"HELP!" Ina'nis screamed as she was tossed into the air.
"INA!" Gura screamed as two robotic arms came from behind her and hold her tight.
"LET ME GO!" the scarred little shark girl screamed.
"Please, let me go!" she said in tears, which turned into cries. She tried to flail around, however with each attempt, her captor tightened its grab. The captor leviantis proceeded to fly, followed by the other two leviantis. Amelia suddenly appeared in front of the airborne Gura. She moved Gura's Head to the side and pointed with her gun in her right hand toward the robot. She fired, and the bullet sent an electric shock through its body, which unfortunately passed over to the Atlantean girl. The leviantis let go and Gura screamed from the electric pain. She was about to fall, but Amelia caught her and both of them were suddenly teleported to the ground, next to Calliope, who was about to get up.
"Sorry, Gura." Amelia said as she placed something on the back of the shark girl. Then she got up and stood between the Atlantean and the two airborne leviantis that were approaching them. She pulled her left hand from her pocket, then raised her gun, using her left hand to stabilize it, and fired a few shots at them. Both of her opponents reacted by raising their left arms and activating their water shields. The bullets got caught in the water and stayed there in place.
"Why must pure water be non-conductive?" Amelia mumbled to herself. She put her gun away and conjured her scythe. As the leviantis were about to swing both of their swords at her, Calliope jumped to Amelia's left and Kiara flew past her right side and both of them intercepted their opponent's attack. Amelia got her gun out and pointed at the robot, which Kiara attacked. This leviantis jumped back, retracted its sword and activated its shield on its right arm. The phoenix pursued her opponent and swung with her right sword at it, which the robot deflected it with its sword on its left arm. It, however, kept it shield facing the time traveler. Kiara noticed that and moved herself in opposite side of Amelia, where the leviantis was between these two women. She then began to bombard it with a flurry of attacks. This leviantis was overwhelmed, defending itself from the attacks and from the gun. It jumped into the air, trying to create some space between itself and the adversaries. However, Kiara was able to catch up and kicked it back to the ground.
The time traveler, meanwhile, was frustrated on not finding an opening and proceeded to point her gun at the other leviantis, where the situation mirrored with the other leviantis, but with the difference, that the reaper was noticeably exhausted. This resulted in the robot on getting the upper hand, and it was able to overpower the reaper. Amelia, who was a bit distressed to see her reaper friend struggle, put her gun away and sprinted towards the apprentice. She summoned her scythe with an orange flame aura and was able to slice through the water shield, but failed to damage any components on the robot. It noticed her approach and ducked down to dodge the attack. It changed its shield on its left arm for a jackhammer arm and swung at Amelia's stomach. She took a step back and by rotating her weapon, she was able to use the pole side of her scythe to push the punch away from her. The leviantis used the momentum to turn its body and swung with its sword on the other arm at her. She blocked the attack with the blade of her scythe, which just so happened to be in the right position from her rotation. But the force of the attack was too much for her. She got lifted up from the ground and got pushed a few miles to the side. Calliope let out a loud scream, to muster enough strength to swing at it diagonally. However, the leviantis used the momentum from the previous attack to turn its body around and pushed her weapon with its sword to the side. It continued to spin and punched into her stomach with its jack hammer, leaving a large hole there. She spouted a lot of blood from her mouth and let go of her scythe. She then clenched her teeth, grabbed its arm and held it as firm as possible.
"RECONSTRUCT!" she shouted with all her remaining might. All the blood and guts, that got shot behind her, returned to her body and grew around the arm of her opponent. The leviantis was unable to pull its left arm out or activate its jack hammer. It activated its speaker head and sent a sound wave at her, which she resisted. It stopped and wound up its sword arm. However, it noticed the time traveler approaching her, winding up her scythe. It detached its trapped limb from its shoulder joint and moved towards Amelia. They crossed their weapons, but she got overpowered. She let her blade be pushed down to the ground, stepped her left foot forward, rotated her scythe and tried to hit the head of her opponent with the bottom part of her weapon. It activated its side thrusters to rotate itself in the air, thus dodging the attack by pushing its head to its left side and kicked her face with its feet. She used the force from its kick to turn on her axis, absorbing the impact. During the turn, she grabbed her gun with her left hand and began to shot blindly at the leviantis. It moved to Amelia's right and flew a bit away to create a distance between them to dodge the stray shots. It changed its weapon to its water shield and held it between itself and the time traveler. She held her gun, pointing at the robot, and slowly moved towards Calliope, who was on the verge of losing her conscience. Amelia then put the muzzle of her gun on the leviantis' arm, which Calliope was holding on.
