I froze. Albert must've been caught off-guard too, because the Serope took its chance. It swiftly bent over, sending Albert flying over its back and pinning him by his neck on the ground. 

"Enough, Elementalist," the Serope bared its teeth again in victory. "Drop the fire sword. Surrender to us. Before a sniper sees you and blows out your pathetic human brain."

My hands shook. Albert was still struggling, and I felt Aránzazu stirring at my feet. But Real was still knocked out cold. The Serope could've been bluffing about the snipers, but if it isn't...there's no cover out here.

But I also knew the moment I let go off my sword, the Seropes will attack. I don't trust my raw elemental powers to help me now, but it didn't seem like I have a choice.

I began calling for the Fire Elemental silently. Hoping for answers. 

Nothing came. My fear began growing.

"Ah..." the Serope gave an unnerving laugh. "I know that look. Surrender now, Fire Elementalist, and we will grant you a fair trial on Nekros."

Taking a deep breath, I willed my sword back into its docile form.

The Seropes began charging before the light fully died, plunging my surroundings into darkness.

I  yelped and fired bolts of fire wildly around me, illuminating Seropes as they sprinted at us.

A lucky strike hit the Serope holding Albert down, melting its painted Nekron Iron armour. I saw Albert legs flying up for a kick before they both fell out of sight. 

Fighting in the dark was the worse. I was shooting fire at random. Deafening booms came out of my fists every time flames shot out of them. I mentally counted the Seropes that fled. There's one...two...three-

Something grabbed my right arm and wrenched it upwards, forcing me to shoot a plume of fire in the sky. 

I yelped and shot fire at my assailant, forcing it to let go and howl in pain. 

I made sure to keep the heat of the fire at a minimum, only using light emotions to fuel the flames. I wanted to intimidate, not kill. 

The Seropes were smart. They didn't make a sound or gave me an audio cue to shoot at. They were soundlessly making their way to me. I would get the occasional lucky shot, but it's only a time before-

BAM!

My jaw snapped to the side as a Serope punched me square in the face. I desperately gripped onto its arm and my hands glowed in blue flame, melting away its armour. The moment the fire touched its bare skin, it shrieked in pain and kicked me away. 

I landed on the ground next to Real. 

I heard a grunt and a loud clang. 

"What the hell..." I heard Aránzazu muttering.

Another loud clang. 

"JAMES?!" Albert cried. 

"I'm here!" I said. Just then, I sensed grass moving behind me. 

I turned around and shot a fireball. It hit a Serope in the chest, blasting it away.

That's when I heard something else.

The unmistakable whistle of a bullet. A pain that travelled like lightning up my thigh. 

I contorted in pain and screamed. 

We heard yells coming from all directions. Another bullet hit the dirt right in front of me with terrifying speed, burying itself itself in the ground and kicking dirt into my face. 

"Snipers!" Albert hissed. 

Aránzazu was slumped in a daze, but the her eyes suddenly flew wide open at the sound of gunshots. She dove to the ground, snatching up a baton dropped by a fallen Serope.

We heard shouts as Seropian reinforcements began coming in from all directions, the flashlights from their rifles illuminating their determined faces. 

I couldn't fight back. If I shoot fire again, my leg won't be the target the sniper hits. 

My stomach sank as I looked to the horizon. The sky was turning orange. Morning was about to arrive. Without the darkness hiding us...we're dead.

"Well..." Albert sighed. "It was nice knowing you guys."

He crouched down with his knife in a fighter's stance-

"Wait," I said in desperation before he charged. "I have an idea."

I got on my knees and laid my hands on the ground. 

If I can control fire...can I control lava? Magma?

And if Planet Zana's core is similar to Earth's...I can send geysers of the stuff spewing into the skies. The snipers couldn't pinpoint me as easily.

But that couldn't be possible, can it?

I concentrated on the depths of the planet. I sent imaginary hands feeling around it, looking for something. 

Then, something struck a chord within me. My body tingled as my imaginary hands gripped around it.

With all my concentration and might, I pulled. 

I wasn't using my emotions this time. I was using my focus. My mind. My soul. 

