I looked at Albert with a mixture of surprise and horror. "Are you sure about this?"

"It's not like we got all the time in the world, do we?" Albert said hushedly. "Those bombs are probably giving Andras cover down on Draco. If we can stop them, then-"

"He'll still raise the Dragon anyways," I interrupted. 

"They'll delay him until we get there," Albert said confidently. "That's the point now, isn't it? Kill the Dragon."

I nodded. "Fine." I took out my sword and set it alight. My hands were shaking from nerves, but a wave of calm washed over me. I wasn't sure if it was the Elementals in my head or just shock. 

Albert looked at me and nodded up the stairs. "Do the honors, Dalton."

I nodded pensively. Bracing myself, I raced up the stairs.

I broke into the room, immediately greeted by the smooth metal face of a Scourger. My arm moved before I could fully process it. One slice, and the monster's head was gone. It collapsed on the floor without a sound.

Confused grunts came from around me, almost instantly turning into outraged roars.

I whipped my head around the room. It was quite big, but the back half of it was empty except for some monsters. The front half was just rows after rows of controls with hologram screens on top of them. 

I heard a screech to my right. Without hesitation, I spun to the side and grabbed a monkey bat by its throat. A Maniac. I snapped my head back as its neck grew to the length of a baseball bat, its teeth almost chomping my face off.

That's when I realised it wasn't going for my head. The monster's razor sharp teeth sliced through my Deltan Device like butter, leaving a gash in my arm as my Device hung precariously from my wrist.

Almost instantaneously, gunshots erupted from behind me as Albert jumped out. 

I tightened my grip around the Maniac's neck and set my hand on fire. To my surprise, the monster almost immediately burst into flames like it was covered its gasoline, screeching in pain. I yelped and threw my new fireball across the room at a squad of Scourgers. 

I turned back to the controls just in time to see a bunch of Krekrons getting up from their seats, brandishing tridents and hissing.

I punched my fist in their direction, sending a fireball at one of the monsters. It deflected it away with its trident, hitting an unfortunate Maniac perching on the back of a chair. The Maniac burst into flames and howled before combusting into smoke.

Then, all the sudden, a powerful explosion vaporised the Krekrons and their controls. I flew back and my brain ricocheted around the insides of my skull. Another one of Albert's grenades flew past me in the corner of my eye, blowing up another row of control stations. 

"JAMES!" 

I scrambled to my feet just in time to see a Raider materialise behind me, swinging a giant sword over my head. I rolled to the side just in time before it chopped me in half. 

Adrenaline took over as I lunged forward with my sword, slicing at the Raider's legs-

"NO!"

My sword bounced harmlessly off the Raider's armour and flew out of my hand, landing a few metres from me. 

The Raider laughed and swung at me again, forcing me to jump back. The heavy blade scraped through the obsidian floor, forming a line between me and my sword. The Raider roared and leapt in front of me, causing me to scramble back. Creating more distance between me and my weapon.

Albert ran over to try to help me, but a door to his right burst open. Another squad of Scourgers poured around, pointing their spears at his face and backing him against the wall. 

I heard a series of rifles cocking to my side. I turned my head to see more Scourgers, these ones carrying guns, pointing them at me. A swarm of lasers gathered on the left of my chest.

"Don't you dare," the Raider growled as my hand instinctively moved to my Deltan Device, glued to my skin from the Maniac's saliva. The Raider sneered, its gravelly voice vibrating in my bones. "If you try to jam guns, Allor will crush your human neck himself.."

I raised my arms. A part of me wanted to hurl a fireball at the Raider, but that means the Scourgers were just going to kill me. If I raise a wall of fire...no fire is enough to melt bullets that quickly.

But a wall of earth...

I can't do that here, right?  I asked the Earth Elemental in my head. 

All I got back was silence.

I growled quietly in annoyance. 

"An Invictus. An Elementalist. Both alive. Lord Hathor will be pleased," the Raider said in the same deep voice. It's hard to tell its facial expression behind the giant helmet it was wearing. Suddenly, its whole body began rumbling in laughter. "And they say Allor is weak! Allor is weak! That's why Allor can't go to battle on Draco! Well not anymore..." I saw a glint of hunger behind the Raider's eyes. "Allor is show Lord Hathor...Lord Hathor will be pleased...yes..."

I slowly lowered my hands.