"Let the arm go, Calli", Amelia said. The reaper barely heard her talking, but noticed the gun on the severed robot arm and immediately understood her plan. She proceeded to rip the arm out of her abdomen with a loud scream. Amelia then pushed the arm down to the ground and shot it, which resulted in the arm short-circuiting.
"Re…con…str…" Calliope muttered, while lying on her four limbs and had a hole in her abdomen, from where a lot of black liquid kept leaking out. She took a few heavy breaths, before taking a deep breath, holding it for a second and then shouted:
"RECONSTRUCT!" All her blood and tissues came back to her, sealing her hole. She tried to get up, but her knees gave in and she collapsed.
"Take a break," Amelia said to the reaper, "we should be able to keep them in check." She proceeded to move to her opponent, while pointing the gun to it. The robot, to her surprise, disengaged and moved backwards. She then heard Kiara scream in pain. The time traveler glanced over and saw that the leviantis, which should be down from her electro-bullet, managed to sneak behind the phoenix and successfully impaled her with its sword. The opponent in front of Kiara raised its sword and separated her head from her body. Amelia, meanwhile, turned around, as her bad feeling had been turned out to be true. The severed leviantis arm was not disabled. It changed to its sword form and beheaded Calliope. The head rolled on the ground and the rest of the body collapsed.
"Sh*et." Amelia cursed. The arm then flew towards her, with its blade pointing towards her torso. She stepped to her right, dodging its attack. She then knocked the arm with the handle of her gun down to the ground and destroyed it with her scythe, engulfed with orange flames. When she looked towards the one-armed leviantis, a water beam flew towards her. She pulled out a blue gemstone from one of her pockets and hold towards the beam. The water dissipated the moment it touched the stone, creating a small fog screen in front of Amelia. She jumped backwards, putting her gem away and getting ready for a attack from the one arm leviantis, which never came. It took her a few moments before she also realized it.
"COME BACK HERE!" she shouted, sprinting forward. However, the leviantis already took Gura, who was still a bit paralyzed by Amelia's bullet. The time traveler relinquished her scythe, put her gun into her right hand, and put her left hand into her pocket. She vanished and reappeared on the opposite side of Gura and the robot. She turned around, pointing her gun towards them, however she was about half a mile away from them. The leviantis began to fly away, and Amelia followed, her aim at them. She noticed that her hands were a bit shaky and her head began to hurt a little again. She took a deep breath and teleported again. Yet again, she was off by a large margin and ended up below them on the ground. She vomited from the side effects. After a few heavy breaths, she began to think. With Calliope incapacitated with her injury and lack of energy, her best bet was to aid Kiara, in order for her phoenix friend to chase after Gura and her captor. She turned towards the phoenix and ran. But after a few steps, she threw up again. She grabbed a bottle from one of her pockets and drank it. After she calmed down a bit, she looked up and witnessed how Kiara's headless body, with her neck on fire, was still moving and kept on attacking both leviantis with no regards to her injuries. The intact leviantis somehow managed to grab both of her arms, while the defective one shot two waters and a red laser beam at her back on an angle, which did not hit its colleague. The laser beam resulted in her body exploding in flames, pushing both of her opponents away, but began shortly after to crumble and turning into ashes. Her head in the meanwhile was already engulfed in flames, and she slowly grew back her body. The intact leviantis proceeded to fly away, while the damaged one ran towards Kiara. But all of a sudden it stopped, jumped back and put up its shield to protect the other leviantis, as a bullet suddenly appeared in the water shield. The frustrated time traveler put her gun away and threw her scythe, engulfed in orange flames, over head, sending it flying towards her opponent. It dropped its shield and moved a bit to its left, as the scythe would not be able to reach its fellow leviantis behind it. However, little sparks came out of its torso, hindering its movement a bit, which resulted in it getting scratched by the orange flames. It lost its ability to fly and fell to the ground. When it looked up, its face got greeted by a fist in orange flames. Kiara only grew back a bit of her upper body and her right arm. She fell after her attack to the ground. The leviantis raised its right arm with its sword, which got chipped away by Amelia's bullet. It turned its head, raising its shield. However, Amelia punched through it, with the water evaporating around her fist, and hitting its face. She grunted a bit in pain, upon hitting the metal. It deactivated its shield and pushed away Amelia's arm. She raised her other arm and pointed her gun at its face, which was then pushed out of her hand by its chipped sword. She then slammed her left side into its body, pushing it towards Kiara, who regenerated both of her arms and lunged herself towards them. She formed with her two hands into a fist and slammed onto its head. The head received some damage and sparks came out of it. Its red gem in its torso suddenly glowed, and it raised both of its arms. Then it shot its red and water beams aimlessly around it. Kiara launched herself towards the laser beam, while Amelia was holding her right hand in front of her, which was holding on her water stone. The time traveler negated one water beam, while the phoenix accelerated her regeneration, thanks to the new energy source, she just received. She sprouted her flame wings and was about to take off, but with her missing legs, her ascend was a bit slow. The leviantis somehow lunged itself towards her, grabbing her left arm, and flew in the opposite direction. But because of its faulty side thrusters, it spun uncontrollably, crashing to the ground and accidentally threw Kiara forward. She somehow stopped the momentum midair and was furious. She flew toward it, preparing her punch. But Amelia beat her to it by jumping onto the leviantis, holding a knife in both of her hands. The robot raised its left arm and was able to block her attack with its shield.
