The Paradox Corridor

Chapter 47: David and Goliath

Without any communication between them, Andrew, James, and Amber all dodged the sword beam simultaneously: James jumped over the beam and off of the cliff, Andrew slid underneath the beam and fell off the cliff, and Amber teleported in a spark of blue light. And not a moment too soon: as soon as all three of them exited the cliff, the sword beam crashed into the cliff face. Debris exploded everywhere, making a loud KERRROOOM! noise. And yet, despite their disastrous position, James and Andrew knew that Amber would catch them. 

As they fell, the robot tilted its sword away from the cannon on its wrist, and it fired a large blast at them. The presence realized suddenly that the blast  was going to hit Andrew and James at the rate it was going. But right when the presence was right about to warn Amber about it, a powerful upward gust of wind pushed the blast up. Had it had a corporeal body, the presence would have smiled: the three friends had gotten much smarter and much stronger in an incredibly short time. It was at this moment that it realized that these young humans really did have a shot at saving the world after all. 

 The blast slammed into the side of the mountain with a loud BOOOM!, sending more debris flying and creating a rather large hole in the side of it. Andrew looked at James, who looked back. They both grinned spontaneously, the thrill of the moment and the adrenaline in their veins getting to them for a moment. James held sword out to Andrew, and Andrew held out his spear. They put them together like hands in a huddle, and lifted them in a similar fashion. They were right about to hit the ground when a strong gust of wind slowed them to a halt, two feet off the ground. They shifted their bodies, so that when the gust died down, they landed perfectly. Amber appeared behind them, and shouted:

"Guys, watch out for the debris!"

They all turned and ran as fast as they could, Amber opting not to teleport in favor of saving her remaining energy. The debris crashed down close behind them as they ran, while the robot fired another shot at them, this time in front of them, hoping to stop them in their tracks. James and Amber dove behind a large boulder for cover from the explosion, while Andrew, the slowest out of the three, stopped as quickly as he could and leaped away from the explosion. James and Amber weren't hurt at all, but Andrew was buffeted by the debris and got the wind knocked out of him. Meanwhile, the robot had began charging towards Amber and James' location, firing rapid-fire laser bolts at them from its arm cannon. The bullets peppered the ground in front of Andrew, sending dust flying everywhere. The dust was both a blessing and a curse: the good thing was, the robot couldn't see Andrew. The bad news was, Andrew couldn't see the robot's lasers either.

"We need to distract it!" yelled James to Amber over the clamor of bullets.

"One distraction, coming right up!" yelled Amber, and she spun her wand in a circle in her hand. The dust from the battle flew towards the robot, temporarily obscuring it's vision. As it waved its one remaing arm around, trying to get rid of the dust cloud, Amber and James ran towards Andrew, Amber stumbling, the power drain seriously starting to affect her. James held out his arm, and Andrew took it. James pulled him up, and they turned to the robot, who had just cleared away the fog. Without wasting a single moment it fired a laser beam at them, and right as they were about to jump out of its way, the presence said;

"No! I have an idea! James: use your sword to reflect the laser!"

"What?!?" James yelled as Andrew and Amber jumped out of the way, "That's not how swords work!"

"JAMES!" the presence suddenly boomed, taking him off guard, "Have I EVER misled you? asked the presence, seriously.  After a few precious seconds of rapid-fire thinking, James decided to do what the presence said. He held his sword out, flipping it sideways so the flat part faced the bolt, then moved the sword behind his back like a baseball bat. He wanted to close his eyes out of fear, but somehow he held his head up high, bracing for impact as the bolt flew towards him at hundreds of miles per hour. When it got close enough, James twisted his whole body and stuck the blast with his sword at full power. The laser crashed into sword, and the impact pushed James back several yards, but to his surprise the laser bolt just sort of stuck to the sword a bit, crackling with energy, still pushing against him. He tensed up, pouring all of the energy in every one of his muscles into pushing back. After a couple of seconds of dedicated effort, he pushed so hard that the bolt flew right back towards the clearly taken-aback robot. But the robot wasn't falling for it this time. It has learned its lesson about dodging its own projectiles. It leaped up and over the bullet, which kept on flying unhindered. The robot flew for a few seconds before crashing back down to Earth a couple of seconds later, much closer to them than before.