Albert and Aránzazu stumbled.. The ground rumbled at the item came closer and closer to the surface-

Suddenly, giant towers of stone shot from the ground around us, sending the Seropes that were on them flying in the air. The pillars of rock collapsed back into a cloud of rubble, blocking the other Seropes' paths and scattering them. 

Cries for blood quickly turned to screams of confusion as more towers rose from the earth. 

Albert's mouth dropped in shock. He drew back to full height.  

Aránzazu's grip slackened around her baton. It dropped silently on the ground

Finally, a voice in my head said. But this wasn't the Fire Elemental. It felt richer. More ancient. A different voice. They see my wrath.

Instinctively, I reached out my hand. The ground opened up and shot something into it. I opened my eyes. The flashlights from the Seropes' rifles that lay on the ground allowed me to see the weapon of deadly beauty I held.

A spear with a tip made of a dark stone that was so sharp it hummed in the air. The shaft was just as deadly. Parts of it was made out of solid gold with engravings on it, but other parts of it were crumbling and reforming in front of my eyes. Pits of dirt and debris swirled around it dangerously. They steered clear of my hands, but as I watched, a dead leaf thrown up by the pillars floated into the cloud of debris. It was torn into atoms before I could even blink.

I couldn't see Albert expression. His face was masked by the shadows of the newly formed pillars. 

Aránzazu, however, looked like she saw a ghost. 

"That..." she mumbled. 

I looked back at her and began ranting in confusion. "I-I'm sorry. I didn't know what I was doing. I was trying to reach into the planet's core to draw fire-"

"You're the Fire Elementalist," she muttered, not hearing me. "But this...this is-"

"The Earthen Spear," Albert finished reverently. "The weapon of the Earth Elementalist."

My tongue refused to move from shock, but a part of me urged myself to move. I heard Seropes yelling encouragements at each other, gathering their nerves for another attack. The three of us winced as the tip of the pillar right behind us was blasted to pieces by an exploding bullet from a sniper.

"Go," I said simply, unable to say anything more. I quickly picked Real up and slung him over my shoulders in a fireman's carry. He was at least as heavy as I was. My regular self wouldn't have been able to even lift even half that weight, but now I felt...impossibly strong.

No. Not strong. Indestructible.

Aránzazu and Albert ran after me. I heard a shuffle as Aránzazu picked up one of the dropped rifles and a few magazines. 

We ran over to the Revelation as shouts filled the air again. I heard the unmistakable sound of aircraft engines in the sky. 

Not bothering to use the stairs, I concentrated and the ground underneath us shook. The platform rose up and I leapt off it onto the landing pad. 

As my eyes adjusted to the dark, I saw the distinct shapes of two Seropes closing in on me. 

Not bothering with my sword, I used my newfound spear to parry their batons. Using the weapon as an extension of my arm, I knocked one of the Seropes off the landing pad tumbling down to the ground below. I sliced at the thigh of the other Serope, causing it to shriek in pain. 

Albert followed up with a sideways kick at it in the head, slamming it against the Revelation. It was knocked out cold. 

"Get in!" I commanded. The door to the Revelation was already opened. The Sun, or star, whatever, was already climbing in the sky. At this rate, it'll be noon in an hour.

Aránzazu gabbed Real off my shoulders and jumped into the spacecraft with surprising ease. Albert quickly followed. 

I stayed outside, holding my spear with one arm. The Seropes weren't expecting us to move so fast, because only a few of them spotted us on the landing pad. 

I was ready to dive into the Revelation and shut the door if any sniper bullets came my way, but none came. 

"James! We're taking off!"

"Are Ling and Cosmo in there!?" I called over my shoulder. I thrusted my spear in the direction of a Serope that was walking up. It took a step back, hissing in fury at me. If the pistol hanging from its belt had been working, I would've been dead.

"Yeah! They've been bound and gagged, but they're fine-"

A distinct female voice began cursing at the top of her lungs about things she would do to Ronan's reproductive organs. 

"That's Ling, alright," I said under my breath. 

"Where's Mira?" I heard Cosmo asked in concern.

