To the Power Born: A Tale of the Slayers
Part 44: Battle On High
Interlude: Eastland Mall, Above Ground:
Buffy saw Ian Matthias flare a bright, brilliant blue, the lines of the Power Hope flaring brighter than she'd ever seen before— and monsters all around the little group of him, Joyce, Piper and Jocelyn started burning, screaming, and (those who didn't burn up completely) staggering away from the mini-jungle that apparently held the entrance to Catherine Madison's underground lair.
Holy crap, she thought. Okay, that's… impressive. I'm glad he's sticking with Joyce.
Then Jocelyn yelled, "Now!" and she, Joyce, Ian and Piper leapt onto the concrete-disc path through the mini jungle—
—and vanished in a flash of blue light.
"Joyce!" Buffy cried, entirely without meaning to.
The blue light— Catherine Madison seemed to have a thing for the color blue— flashed again, all around them— and suddenly, Buffy and Judith were the only actual Slayers in an area crammed to overflowing with demons, vampires, werewolves, tattoo-covered wizards, and other monsters in more variety than Buffy could even begin to count.
"REGROUP!" Buffy shouted. "ON ME, MOVE, MOVE!"
Dawn wasn't far away, and she reached Buffy's side in three long strides (and two swipes of the Guardian Blade). "Cover me, Buffy, I can help clear some of these things away— but I need a few seconds!"
Judith Holmes appeared on Dawn's other side, pale, frightened, but with a set to her mouth that said she was in control of her fear. "I have this side," she said, and turned to face a bunch of incoming vampires, a saber in one hand, a stake in the other. Buffy put her back to Dawn and Judith, hefted the Scythe and growled, "Come on, then!" to a Gleven, a tall, slender, almost elven demon that glowed with a pale green light.
The Gleven smiled, extended three-inch-long claws from the tips of its fingers— and leapt at Buffy. It hit the ground in four pieces a split second later as Buffy, with timing born of years of experience, sidestepped and swung the Scythe through its arm, its neck, and its other arm, in that order.
The whole time Buffy was doing this, Dawn was chanting, and Buffy had time to glance back and see that her sister was holding what looked like a steel Frisbee with sections cut out of it to make it a spell-delivery vehicle, like Dawn often did with ordinary plastic Frisbees, and engraved where she might have drawn on a plastic version.
"Ahn ah rhiay, ahn ah leevaht, ahn ah VAY!" Dawn finished— and threw the steel disc hard, aiming at the demon— a Disfen, sort of a humanoid badger with fangs so big they were more like tusks— farthest from her that she had a straight shot at.
The disc flew straight, cut the Disfen's head off neatly— then flew on faster, curved slightly, and cut the head off of a vampire and accelerated more before jogging neatly around a START soldier and cutting the head off of something that Buffy didn't recognize, basically human shaped, but with an over-large head and skin the color of the heart of a ripe watermelon.
The disc kept going, dodging neatly around the members of Team Slayer and START, and it killed a good four dozen demons, speeding up after each target, before seemingly melting from air friction between beheading a vampire and heading to its next target, a were-tiger.
The confusion it sowed was sufficient, though, and everyone got to the area immediately around Buffy— or almost everyone. Two START soldiers died before they could get there, resulting in grim looks on the faces of their fellow soldiers.
Buff looked at her sister, saw that Dawn was panting, sweating— and grinning.
"It worked," Dawn said, smiling a hard smile and mopping sweat from her brow. "Let's see Chantelle or Jocelyn do that with a crazy disc!"
"Are you quite all right?" Judith asked, noting the sweat and that Dawn was breathing hard.
"Fine," Dawn assured her, and took a deep breath. "Just took a lot of energy to do that— not enough to burn me out or turn me dark, but… a lot."
"Don't overdo it," Buffy cautioned. "Never know when we'll need you to drop a house on a wicked witch or something."
"I'll be careful," Dawn said, smiling a little, "if you will."
"Deal." Buffy looked around and said, "Okay, everyone— slow push for the jungle spot! Don't hurry, look out for each other, and remember to look up— some of these things can walk on walls and ceilings."