"GO GET GURA!" Amelia said it very loudly. Kiara screamed out of frustration, not being able to punch this stupid robot, but listened to her friend and proceeded to pursue her shark friend. The damaged leviantis, below the time traveler, sent its left arm flying. It pushed Amelia, who was squatting on the robot, away and shot a water beam with its other arm aimlessly. Kiara looked back and then redirected her focus on the two leviantis in front of her. The leviantis with two arms turned around and blocked Kiara's sword attack with its sword. Because she exaggerated her swing, she used the block and her wings to move herself around her opponent. When she was behind it, she tried to fly forward, but her newly formed left leg was grabbed by the leviantis behind her and was dragged into the opposite direction. It then changed its right arm from a sword to the jack hammer version and proceeded to punch her shield, which she reactively raised, with its right jack hammer arm, without activating it at first. The leviantis then detached its right arm and sent Kiara flying backwards. It then activated its punch, pushing her even further away from Gura and lastly shot at her with a water beam from its detached arm. Kiara was unable to do anything against it and crashed onto the ground. Its right arm flew back to its owner, and the two captors flew further away. Kiara took a few moments to recover from the fall. She stood up on her feet and was about to lunch into the air, when her left torso was hit by a water beam from behind. She flinched and screamed from the sudden pain. She turned around and saw the damaged leviantis, pointing its water gun at her. She noticed Amelia lying next to it, with the detached left arm of the robot pushing her neck to the ground and a pocket watch on the ground, which was out of her reach. It appeared that the time traveler was unable to get the arm off and was chocking.
"AMEEE!" Kiara screamed in panic and ran towards them. The leviantis shot another water beam, which she easily dodged. When it tried to shoot another water beam, nothing came out of the canon. Kiara lunged herself at it, but got hit by its red laser beam. The shock from the surprise attack made her miss her attack. Her sword slid to the left side of the leviantis, where its arm should be. The robot managed to grab her neck with its right arm and tightened its grip. She used her left knee and elbow to try to break its arm, but it was too hard. It slammed her to the ground and holding her there in place. Kiara placed her sharp side of her blade on her neck, below its hand, and proceeded to cut through her throat. She screamed from the pain, but tolerated it by clenching her teeth. She looked up, and her body, freed from its head, used her sword to slash head of the leviantis off. It stumbled backwards, out of sight of Kiara. She grunted, and her body moved and swung the sword aimlessly. Both of the detached arms increased the pressure on their necks. Amelia desperately banged her hands against the arm and Kiara screamed:
"COME BACK HERE, YOU COWARD!" She tried to raise her head to see where the leviantis was going, but was unable to. Her head became hotter, and her hair began to burn. Suddenly, the hand on her neck loosened its grip. The fire on her hair became smaller, and she managed to guide her body to her head. She attached the severed body parts back together and saw Calliope, sitting on top of the lying leviantis, with the broken sword arm from the other leviantis in both of her hands, piercing through its core. Amelia pushed the arm on her neck away, quickly grabbed her pocket watch and stood up to assess her surroundings. When she noticed the reaper sitting on the defeated robot, her attention quickly shifted to Kiara, who was about to fly away.
"Stop, Kiara!" she shouted as she put her arms around Kiara's waist.
"Why?!" the phoenix asked, confused. "Moments ago, you asked me to chase them!"
"But now they are too far away. Sorry to say, but I doubt that you can deal with both of them alone and keep Gura safe at the same time."
"But why not let me try? It is far better than doing nothing!"
"Because, when you are fighting them there, alone, we aren't able to give you support or rescue you, when you lose. It will probably only waste resources and time!"
"Then what do you suggest,?"