I felt my heart sink into my stomach.

"She-she can't come! We need to go!" I heard Albert say, his voice breaking on the last sentence.

I felt my insides shaking as the Revelation began to rise in the air. 

"James!" Albert reached out a hand through the door. 

I clasped his hand and lifted myself to the door. 

I heard a battle cry and turned around in time to see the Serope charge at me. I thrusted at it again. 

To my horror, its breastplate did nothing to deflect my spear. I stabbed the Serope directly through the heart. I pulled my spear back in shock. 

The Serope's eyes rolled back and dropped without a sound.

"NO!" I cried. 

"There's nothing we can do for it, James!" Albert yelled back. "NOW GET ON!"

I didn't hear me. I just stood there, in total shock, looking at the dead body at my feet. Suddenly, I felt two rough hands grapple me by the shoulders. Albert practically threw me inside the ship just as we began taking off.

Cosmo and Ling were already working furiously at the controls.

"Hey, Tinder," Ling muttered, half-turning for me to see her black eye. "Nice day for Serope hunting, eh?"

I didn't reciprocate her smile. The thought of the Serope's dead body...the image was burned with hot iron into my brain.

Cosmo was looking up something in his controls. "Albert, where's the light accelerator?"

"Right here," Albert opened up his cloak from Hardin. The light accelerator was still tucked in it. 

A chute opened up behind Cosmo's pilot seat. "Put it in there. The sooner we get out of here, the better-"

"Oh, for the love of-" Ling threw up her hands and looked at me, annoyed. "Tinder, put your friendship bracelet back on. You're messing with the radar."

My original Deltan Device was shot to pieces, so I strode over to Real and took his Device.

A million beeps filled the air as multiple systems came online after my jamming aura was gone. 

"Great," Ling said breathlessly. She hummed as she began fiddling with a knob. "Just need to get the right frequency-"

The sound of gunfire echoed from below as the Seropes on the ground began shooting at us again. I was nervous, but nobody else seemed concerned.

"Little late on that, boys," Ling muttered with a smile on her face. She looked at her radar and her face whitened. "Shit! Enemy spacecrafts!" 

"What kind?!" Aránzazu asked, running over to the cockpit and looking over Ling's shoulder. 

"Venom-class fighters by the looks of it," Ling mumbled. "Shit, shit, shit, shit. We're deep in shit now."

"How far are they?" I asked. 

"They're locking in on us. This is bad. This is bad. This is bad," Ling repeated. "Cosmo...those ship parts Real stole...do we have any weapons modules?" 

"Three steps ahead of you," Cosmo said quickly. "I'm getting weapons online..." 

"Weapons modules?" I looked at Aránzazu, terrified. "Where'd you get those?!"

"Well, Real was salvaging the spare parts from the crash site before the Seropes jumped us," Aránzazu muttered, still looking at the radar. "Shield cores...weapons modules...old missiles..."

"Missiles?!" I demanded. 

Aránzazu shrugged. "You thought your time on Hardin was bad?"

"Albert, how long on that accelerator?!" Ling cried.

"I need a few more minutes!" 

Ling opened her mouth to say something, but something else caught our  eyes. The side of the ship unfolded to reveal a collapsible chair. New controls opened up in front of our eyes.

"Weapons master station is...online!" Cosmo called out. "Two plasma machine guns and three questionable incendiary-" 

A loud scream from outside made all of us look up. 

"Shit!" Cosmo and Ling simultaneously yanked their control sticks to the side. 

The Revelation lurched to the left just in time to dodge a missile that flew past us. From the Revelation's light, I saw it crashing and blowing up on the rocks formations below, sending boulders flying in the air.

"THREE MORE MISSILES INCOMING!" Cosmo yelled. 

Aránzazu's face steeled in resolution. She sat in the weapons station and took hold of two control sticks on either of her armrests.

"Cosmo, Ling, get us out of here," she commanded. "We need to buy Albert time with the light accelerator."

"Two more minutes!" Albert called back. "The stupid ship needs to scan it for viruses first!" 

Aránzazu pushed the control sticks forward. 

