Chapter 10: Poseidon and pseudo Leviathan.
Poseidon glared at Zero, before staring at Leviathan, who was waiting inside the water.
Poseidon was large and tall; from his neck down he was covered with a robe of dark blue with a symbol of a trident embroidered on it.
A hand was sticking out of the robe's sleeve, holding a golden trident.
The other hand was concealed within the depths of the ocean blue robe.
Poseidon's head was that of an octopus, tentacles were dangling from the bottom of it and in the middle of them was what seemed to be his mouth.
His eyes were a light glowing blue and they were rather large.
The octopus reploid blink and a second one appeared, the first dived into the waters.
Zero stared in surprise, "Two!?" he said to no one in particular.
The Poseidon above the water removed his robe and revealed himself:
He had four humanlike arms and four tentacles for legs, his torso was wide and covered his shoulders, it was painted blue and dark blue and engraved on it was a golden trident.
The pelvis armor yet again, was v-shaped and colored simply blue.
Zero knew that the fact that the octopus had four arms won't matter since he had only one trident, that was until three more were teleported into Poseidon's outstretched hands.
"Rats..." Zero said, he thought for a moment and decided to wait for Poseidon to attack.
Poseidon crawled over pretty fast even though he was using tentacles instead of legs.
That should give him an advantage in the water but not on land Zero thought.
Poseidon pushed himself into the air and attacked Zero. Zero jumped backwards into another iceberg and hailed bullets on Poseidon from his Z-buster, finishing with a charged flame shot. Ice's weakness is flame, flame's is electricity, and electricity's is ice.
The shot hit him dead on but the octopus reploid remained unscathed.
"How the!?" Zero asked, he shot at Poseidon again but still he wasn't affected.
Zero charged up his Z-saber and slashed at Poseidon, hitting directly but still not harming him.
He froze in surprise and received two hits from Poseidon's tridents, throwing him into a stalagmite of ice.
Zero crashed through the ice stalagmite and landed on another iceberg, which started cracking and pieces floated away from it.
Leviathan wasn't doing any better; the second Poseidon had her where he wanted, hurling his tridents at her and summoning more.
Leviathan pushed the tridents away with her staff but some managed to hit her, her shoulder was slashed once, a red liquid started spreading in the water.
She decided to use that as a diversion and squeezed her shoulder painfully, like the squid she disappeared in the red liquids and ascended to attack Poseidon from another angle.
She dove at him and whacked him with her staff before he could react, then she took out her daggers and stuck them in him. She finished with a blue serpent aimed at the octopus reploid.
The dragon hit dead on and the bubbles that formed blocked Poseidon from view, as they dispersed however Leviathan saw a grim image of Poseidon looking at her as if in boredom.
Leviathan swam backwards and unleashed the serpent again, but this time Poseidon didn't even let her finish before hurling a trident at her which skewered her left side.
She yelled out and on the surface Zero, who in the meanwhile was getting hit pretty bad himself heard her.
"Leviathan!" he yelled and dove into the water...
"Leviathan stop! It's me Harpuia!" Harpuia said to the doppelganger he thought was his trusted partner and friend.
'Leviathan' however still tried to stab and hit him with her battle staff.
"Please Leviathan I don't want to hurt you! Why are you doing this?" the frustrated Harpuia said as he dodged her attacks lightly.
The doppelganger's red eyes shun for a moment and she dashed forwards with speed, hitting Harpuia dead on with the shaft of her staff, pinning him against the wall.
"Wait Leviathan don't!" Harpuia yelled, trying to keep her from himself.
She held the shaft of the staff with one hand and punched Harpuia with the other one.
"Ugh... Leviathan!" Harpuia coughed and gasped as she drew out one of her homing daggers.
"No." he ordered but the doppelganger didn't care, she thrust it into his armor but couldn't break it. She lifted her hand for another stab but her hand was grabbed from behind.
"What in blazes are you doing Leviathan?" asked Fefnir, who apparently heard Harpuia's cries and went to investigate.
The doppelganger Leviathan hit Fefnir with a back kick and he let go of her arm. She then continued with an elbow to the face, knocking Fefnir back.
Leviathan then punched Harpuia with a left hook and a right uppercut, still against the wall Harpuia couldn't do much, and even if he could he wouldn't just attack his friend, there had to be a reason why she was acting this way.
Fefnir wasn't as reasonable as he was and tried to smack the pseudo Leviathan, she jumped way too fast out of his way and he hit Harpuia instead.