It was not a pleasant trip, nor was it short. The kids had been gone for more than ten minutes when the mixed group of Team Slayer and START members reached the edge of the miniature jungle, still fighting the monsters that seemed to be coming from every part of the abandoned mall, coming in wave after wave that never seemed to let up.
They reached the edge, found that the monsters and demons seemingly had no interest in stepping on the concrete path. Buffy stepped towards it— and stopped as light flashed, a brilliant, clear, white light, not the trademark blue of Catherine Madison's magic.
When the light cleared, four people stood on the concrete path, three men and a teenaged girl— and only the girl didn't look alarmed and confused.
"What the hell just happened?" asked one of the men, a handsome man of thirty-five or so who, while a bit above average height and built well, seemed almost small compared to the big, solid man behind him. He brushed the brown duster he wore back, revealing a rather odd-looking handgun in a holster on his hip. "Doc, was this your sister?"
(Also, he reminded Buffy of someone, but the who wouldn't come, only that he resembled someone she'd known— and hadn't liked.)
"I didn't do anything," the girl said, her voice calm. She looked small, slender, and maybe seventeen or so. Her long, dark hair hung in waves down her back, and swayed gently as she shook her head. "I told you, all the worlds are getting crossed up. It isn't me, it's the witch-woman."
"Lady, duck!" the big man snarled, and raised his weapon— a rifle of some sort, though Buffy had never seen one like it— and pointed it at something behind Buffy. As Buffy bent at the waist, he shot, firing from the hip (if he'd raised the weapon to his shoulder, Buffy wouldn't have needed to duck at all), making a surprisingly mellow bang, and something screamed, made a noise like fluttering cloth, and hit the ground. The man lowered his rifle and said, "Sure hope that weren't nobody's pet flying monster."
"This," the slender, handsome man next to the girl— they resembled each other enough that Buffy decided they were brother and sister— said in a morose voice, "is what it feels like to go insane. I remember the feeling."
"Listen, you're not crazy, you're not— oh, holy shit, I know who you are!" Buffy smacked her own forehead, then called, "Xander! Honey, am I crazy, or are these folks—?"
"Malcolm Reynolds!?" Xander said, moving through the group to get closer. "Holy— worlds are getting crossed again, Buffy.
"Captain Reynolds, I'm Xander Harris and this is my wife, Buffy. We're… look, it's kind of a battle, right now, as you can see. If you don't want to weigh in, we'll understand— but we could use the help."
Mal Reynolds— Buffy shivered suddenly, and realized that the man looked a lot like Caleb, the psychotic preacher who'd been assisting the First Evil back in the last days of Sunnydale— looked around briefly, then sighed. "Them ain't natural creatures you're fighting— so I'm gonna go with my gut and decide you're the good guys.
"Jayne! Do what Mr. Harris tells you."
"Actually, Buffy's in charge," Xander said hastily.
"Jayne, do what Mrs. Harris—"
"Aw, come on, Mal— don't make me follow no girl's orders!" the big man whined.
"Hey!" Buffy said. She decided to settle that problem immediately, and reached out and grabbed this Jayne person by the belt and lifted him over her head with one hand. "You've got a big mouth for a man with a girl's name!"
Jayne gulped once, stared down at Buffy for a long second— then said in a mild voice, "So, where do you want me, ma'am?"
"With that gun?" Buffy said, setting Jayne down. "Anywhere you can see to take out the flying things— they're new, and they could be a problem."
"Oh, good— a challenge," Jayne said, and moved to the edge of the concrete path, hefting the big rifle to his shoulder.
"You got wounded, the Doc here's about the best in the 'verse," Mal Reynolds went on. "He ain't much in a fight— but his sister you got to see to believe."
"Mal, I don't want River fighting," the doctor said immediately.
"It's okay, Simon." The girl River smiled a little and said, "These things aren't nearly as scary as Reavers.
"Can someone spare me a weapon?"
"River Tam, you're not—" Simon started.