"Rest a little, charging ourselves up a bit and then attack them at their base together. The fact, that they catch her alive, probably means that the mastermind wants her alive. And preparing and executing experiments usually take a long time. I am betting, that, whatever makes Gura dangerous, won't take effect that fast." Kiara wasn't fully convinced by Amelia's persuasion, but took a deep breath.
"I trust you on that." the phoenix said. The time traveler let her go and Kiara went towards the car. Amelia walked towards Calliope.
"How are you?" Amelia asked.
"Somewhat good and somewhat bad." Calliope answered before her right arm fell off from her shoulder and rolled next to the leviantis and she breathed uncontrollably. Amelia put her right hand into her coat and pulled out a small capsule. She crushed it, one-handed, and dropped it. From there grew a naked body that looked a lot like Calliope, lying face down.
"Here, you can use this dummy." Amelia said.
"Wait, huff, what!?" Calliope said with a shocked and confused face. "Where did this come… huff? When was this… huff? WHO CREATED THIS!?"
"I created this a few years ago for emergency purposes."
"How… huff… did you… huff… get my measure…?"
"Kiara."
"Figures."
"Mind if I can take your old bodies?" Amelia pointed behind her at the beheaded corpse of the reaper.
"Whyyyyy?"
"Research purposes."
"What… huff… are you… huff… going to…"
"Confidential. It is something for Daiestro. It would be…"
"No."
"But…"
"No."
"A pity." Amelia was still going to collect her body a few days after. "I'm gonna check on Kiara. After you swap your body, let us together go to our enemy's ‚secret' base."
"Do you know where it is?"
"I came from the future. Plus, I put a tracker on Gura, just in case."
"Ok, huff. See you later." Calliope suddenly stopped moving, her body broke into parts and blood flowed out of it. Amelia, unfazed of her reaper friend's body decomposing, continued walking towards Kiara, who took out a medium-sized tube-like device from the upper part of Amelia's robot. She pushed a button on the side and three spikes came out on the bottom of the device. She lifted her shirt and put the device on her stomach.
"How are you doing?" Amelia asked.
"I am on the edge. How is Calli?"
"I gave her the emergency body."
"That bad, huh. So we have to wait about 5 minutes, right?"
"Probably."
"Wait! Where is Ina!?" Kiara flew up into the sky and scanned the area for her friend. When she found her, she immediately flew towards her and landed next to her human friend, who was still shaking in fear. She kneeled and carefully put her hand on her shoulder.
"Ina?" Kiara said, but as soon as she touched her, Ina'nis shriekedr, backed off from Kiara and protected her face with her hands.
"Ina!" Kiara said with a firm voice. "It's me, Kiara." Her friend stopped shaking, and she slowly moved her hand down.
"Kiara?" she asked when she recognized her. She removed her hand from her face and noticed a strange device, stuck onto Kiara's torso.
"OMG!" Ina'nis screamed, "KIARA, There is something in your stomach!"
"Oh that.", Kiara stood up, revealing the device to her friend. "Don't worry, I'm just charging."
"What?"
"Hey, let's get to the others."
"Does that mean we won?"
"Ehhh not exa…"
"Is Gura safe?"
"Just… come with me, we will explain it later." Ina'nis silently nodded. Kiara put her right arm under the arms of her friend and flew with her towards Amelia.
"Where's Gura?" Ina'nis asked again, while they were airborne. Kiara hesitated a bit.
"Not here… They took her." Ina'nis face went pale.
"WHAT!? What do yo…"
"We are going after them, don't worry. We are going to save her."
"But why didn't you save her then!?" The human got a bit agitated and lost a bit of balance. Kiara tightened her grip, as to not lose her friend.
"I know how you feel, but just hold it, until we land." Ina'nis had a perplexed face and faced away from Kiara. When they landed next to Amelia, who was drinking something from a bottle next to the giant leviantis. Kiara pulled out the device of the torso.
"You wanna use it?" the phoenix asked.
"No, I'm fine.", the time traveler answered and threw the empty bottle away.
"What about Gura?" Ina'nis asked.
"Won't be in immediate danger. We still have time to rescue her.", Amelia answered without looking at them. She began to climb on top of the destroyed giant leviantis.
"Then why aren't you going after them right now?" Ina'nis asked.
"First, we are exhausted." Amelia answered, while searching for something around the shoulder of the leviantis. "Going after them without proper rest is like not going after them at all. Second, do you see Calli anywhere?" Ina'nis looked around her and saw three corpses, that resembled her reaper friend.
"She's dead!?"
"Of course not. Death has a different meaning for her." Amelia summoned her scythe and carefully cut away the layer on the left shoulder of the leviantis, revealing a big blue gem.