"No tricks, human," the Raider growled. It heaved a giant double-bladed sword the size of a refrigerator over his shoulder.

"Wasn't going to," I said, trying to sound meek. "Look, you win, okay? You..." I looked at my sword in docile form. The stick lying on the ground behind the Raider's feet. "You win. Allor is the winner. Allor has beaten us."

The Raider must've not been the brightest, because it huffed in satisfaction and puffed its chest. "Yes! Allor has beaten an Invictus and an Elementalist! Allor is the best!"

I clicked my tongue in irritation and opened my hand, trying to manipulate the metal underneath us.

No luck. There was some other element in there...something besides the metal...something darker. Something blocking the Earth Elementalist from controlling it.

I tried with the Scourgers pointing their guns at me. They're even worse. There's something in their twisted metal bodies...like a screaming soul.

But what about their guns? 

I reached for the bullets in their rifles. Iron. I can work with that.

"Or should I kill you now and get it over with?" The Raider mumbled out loud.

"No!" I yelped, breaking my concentration as my eyes flew open.

"But why?" The Raider looked at me. If it wasn't for the genuine confused look in its eyes, I would've laughed.

I shot a desperate look at Albert. Keep it talking. I got a plan.

Albert seemed to understand. He jerked his head back as a Scourger jabbed at him with the tip of its spear. He tightened his grip on his gun.

"So...Lord Altor-"

"Allor," the Raider corrected smugly. 

"Yeah, Lord Allor-" Albert corrected hastily. "Look, what are you planning to do after you capture us? Besides killing us, of course."

"Hmm..." the Raider rubbed its chin. "Allor has never thought that far ahead."

The Scourgers looked up at him. Despite their lack of facial expressions, I could tell they were annoyed of their superior's stupidity.

I reached out with my mind at the Scourger's guns. It was hard manipulating their bullets from this distance, but I shaped the metal with my mind, puncturing them and silently causing the gunpowder inside of it to leak out. It took so much concentration that even the occasional murmur from the Raider was enough to throw me off...

There. All five of the Scourgers' guns were sabotaged.

I looked at Albert and whistled quietly for him to meet my eyes. I silently held up a three. He nodded.

The Scourgers and Raider were too busy to notice us. 

"Allor will most likely give you up to Lord Hathor. That's what any good Raider would do..."

Three.

"But then Lord Hathor will give it to the Andras human. Allor doesn't like that-"

Two.

"But Allor also wants to be a good Raider, so-"

One.

I lunged out and shot two fireballs at the Scourgers surrounding Albert. It immediately blasted away three of the five monsters, melting them. 

"Wait!" The Raider cried.

Albert kicked the fourth Scourger in the shin and ducked under the fifth one's spear before it could impale him. I saw a glint as he picked his pistol back up from the ground. Two shots. Two holes in the Scourgers' heads. They fell to the floor, incapacitated. 

The Raider growled and looked at the remaining Scourgers. "What you waiting for?! Shoot the humans-agh!"

Albert fired at the Raider's helmet. The bullets bounced harmlessly off it, but it stumbled back and dropped its sword with a loud crash.

The Scourgers posted on me fired their rifles, only to have their guns blow up in their faces. 

Before they could react, I slammed my fists together.

Walls of fire appeared on both ends of the line of Scourgers and crashed into each other, melting the Scourgers with them. 

"Wait! Wait!" The Raider cried. I looked back to see the giant monster cowering against the wall. Its helmet was blown off, with Albert pointing his gun straight at his head. "Don't harm Allor! Allor is innocent! Innocent!" 

I walked over to the Raider and picked up my sword. It grew back to its full form. The sight of it made the Raider whimper and press itself up against the wall again. 

"Please! Spare Allor!" The Raider pleaded. 

Albert looked at me. He lowered his gun and grinned. "I'll let you do the honors."

"No, please!"

I looked at the cowering Raider. Even though it was trying to murder us moments ago...even though I just killed almost eight Scourgers without batting an eye...

It seemed pretty heartless to kill someone begging to live. 

"Can we tie it up or something?" I asked Albert. 

Albert's jaw dropped. He looked at me, then at the Raider, then back at me. "Are you crazy? You think you got a rope big enough for that guy?"

"No, no need to tie up Allor!" The Raider said, half-laughing from relief. "Allor won't hurt you humans! Allor was forced to fight this war, you see? Because Lord Hathor agreed to help the bad human-"

It happened so quickly. A flash of purple. A guttural scream from the Raider. 