"Jayne, look out!" River cried, and took a single running step at the big man, jumped up and used his shoulders as a vaulting horse, and kicked the incoming Thevev demon that had dived towards him from his blind side in the face. The demon's neck broke, and it's wings folded forward to cover Jayne and River for a second before the girl shoved the corpse away and stood up holding the heavy longsword it had been about to cleave Jayne's skull with.
"Never mind," River said, her voice almost cheerful. "I have a weapon now."
"I'll be damned," Jayne said, looking at the girl and smirking a little. "Guess maybe I could learn to like you after all."
There was a bang, and Jayne jumped and looked around wildly, saw Mal Reynolds standing with his pistol extended and pointed at a spot just past Jayne— where a vampire was getting to its feet, shaking its head and snarling with pain over the hole in its forehead.
"Huh." Reynolds looked puzzled and said, "Got back up after a bullet to the head. There's somethin' you don't see every day.
"Jayne, make nice with River later," Malcolm Reynolds said as River leaned around Jayne and beheaded the vampire that Mal had shot, causing it to dust, which caused him to shake his head and looked exasperated. "Doc, she's gonna fight, and you know as well as I do that can't neither one of us make her stop. So just… do what you can to help these people, and let's get this over with so maybe we can get back home."
Buffy stared in open admiration as the girl— River Tam, that was her name— waded into the ground-fighting demons that came for her and Jayne Cobb, moving with a balletic grace that left Buffy thinking of Elaine Marshall, and she smiled. The way the girl used the sword she'd confiscated added a little bit of Rose to the reminding….
River's brother watched for a moment, then heard a START soldier call "Medic! Stimson's hurt bad!" and went that way, moving with surprising speed and grace, ignoring the chaos around him completely.
Buffy called Dawn over and asked, "Why isn't the gate to the underground complex working any more?"
"It… may have been a one-use gate, Buffy," Dawn said, sounding unhappy. "I can't see any other reason why it would have failed."
"Can you force it open?" Buffy tried very hard not to think of her daughter being trapped down in Catherine Madison's underground fortress with the crazy witch and the Powers That Be only knew how many monsters— and Warren-bots— and knew by the shakiness of her voice that she'd failed.
"I can try, Buffy… but I don't know." Dawn shook her head a little and said, "Catherine's powerful, maybe more powerful than Amy, if she can do a black-as-midnight spell like the Ritual of the Gaping Way on an equinox instead of at or near winter solstice.
"I'll do what I can, Buffy, short of going into the Dark."
"Thank you," Buffy said, her voice low and shaky. "Thanks, Dawn. You'll need cover?"
"Lots of it." Dawn sat on the edge of the concrete path and started pulling stuff out of her spell bag.
"Judith!" Buffy called, and a moment later the newest member of the Original Line Slayers appeared by her side, breathing a little hard, wearing a single bruise on her cheek, but otherwise none the worse for wear. "Judith, Dawn's going to try to get us a way into Catherine's complex, down to where Joyce, Jocelyn, Ian and Piper are. She'll be focusing on her magic, not defending herself— and if any of the demons recognize that she's trying to get to the place they're defending, they may come for her."
"They'll not get at her," Judith said promptly. "I'll see to that— you get on the front lines, they need your experience.
"Giles! I shall need your help here, please!"
"I'll help, too," said a girl's voice right behind them— and Buffy, who didn't have a lot of experience with being snuck up on, jumped, spun, and landed facing the girl River, who was now splattered with several different colors of demon blood, but otherwise looked calm, cool and collected. "Jayne and Mal are working together, they really don't need me, and… this is about girls. Like me. So I'll help here. If we can hold them until the one that burns can see what she needs to do, see the connection and how to use it, it'll all be okay. The witch woman, she can be talked down— if the one on fire can get to her, make her see."
"How do you— no, never mind." Buffy took a deep breath and said, "Judith Holmes, this is River Tam. She'll help you cover Dawn."
"As will I," said Giles, now standing next to Judith. "What would you have of me, Judith?"
"I don't know monsters as well as a Slayer should, Giles— yet," Judith said, stepping forward and nudging aside the two START soldiers who were currently between Dawn and the incoming waves of monsters. "I shall need you to coach me through killing these… things."