I looked out of the window. Turrets rose out of the Revelation's wings and fired a shower of neon blue bullets into the missiles, causing their warheads to preemptively explode.

"Nice, Ará!" Ling yelled. 

I walked over to Albert. "Do you need help?"

"Nothing you can do!" he roared, still focused on a time that said 1:34:23 and counting down. "Too many security protocols!" 

I stumbled back as the Revelation suddenly turned to one side, causing me to bump into the glass window. 

I looked out and gasped. 

There were seven aircrafts behind us, but they were much slimmer than the ones on earth. With wings barely ticker than a pencil and a cockpit tinier than a table, they looked more like mosquitoes from afar than actual fighter jets. 

But as I watched, the head of a missile popped out from underneath one of the fighter jets and launched itself at us, growing in size as it approached. 

Aránzazu's bullets tore through the missile with ease, but when she began shooting at the Seropian ships, the bullets bounced off about a metre away from making contact with the aircrafts. The invisible shield around the aircrafts flashed red every time a bullet made contact.

"I'll try to lose them in the canyon!" Ling called out. 

The Revelation's nose pointed down and we dived into a valley with the cliffs of the gray rock that covers Zana on both sides. Jagged spikes lined the bottom of the ravine, baying for blood. 

The Seropian aircrafts followed us, but a few lifted up in the air and flew above us. They tried to shoot missiles vertically on top of us, but Aránzazu returned fire at their belly. 

One of the aircrafts exploded in flames. I saw a parachute opening up as the pilot ejected. For a moment, I was afraid Aránzazu would kill it, but she instead turned her attention to another aircraft, firing at its unshielded underbelly. It exploded too. 

The aircrafts above us scattered, leaving only three left that followed us into the valley. 

"Nice one," I said softly. 

"Light work," Aránzazu muttered back. She turned her attention to blasting at the nearest aircraft that was beginning to catch up. 

The first few barrage of bullets were deflected, but as I watched, a few of them squeaked through and penetrated the hull. The aircraft began smoking and slowly descending to the ground.

The pilot panicked and fired another missile. 

Without missing a beat, Aránzazu took out the warhead, causing the missile to explode directly beneath the aircraft before it could even move. I heard alarms blaring from the pilot's cockpit as the explosion took out the remainders of its shields.

The shockwave from the explosion sent the aircraft veering into another one beside it. Its wing shattered against the other aircraft's shield and it tumbled out of sight. I saw the pilot ejecting into the air just before its plane crashed into the spikes at the bottom of the canyons in an eruption of fire.

"WOO! YEAH BABY!" Aránzazu hollered. 

The last two aircrafts retreated, flying up in the air and dodging out of sight before Aránzazu could take advantage of their unshielded bellies.

"Why'd they leave?"

"Venom class fighters only have missiles," Aránzazu said, swirling her turret left and right as she scanned for more enemies. "They would be useless in close quarters. These planes must be expensive too, so the military probably won't be too happy if they lost all of them."

We heard the sound of a machine powering up and a whoop of victory from Albert.

"I got it!" He cried. "We have light speed!"

A button on the controls that was once dark now lighted up in red. 

"Finally!" Ling said. "Let's get out of here before they come back with bigger guns!"

Cosmo pulled up. As we flew out of the valley, I got a astounding view of the landscape below. 

Just then, something caught my eye. Something perched on a rock. My heart stopped. 

I instantly recognised the brick red paint that covered its entire body. The metallic wolf mask. The two crossbows, one in each hand. 

The creature looked up. It should've been impossible to see me from this high up, but I saw a glint from the light reflecting off its teeth as it smiled. 

As we flew even higher, it gave a salute and leaped down into the valley. 

I just kept looking out, stunned. There was a pilot down there. A Seropian pilot that ejected. What if the assassin...

"We're leaving the atmosphere of Zana!" Cosmo declared as the valley shrunk to the size of an ant under us. "Warping to light speed! Draco, here we come!" 

As our ship began accelerating to the speed of light, I could almost here the screams of the Seropian pilot being murdered hundreds of metres below.