I yelped and took a step back. 

When the light died, all that remained of the Raider was an empty set of armour. I rubbed my eyes and opened them again, but the monster was really gone.

"Stupid animal," a voice drawled behind me. "Maybe it's a good thing Lord Andras left you here."

I scrambled to my feet and turned around. 

Adrian stood at the side of the room, leaning against the frame of the door he came from. His entire body was decked in some sort of sleek golden armour that ended at his shins.  His eyes lazily scanned me as he uncoiled a whip glowing radioactive green around his arm. His other hand was holding an unraveled purple whip that hummed with energy. 

I scrambled over to my sword and picked it up, pointing it at the Space-Time Elementalist.

Adrian just raised an eyebrow at me. "Seriously? Not a single 'thank you, Adrian' or 'oh my god Adrian you're so awesome'?" He shook his head as his green whip unfurled on the ground. "The least you can do is grovel, you know," He winced. "Maybe not my best idea. Quite exhausting to teleport something that big for more than a couple of klicks, and the stratosphere no less-"

"Stand aside," I commanded the Space-Time Elementalist, finally recovering from my shock. "We're here for Harold. Nothing else."

Adrian looked at me, smirking. "Those guts aren't going to do you any favours, boy," he nodded at the destroyed control stations. "You two just ruined the only way I could kill Lincoln Everett... but no matter," he sneered. "Andras said the moment you two are dead, I can go down to Draco myself."

"Adri," Albert whispered. "Adri, look at me."

Adrian's eyes narrowed, but he remained fixated on me. I glanced to my side. Albert's pistol laid untouched on the ground. There was a strange expression on his face...almost like nostalgia. Or longing?

"Please, Adri," Albert repeated. "Look at me."

"You should not have come here, Al," Adrian growled through gritted teeth, his voice much deeper now. His eyes still fixed on me. "You should've stayed back at Delta. Made sure Ará and Real were safe."

"And let you release the Dragon?" Albert demanded hushedly. "We're going to die either way-"

"I can negotiate with him," Adrian said confidently, but I could see his grip tightening around the handles of his whips. "I can talk him out of it. He only wants the Dragon for...for killing the Elementalists. Nothing more." 

"You can't trust him, Adri," Albert pleaded. "He's only here to control you-"

"Then if he's controlling me, the Alliance must've been suffocating me to death," Adrian snarled, finally facing at Albert with a burning rage in his eyes. "Did you forget, Al? How they treated us like little kids?"

"They were trying to protect us, Adri. My father-"

"YOUR FATHER WANTED ME DEAD!" Adrian roared, causing me to take a step back. 

Albert's eyebrows furrowed.

"Why did you think I got so little training, huh? I asked your father. I asked Garrick. They said I was too young. That I needed to wait. But when I turned nineteen..." he took a shaky breath. "Your father...he pulled me aside. He said he wanted to assign me a mission. A confidential one. One that could win us the Forty-Sixth War. And you know what the mission was?"

He looked at me for a brief moment, then back at Albert. 

"The hydrogen bomb detonation. My job was to fight Andras one-on-one. Distract him long enough until the Alliance can just-" he snapped his fingers. "vaporise the planet. And everyone on it. That's why they didn't bother training me. Andras can never pass up the opportunity to kill an Elementalist with his own bare hands. The Alliance was the farm. I was the pig. And Andras is be the butcher. And don't-" he looked at Albert. "try defending your father. Don't pretend that isn't something he would plan just because I was your friend. He couldn't give less of a shit if I was his own damn kid."

Albert opened his mouth. Then he closed it. 

"Of course, Cory never said it was a one-way trip. He kept spouting bullshit about the Alliance coming to extract me just before the bomb goes off, but there's no way Andras will just let me get away," he growled. "But I know better. So I trained myself. The Alliance kept finding excuses to ban me from going to Nekros, but I still met the Space-Time Elemental in my dreams. I practiced teleporting until I almost died. Can you imagine four months of that? In constant pain from ripping your body apart and reassembling it?" He bared his teeth. "But what do you know? You were too caught up with War Room meetings. Albert Kairo, the up-and-coming strategist of the Alliance."