"Done," Giles said smartly. He glanced at Buffy, smiled a little, and tilted his head towards the thick of the battle. "They need you out there, Buffy."
"On it." She took a deep breath, looked at the two young women who were going to protect Dawn while she tried to find a way to get to Joyce and the others and said, simply, "Thank you. All of you."
Then Buffy turned and charged into the battle.
She had barely done so when a man appeared in the very middle of the concrete path, halfway between Giles and Captain Reynolds, appeared out of nowhere and with only a minor displacement of air to herald his arrival. However, that was enough to alert Giles, who spun and raised his longsword to menace the man.
The new arrival, a big man, muscular, and wearing what looked to be almost a Renaissance outfit of black, gray and silver, raised his hands and said, "I'm here to help, sir— again."
Giles looked carefully at the man, noted the facial resemblance to a thirtyish Timothy Dalton, the boxer's build, the sword on his hip, and frowned. Then he remembered the footage from the Law and Justice Center in downtown Bloomington on the day of the Battle of Bloomington, and how irritated Whitey had been at not getting a chance to meet this man and his family. Giles's encyclopedic memory kicked in, and he nodded slowly and said, "Prince Corwin of Amber, I believe?"
"Oh, hey, a fan," the man said, smiling a little.
"Not in and of myself," Giles admitted. "However, I have a colleague here who very much is, and was furious that he did not get to meet you and your family during our last catastrophe.
"As I recall, you… Amberites, I believe Whitey calls you— you were instrumental in driving off the demons that assaulted the Law and Justice Center, last time. We could certainly use your help again— but if you could move off the path before bringing any of your family through via your own methods, it would help." At Corwin's raised eyebrow, Giles indicated Dawn, sitting cross-legged and making a circle around herself, ignoring everything else. "My daughter is trying to help us open a way to some young people who may well be in over their heads— including my goddaughter and my granddaughter. I would not see her disturbed."
"Understood," Corwin of Amber replied. He looked over his shoulder and said to the air, "Let me get clear of the young lady's working, Random, then I'll start— oh, hey, good idea." Corwin looked back at Giles and said, "One person coming now— our best sorceress, she may be able to help your daughter."
"That would be appreciated, y— good lord!" Giles stared in amazement as Corwin held out his hand, and suddenly a simply gorgeous woman appeared holding it, seeming two-dimensional at first, but rapidly becoming three dimensional.
The newcomer might have been an inch over five feet tall, but if so, only barely. Long, flowing red hair had been pulled back in a ponytail, framing fine, delicate features highlighted by brilliant green eyes. She wore a simple, Chinese-influenced, martial arts-style outfit in green, lavender and purple— and Giles could not help but be reminded of his daughter Rose, though she, at least, would never wear any shade of purple. The woman looked around, saw Dawn and the beginnings of her circle, and moved to a place where she could see what Dawn was doing, stood, and watched silently.
"My sister, the Princess Fiona," Corwin said. "I didn't get your name, sir."
"Rupert Giles, head of the Watcher's Council," Giles replied, taking the other man's offered hand, then nodding at the woman when she looked up and flashed him a quick smile. "Just call me Giles, please. My daughter— not by blood, but my daughter nonetheless— is Dawn Innes, the young lady with the braid is Judith Holmes, and her smaller helper is, I believe, named River.
"Your Highness—"
"Oh, please, just Fiona." The woman quirked a smile his way without ever taking her eyes off of Dawn.
"Fiona, we do appreciate the assistance. Things are… quite grave."
"Yes, they are," Fiona agreed, still watching Dawn. "You can tell— we had to get involved. When one shadow merits the attention of the Royal Family of Amber twice in less than twenty years local, less than ten years Amber-time?
"Yes, things are dire."
"Fi, I'm going to move off and bring the others through," Corwin said. She nodded, and he turned to Giles. "Listen, I, at least, will stick around after this is over, this time— so I can meet your colleague. Wouldn't want him feeling like he missed out twice, that would have to suck."
Giles chuckled a little, nodded, and turned his attention back to River and Judith, who were turning out to be quite the fighting pair.