Pseudo Leviathan landed behind Fefnir and launched a kick to his back, knocking him straight into Harpuia.
Fefnir recovered and turned around and stood in his combat stance.
"Why you little... I ought to..." he said before firing with his arm cannon.
"Fefnir don't!" Harpuia yelled as Fefnir shot at Leviathan, who dodged every single fireball and started to hit Fefnir with her staff, she used the shaft to whack Fefnir and then she sliced at him with the sharp tip of the staff.
She sliced Fefnir once across the armor, leaving a notable mark on it.
"That's it!" Fefnir said as his face turned red and punched doppelganger Leviathan in the face, throwing her across the room.
He took good aim at the doppelganger and fired a large fireball that would surely destroy her.
The fireball hit something and Fefnir smiled, until he realized Harpuia positioned himself between him and 'Leviathan' and absorbed the attack.
"She's our friend you ignorant fool!" Harpuia yelled at him, "If it was you would you want me to attack you like that? Maybe she can explain herself! What crossed your head when you did that?!" Harpuia yelled and suddenly felt a sharp object pierce his back.
'Leviathan' stood up in the meantime and stabbed him in the back. The damage was light but Harpuia was ticked off.
He himself lost control and punched Leviathan hard in the face, crushing it completely.
Both Fefnir and Harpuia were shocked, the fluids of 'Leviathan' spilt on Harpuia who was completely petrified.
"What the...?" Fefnir started,
"Fefnir, this isn't Leviathan..." Harpuia said after closer examination.
"It's a copy or something, I think you'd better go to that storage facility now. Ask the operators to get you to Zero's coordinates." Harpuia commanded, "I'll go and patch this up." He gestured at the minor injury he has sustained.
"Right!" Fefnir said and ran outside the room.
Zero dove to find Leviathan floating upwards, the octopus reploid aiming to finish her off.
"No!" Zero yelled and rammed the octopus in the back.
Poseidon who up until now used his tentacles to float in the water lost balance and sunk.
He whirled around and threw a couple of tridents at Zero, who managed to dodge three of them but the fourth hit his leg, crippling him.
It wasn't fair, what a childish thought. But Zero couldn't help but thinking it, this reploid was immune to any form of damage, Zero tried everything from the Z-saber to the shield boomerang but nothing seemed to hurt the water monster that was Poseidon.
The other Poseidon jumped into the water and swam towards Zero.
"That's it then." Zero said to Poseidon.
"You shouldn't have been here. I am sorry." The opponent apologized, what was weird that it wasn't the one near him. It was the one about to kill Leviathan that spoke. Something in his voice sounded sincere and Zero heard obvious reluctance in it.
He looked at the Poseidon in front of him and at the other Poseidon and then it hit him.
Fefnir appeared next to him in a white flash, ready for action and aimed at the nearest Poseidon, the one about to attack Zero.
"No don't, attack the other one Fefnir!" Zero yelled.
Fefnir nodded and aimed his arm cannon at the other one, firing three large fireballs at him.
"No!" Poseidon yelled as the first fireball hit him.
The second and third hit him and he exploded, the shockwave coursing through the water.
The Poseidon about to attack Zero disappeared, as Zero thought: The first Poseidon was the real Poseidon; the other one was a double. He remembered using this technique himself once but couldn't remember when.
Zero swam and grabbed Leviathan's body also grabbing an ice chip from the ruins of Poseidon.
"Operator transfer us." Fefnir said and the three disappeared in a white flash.
Upon their arrival at Neo-Arcadia Zero explained to Fefnir and Harpuia about the doppelgangers,
"I figured that much." Said Harpuia.
Harpuia took Leviathan for repairs but Fefnir said to Zero,
"Come on, I want to destroy where they're manufacturing those doppelgangers." He said, "As soon as we do it the better."
Zero was exhausted, but what choice did he have? So he agreed and the operators showed them two likely places where they might be manufacturing the doppelgangers, one was a Mayan temple and the other was an electricity provider for Neo-Arcadia (like a power generator) it was self maintaining and recently strange reploids were spotted there so it seemed more likely to be manufacturing the doppelgangers.
"Transfer us to the energy provider." Zero said and he and Fefnir disappeared in a bright white light.
To be continued...
Author notes: Poseidon's technique was actually an enhanced version of the MMX 5 "Twin dream" technique. His body was weak so he was solely depending on the 'double' he had to do his dirty work.
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