"Adri," Albert whispered, his voice soft again. "I'm so sorry. I didn't know-"

"But Real was there," Adrian said, shooting a deadly look at Albert. "I told him about my death sentence. How dear Alby's own father is ready to get me killed," he sighed and inspected the scars on the back of his hand. "Real got the idea of having the Alliance send us on a mission. Alone. For me to really test my limits. It took nearly half a year...but we did it. We got on a recon mission to one of the frontline planets." 

Creepily, for the first time, the Space-Time Elementalist smiled. 

"I don't know how Andras found us. Maybe it was a coincidence. Maybe he saw our ship. Maybe it's fate. Whatever the case, he found me. Ambushed me. I tried to fight him, but he pinned with cryoargon handcuffs before I could do anything," his eyes lighted up. "And he offered me a deal. He said he'll give me everything the Alliance has kept for me. The power of a deity. A status as a general of an army. Respect worthy of an Elementalist. He said I'll finally be happy. He gave Real a-" something occurred to him. He shook his head. "He gave Real a deal too. Pity he refused it. Andras wanted to kill him, but I told him to spare his life."

"See? There's still some good in you, Adri," Albert said, half-begging. "Come back to us. The Alliance became better, Adri. Real, Ará and I...we all missed you."

Adrian looked at Albert, almost contemplating for a moment. Then, he shook his head. "But here's the thing, Alby...Andras is right. I am happy here. This..." he gestured the room. The armour he was wearing. "This is everything I wanted. Power. Notoriety. Glory," he gave a hearty laugh. "Oh...the irony. Cory kept me from getting all those things while he held onto them. Now here I am, and well..." he looked back at Albert, smiling. "I saw him on Lithas. He died like a pussy."

Albert's face suddenly contorted from ache to rage. His hands dropped to his side. "You killed my father?" He said calmly, but a dangerous edge crept into his voice.

"I wished I could..." he clicked his tongue. "But I only managed to cut off one arm. Andras did the rest," he chuckled darkly. "you should've heard him beg for mercy."

Slowly, silently, Albert picked up his gun. 

Adrian smiled. "I knew Cory's death would get you."

All the sudden, he lashed out with his whips. The next thing I knew, a sharp pain exploded on my left cheek. I howled and fell onto the ground. When I pulled my hand away from the wound, it was covered with a mixture of blood and glowing purple dust.

Albert fired his gun, only for it to jam. 

For a moment, he looked confused. Then, Adrian laughed again and threw something at my feet. I gasped.

A Deltan Device. My original Deltan Device. 

"You dropped this on Zana," Adrian sneered. "The Red Wolf asked me personally to give it to you. Along with his thanks. What with the Shapeshifter and the Seropes..." a sick smile grew on his lips. "He said he never had a feast like that in decades."

Albert froze for a moment. Then, his lips curled up in a cold snarl. "Good," he whispered dangerously. He took out a knife from his belt. "I get to see your pain up close."

With a roar, he pounced on the Space-Time Elementalist.

Adrian hissed and cracked his whips at the both of us. Albert rolled to the side and barely dodged it. I yelped as the green whip struck me in the face. Falling back, my face contorted in horror as the whip wrapped around my arm. As I watched, the skin on my arm began to turn paler and more translucent. My veins popped out. Cracks grew on the surface.

In a panic, I grabbed Adrian's whip by its tip. Ignoring the spiking hot pain, I wrenched the tip upwards, forcing the whip to unravel. 

I scrambled back on all fours as I inspected my arm again. Almost immediately, my skin turned back to a youthful and smooth surface. 

My eyes jerked back to the fight at the sound of Albert's howl. Adrian punched him with the handle of his whip, forcing him against the wall. Before Albert could even move, he lashed out again, wrapping the purple whip around the Invictus' throat. With one powerful pull, Adrian yanked Albert towards him with his whip, knocking him out with a precise punch.

"NO!" 

I leapt forward as Adrian turned to face me, his sneer still evident on his face. 

"Never a fighter even when you're pissed, were you Alby?" Adrian sneered. He glanced over at me with a venomous gaze. "You're next."

I slashed his incoming whip with my sword, causing it to wrap around my blade instead. Adrian narrowed his eyes before I suddenly brought my sword to the ground, puling his whip down. 

"Why you-"

Closing the distance, I planted my fist between the Space-Time Elementalist's eyes. 

Adrian crumpled against the wall, growling. I raised my hand to punch him again, but his leg flew out, kicking me in the stomach and launching me away from him. 

I yelped as I crashed against