"Judith, the blue-gray beast slogging it's way towards you is a Welmacre demon," he called, just loud enough to be sure that Judith heard him. "Its only real weakness is its heart, which is just above its navel. (I've never understood why those things don't wear armor or shirts, the idiots, but it's to our advantage.)
"River, the tall, white-skinned creature behind the party of vampires you're engaging is a Farfelen— it is bitterly cold to the touch, will cause frostbite at the minimum if it touches you. Chop off any limbs it extends towards you, then behead it— it has no vital organs as we understand the term, but beheading will kill it."
Giles stood between the pairs of Judith and River and Dawn and Fiona, and did what he did better than any other man alive— informed those under his charge of how best to beat the creatures that attacked them.
Around him, just outside the circle of plants, other people appeared one at a time next to Prince Corwin, mostly men, and waded into the fight. A man in shining white plate mail that appeared to be made of ceramic or porcelain rather than metal. A tall, slender man in orange, yellow and brown who wore no armor at all, but wielded a long sword in each hand and moved so fast that no enemy seemed able to hit him. A redheaded, smiling man in leather armor of orange and red, a saber in one hand and a buckler in the other, danced in and out among the crowd of monsters, laughing as they fell beneath his blade. Prince Corwin fought sided-by-side with a slightly younger man who looked much like him, even dressed similarly. A small, smirking man in red, orange and brown with a huge ruby hanging from a chain around his neck stood behind that pair, tossing around magic as casually as Jocelyn and Chantelle did their various missile weapons. A huge, powerful man (who bore some notable resemblance to Vincent Chandler) fought beside a tall, slender blond woman who wore pastel orange, yellow and white, and had some discoloration of the skin for some diameter around her right eye— it appeared to be a series of red lines, and Giles wondered in the back of his mind if it were some sort of tattoo…. A blond woman in a riding dress of green and gray used a saber and poniard combination with great (and sometimes brutal) efficiency. Lastly, another woman in a more practical outfit— she could have been ready to play Hamlet, in her green, lavender and gray tunic, doublet and hose— stood near her and added her own magics to the other woman's bladed assault. Her hair was as green as the lining of her short cloak, and her skin had an olive cast to it, more truly green than Giles had ever seen….
Regardless— though these "Amberites" were definitely helping, his first duty was to Judith and, because she was helping, River.
"Judith, the creature approaching you is not, despite appearances, a werewolf. It is a werecoyote, and can be killed by simple beheading…."
The monsters came on— and the battle continued.
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Interlude: Asimov Station, Inboard
Rose Killian, her reflexes already adapted to the thirty-three percent gravity of Asmiov Station again— Slayers adapt quickly and it hadn't been that long since she was last here— took advantage of her superior knowledge of the environment and used the powerful kick she'd just delivered to the stomach of a Hurkulpo demon (huge, purple, ogre-like monsters) to launch herself, blade-first, at a critter that made her think of Godzilla, only on a much smaller scale. The lizard-looking demon was "only" not quite ten feet tall, and Rose used the kick-off to get her sword shoved through its lower jaw— and then its braincase.
She hit the ground and Elaine spun past her, moving in something that was half the ginga of Capoeira, half a balletic pirouette, the blade of the spear she held slashing multiple times through the Hurkulpo that Rose had just used as a springboard. The last of those slashes went across the demon's throat, and it sank to the ground, dying as blood fountained from the wound.
"Nice," Rose murmured as her first love whirled deeper into the melee, her spear damaging or discombobulating every demon she passed and could reach. She spun her sword in one hand as she turned back to the melee herself, waded in and chopped the head off of a vampire that was menacing Vincent from behind. He called his thanks casually as Rose moved deeper into the furball and found herself approaching the team of Faith and Ballard.
Faith's style— wilder and more untamed than most Slayers, much like the way Sh'rin fought, come to notice— meshed well with Ballard's more controlled but still frenetic Capoeira, and the two of them seemed to be in no danger at all. Past them, near the outer bulkhead of the station, Chantelle and Sh'rin worked together, the Guardian from the past mixing magic, martial arts and swordplay— she had replaced the Guardian's blade with a non-magical one that replicated its look and feel— to protect Chantelle while the blond Slayer used her nearly uncanny ranged combat skills to thin the enemy numbers, firing arrows occasionally from the over-sized quiver that she wore on her back, tossing crazy discs and knives from the twin bandoliers she wore, using the short sword she carried when anything got close to her.
