hanger bay full of ships. The elementals headed straight for the raging Titanium trying to divert her attention from the others. Titanium was ready and willing to obliterate them all without a second thought.
"Hey metalhead!" Harmony shouted from where she hovered behind Titanium. She looked wild and crazed with her whole body whistling with the sound of rushing wind. Titanium turned around to face Harmony and as she did a stream of fire hit her backside making her collapse onto the rocky surface of Sanctuary.
"That's for trying to steal Harmony!" Alexi roared. Her fiery body spazzed and writhed with brewing rage as her flames grew larger until you couldn't tell if it was Alexi or a wildfire you were looking at. Titanium tried to get up but a water stream from Courtney sent her tumbling into the wall.
"That's for attacking the Guardians of the Galaxy!" Courtney yelled. Water cascaded off her body to form shallow pools in the dips and cracks of Sanctuary. She looked like a cross between a river goddess and some kind of water demon, her features both angelic and demonic at the same time.
Finally Titanium struggled to her feet and with a scream of rage threw an army of metallic spears at the three of them. Without leaving their midair positions Alexi blocked the spikes with a fiery wave of her hand, Courtney washed the fried metal back up to Titanium's feet, and Harmony shouted to the Guardians, "Cover your ears!"
Alexi and Courtney followed Harmony's order while the Guardians and Titanium paused momentarily. That momentarily was all it took for Harmony to release the loudest banshee shriek they had ever heard. It was an eardrum shattering, eyes watering, painful migraine for days, tortured animal cry of agony that shook them down to the core. The wail sent Titanium cowering to her knees in the fetal position and knocked both Alexi and Courtney out of the sky and to the ground. Courtney hit the rocky surface and started bleeding from the cuts along her arm as her watery skin disintegrated. Alexi fell into a puddle of water and cried out in pain as her fiery skin escaped in a mountain of steam. All the Guardians and Dey were hunkered down as Harmony's scream died out like the wind did when a storm ended.
Peter picked up is head which was ringing and looked up at Harmony. Her mouth moved like she was saying something but his hearing was slightly on the fritz. The confused looks from the others told him that they too would be momentarily deaf. Harmony's winds dispersed and she lowered herself to the ground where she lifted the bleeding Courtney and the shaking Alexi off the ground. The three girls looked like they were speaking to each other as they limped across to the Guardians who had found a nonexplosive Sakaaran ship to borrow back to Xandar or Terra or wherever they were going now.
Alexi sparked her hands up with a small flame and wrote some hovering fire words up in front of the Guardians. Then had Courtney extinguish them so she could rewrite them facing the Guardians so that they could read it. She finally got it right on the fourth try, as writing with fire in the sky was hard, especially after getting thrown out of the sky and into a pile of water. You'll be deaf for about 5 minutes.
The Guardians nodded that they had read it and the group silently made their way onto the ship, most of them clutching their pounding heads like they had a headache. Rocket jump started the ship and soon they were off zooming through the cosmos.
5 minutes later
"So now that I can actually hear and concentrate," Began Peter, "Let's discuss what we're going to do, what happened back there, and if we're safe." He paused. "But not in that exact order since I think the whole what we're going to do now and if we're safe is more pressing than what the girls just did."
"I liked you a lot better when you weren't being annoying." Alexi grumbled. She was icing some bruises on her face while Courtney was getting her wounds cleaned up and Harmony was laying down to rest in the backroom they had found.
"We need to go back to Terra." Gamora spoke up from where she was getting some bandages out of the medical box for Courtney. "Thanos most likely knows that the Infinity stone is down there and we need to be there first to get it." Drax shook his head.
"No way, Thanos cannot know about the Infinity Stone because the wind sprite and I told him nothing." Alexi and Courtney nodded their heads in agreement.
"Muscle maniac has a point." Alexi spoke up. "Hijinx got nothing out of me and Courtney." Alexi shot a glare at Courtney. "Despite the fact that she almost told him."
"Well excuse me for wanting to help you!" Courtney muttered. Alexi ignored her. The Guardians noted that some animosity seemed to have sprung up between the two. Was that because water and fire were enemies? Or was it something else? They chose not to reflect on it as Dey came back into the room after a conference call with Nova Prime.
"We're not going to Terra." He said. "We need to report to Xandar what has developed. That Thanos and a scientist are working together, that Thanos is in possession of a powerful weapon, and that we have three of the things that Thanos wants."
Alexi shot a glare at Dey. "Courtney, Harmony, and I are not things mind you. We're human beings that just found out we have unbridled power." She removed the ice from the bruise on her forehead and moved it to her cheek. "The least you could do is have a little sympathy."
Gamora put her hand on Alexi's shoulder but when she stiffened Gamora removed it. "We do sympathize with you three for what has happened, truly. Dey was insensitive to refer to you as things." Gamora glared at him. "Apologize." She ordered.
Dey sighed. "I will refrain from referring to you three as things from now on, okay?" Courtney and Alexi nodded. "I can't guarantee that others will do the same though." He continued. "Now back to the matter at hand, it doesn't matter what any of you think, Nova Prime's orders are Nova Prime's orders. We have what Thanos wants so that automatically gives us the upper-hand."
Gamora scoffed. "We would have more of the upper-hand if we went to Terra to get the stone." Peter shook his head as he sided with Dey.
"We can't argue with orders Gamora. No matter how much we want to, it's just not the right time to go on another trip to Terra. We'll just have to hope that Thanos doesn't put two and two together."
"What does basic math have to do with Thanos knowing where the Infinity Stone is?" Asked Drax. Everyone looked at him. "Oh wait, was that a metaphor?" They all nodded. Drax just shook his head and sat back in his seat.
"So to Xandar it is then?" Peter asked. Dey nodded and Peter set course for Xandar. Everyone then went their own separate ways to either think (Like Courtney and Peter), rest (Like Alexi and Gamora), tinker (Like Rocket and Groot), or eat (Like Drax and Dey). What none of them knew was that their adventures were far from over. Not even close, they were just getting started.