"Then about these bodies… Wait, did she die 3 times?"
"Of course not, she is currently trying to possess one of the bodies." She relinquished her weapon and was inspecting the gem.
"What are you doing anyway?" Ina'nis asked, but got no response. "What is she doing, Kiara?"
"Don't know." the phoenix replied. Amelia stood up and threw 2 smaller looking blue gems towards Kiara, who caught both of them.
"Preparing for the upcoming battle." the time traveler finally answered. "These gems can absorb water. You can use them to protect yourself from those water beams to some extent." Kiara gave one of the gems to Ina'nis
"Any change to our battle plan?" Kiara asked. "You know, besides just going in and fight."
"Not really.", Amelia answered. "We have reduced their firepower by a lot, by destroying this big boy here," she knocked at the giant leviantis, "and one of the three special units."
"Wait, you knew?" Ina'nis asked. "You knew something about the enemies, that we didn't and didn't bother to tell us?"
"Sorry, I forgot."
"THAT DOESN'T…"
"Everyone makes mistake.", Amelia countered.
"BUT…"
"And bickering here right now is counterproductive. It just wastes time and energy. You can complain about me all you want, after everything is good and done." Ina'nis was stunned and was baffled by her response.
"Who are you?" Ina'nis asked. "You are so cold and demanding now. I don't recognize you anymore, Ame." Amelia turned away from her two friends.
"A friend," she said with a hesitant voice, "who hopefully is going to save you guys." Ina'nis was also stunned by this response. Tears began to form around her eyes. She held her hand in front of her face and proceeded to cry from all the conflicted emotions she felt.
"Ina." Kiara said. As soon as she touched her shoulder, Ina'nis suddenly hugged her phoenix friend very tightly and cried even louder.
"I don't know… sniff… what's happening… sniff…I'm scared… sniff I'm angry… sniff I'm frustrated… sniff, and I'm ashamed… sniff… of myself…"
"There, there." Kiara pat on Ina'nis' back. "It's going all be okay. We promise you. And let's get Gura back." Ina'nis tightened her hug.
"I'm not going." she said very quietly.
"What?"
"I'm not going!" she said, this time a bit louder. Kiara wanted to say something, but got interrupted by the person behind her, who put her hand on her shoulder.
"I agree." Calliope said, with her new body and with her usual attire. "Not to attack on Ina, but I don't understand why we took her with us to this obviously dangerous mission. It makes sense why we took Gura."
"Everyone makes mistakes." Amelia reiterated, what she said before. She turned around and tossed another water gem to Calliope, which she caught. "It can absorb water." Calliope nodded, engulfed this gem with a black mist and the gem then vanished.
"How do we travel?" the reaper asked.
"I fly us there." Kiara answered.
"Are you strong enough to carry two people?"
"No."
"Okay, then let's go… Wait, what?" Amelia jumped down from the robot and patted on Calliope's chest.
"This will help her." Amelia said, as a disk was revealed on Calliope's chest. It changed its color from red to green. "It increases our buoyancy, thus making us a bit floaty and easier for Kiara to carry us."
"I see." the reaper said and tested the device, by jumping up slightly. Amelia and Kiara immediately grabbed each one of Calliope's feet, before she floated far too high.
"Careful." Kiara said with a little giggle and was still holding on Ina'nis with her left arm. "You have no flame wings, like I do."
"Well," Calliope tried to counter. "I can also come back in the other body over there."
"Yeah," Amelia said with a little smile. "then you won't be able to use the outstanding laser gun, that I installed in your left arm."
"YOU DID WHAT!?" Calliope asked and immediately aimed with her left arm away from the group. One small looking gun ascended from her left arm and shot a small red laser beam. The reaper looked at Amelia with a shocked face. "You did WHAT?!"
"You have 1 more shot left." The time traveler said. "2 on the other 3 limbs."
"Limbs…?! You have also installed them in my legs too?"
"Yeah, forgot to mention it." Calliope looked at her with a stern face. "Don't worry about it." Amelia put another buoyancy device on her chest and activated it. Kiara patted Ina'nis head with her left hand.
"Sorry." The phoenix said. "But we have to go now." Her human friend nodded ever so slightly and separated herself from Kiara. She turned around, as to not let them see her crying face.
"Alright then," Amelia said. "let's go." Kiara held the hands of both of her friends and took off. Ina'nis didn't dare to turn around. Her three airborne friends looked back in sync and saw Ina'nis just standing there, not moving an inch. But then she fell down, onto her knees, and cried into her hands.
"Everything's gonna be fine!" Kiara shouted, in hope of giving any kind of comfort to her friend, before the three of them flew away.