Willow and Starpulse hadn't caught up with the rest of the group yet, but— no, there was Willow, drifting out of the nearby spoke entry that led to back to the station's hub. She looked around, shook her head in exasperation, and did… something magical. Rose followed Willow's eyes, saw a small magical gate over on the wall away from the fight— and saw it close around the head of the Gotlak demon that had stuck its head through to look around, killing the beast neatly. Willow nodded in satisfaction, then started looking around for anything else that could use her magical touch.
As Rose spun back into the fray, she saw a man from Station Security approaching from back along the hall, hugging the inner bulkhead. He caught her gaze and waved, and she nodded and cleared the enemies immediately around her, glanced around, saw that no one needed reinforcements, and ran to the man, who wordlessly handed her one of the station-safe cell phones that security used. She put it to her ear and said hello— and Starpulse spoke rapidly from the other end.
"Listen and don't interrupt, I don't have the time," Starpulse said. "Warren has a backup plan in place, and—"
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Interlude: Asimov Station, Outboard, three minutes before:
Starpulse melted the last of the space stations retrorockets, having gone ahead and destroyed them all because he didn't know their capabilities— it might be that with even one intact retro, Warren could push the station out of orbit, send it crashing to Earth, killing everyone aboard, and no telling how many on the ground.
That was a bitch, he thought as he began looking for a smaller, personnel-friendly airlock. My power's lower than I like, even if Willow does think I'm probably at least a little more likely to stay here than be jerked back to my own universe if I run dry now. I'm below twenty percent— looks like I fight hand-to-hand from here on out— unless I can get one of the station security guys to give me a gun.
He started moving against the station's clockwise rotation so that he'd cover the outside area faster, stayed maybe fifty feet away from the station itself. He passed a porthole on the side of the station, saw an airlock another seventy or eighty yards down— and braked to a halt, flew back to the porthole he'd passed, staying well out from the thing, so it wasn't likely he'd be seen out here. In space, the new costume that Jocelyn and Kelly had provided him was, effectively, camouflage, which was a very good thing right now if—
He lined up with the porthole, looked inside— and cursed as he counted at least seven Warren-bots in the room the porthole looked into.
When he'd first activated his powers, he'd learned that his vision wasn't limited to what ordinary humans thought of as "the visible spectrum" any longer, and he now shifted into the heat spectrum— and saw what he'd been afraid of.
Each of the Warren-bots that he could see had a spot of intense heat— approaching two hundred degrees, rising rapidly— at the same spot on its body, an inch and a half or so below the belt— not a place that anyone would target as a "vulnerable area" normally, as it was above the area commonly thought of as the groin, but below the stomach.
That's where I'd put a power source, if I were going to design myself a robot body, dammit! Starpulse thought— and he accelerated for the airlock he'd spotted before, stopped in front of it, heaved a sigh of relief (his body produced a force field seemingly on its own when he entered low atmospheric pressure, and somehow provided air for him) as he saw a security man start the lock cycling for him to enter.
As soon as the airlock and station pressure equalized and the inner door opened, Starpulse said, "I need to speak to Rose Killian right now— it's an emergency involving station safety!"
The man neither hesitated nor asked questions, he simply pulled his cell phone and made a fast call. After a moment, he said, "Anyone close to the group from Designation Hammer, get to them and get Rose Killian's attention— she's small, redheaded, uses a sword. This is an emergency, her teammate Starpulse needs to talk to her ASAP."
With that, the man handed the phone to Starpulse and looked expectantly at him.
"Follow me, stay behind me," Starpulse said as he listened for Rose to speak— nothing yet, though he was beginning to hear the sounds of a melee. "When I stop at a door, if it's one you can override, do— and then get out of the way. Multiple robots in the room, and I think their power sources are on overload."
The man paled, but nodded— and from the phone, Starpulse heard Rose say "Hello?"
"Listen and don't interrupt, I don't have the time," Starpulse said. "Warren has a backup plan in place, and I'm on my way to stop him. He's got multiple bodies in a room on the outboard side of the station near— where are we?"
The security man answered, and Starpulse said, "Near the emergency airlock at radius one-zero-five, back somewhere between that and the big lock at radius ninety
"I'm going to stop him, Rose, and I don't know if there's time to wait for you, even for Willow if she flies— and I'm dangerously low on power."
"Starpulse, you wait for—" Rose started.
"Don't!" he snapped. "Don't waste the time, I don't have much before we're there!
"If I do have to drain my reserves, you tell Jocelyn, Piper and Judith that I love them, and that I will find a way back! I don't know how soon, but I will come back to them! Promise me you'll tell them, Rose!"
A fraction of a second of hesitation, then Rose said, "I'll tell them, Colin. Good luck— and I'd better see you soon!"
"Here's hoping," Starpulse muttered, and broke off the call. He handed the security man back his phone and they arrived at the door in question.
As the man started working to override the door— which didn't open as it should have when the man swiped his security badge— Starpulse asked "What's the melting point of the interior bulkheads, do you know?"
"The bulkheads are a titanium-steel alloy with— well, a lot of other stuff," the man told him. "Won't melt before about 1925 degrees Celsius." At Starpulse's small frown, the man sighed and said, "Around 3500 degrees Fahrenheit."
"Good, thanks." Starpulse took a deep breath and said, "I warn you— I'm going to go straight to producing about three thousand degrees Fahrenheit. You might want to stay back from the door."
"There's a porthole in there," the man advised, holding a wire in each hand and looking up at Starpulse. "It may blow at those temps, if you stay there for any length of time. That happens, I'll have to let the door close."
"Understood," Starpulse said. He took a deep breath. "Hope this works.
"Open it."
"Good luck, sir," the security man said— and touched the two wires together.
The doors opened, Starpulse flew in, and grinned as he realized that the Warren-bots were seated in two neat rows of six along the outer bulkhead— and he didn't waste time talking, didn't give them the chance to attack him, or hurry the overload cycle that he was pretty sure they were locked into.
His hands lanced out, fingers straight (he held them fists-closed for concussion beams, fingers-extended for heat beams— it was an excellent mental shortcut), and took his heat beams to around forty percent— close to three thousand degrees, as close as he could get without a lot of time and concentration and building up to it slowly— immediately, did what he could to keep the heat contained, not allow it to spread too widely, even though that took more power.
He aimed directly at the power sources on the Warren-bots nearest him, front row left and right middle— and the beams lanced through them immediately, as well as the two behind them, and the power sources all four stopped working. Starpulse grinned, swept his hands outward, and found that the rest of the robots had activated force fields of some sort. His beams were eating through the fields, but the subtle whine coming from the Warren-bots had started to cycle up and grow louder more quickly than before.
"Damn it," Starpulse said softly— and increased the power, taking it to forty-five percent of maximum output, then to fifty, with part of the power output being used to contain the heat as tightly as possible. He dropped to the floor to preserve even the tiny bit of power that flying cost him as his power reserves, once things that seemed to replenish as fast as he used them, dropped alarmingly— and swiftly. "Burn already, would you, you mismatched mess of mechanical men!?"
Four more went, and Starpulse swept his hands out to nail the last four— and kicked the power output up to sixty percent as the robots began to glow in the visible spectrum. Their force fields were wearing away, he could see that— but not fast enough.
Please, if anybody's listening, let this work, let me stop them before they kill a whole bunch of people! he thought— and cranked the power output to eighty percent, the maximum he could use and still contain the heat in the beams to any degree.
Starpulse's beams punched through the force fields of the front pair of Warren-bots, then though the back pair, all four collapsed to the floor, inert— and before he could turn the beams off, they shut off by themselves.
Starpulse felt a horrible cold sensation at the center of his being as he ran out of power—
—and he vanished from the room without so much as a flash of light.