Sigma/Star

Chapter 98: Kurai

Porter shakily rose up, straightening out after nearly getting bowled over by a shockwave that had come from out of nowhere. None of the scanners had detected it within his Goliath, which meant it hadn't been a weapon of some sort. What could produce something like that? Porter scrambled for answers in his mind but came up with a blank, puzzled over the burst of energy.

The youth twisted around, trying to identify where the original source of the blast was. The cameras on the White Storm began to zoom and pan in an attempt to locate the original attack. The Goliath identified Ardwen in the distance, struggling to get back onto his feet. Next to him was Riya, whose Goliath burned with a dark aura, the air around her bending and warping as Porter stared at it. He had to tear his eyes away; it hurt his head to watch the shifting space too long.

"Riya, what's going on? Riya?" Porter tried to call up a viewscreen into the cockpit but was greeted with nothing but static. He couldn't gain a connection to The Warlord no matter how hard he tried.

"She won't respond." Ardwen cut through as he stabilized. "She lost it when Chase died. Couldn't handle it I guess."

"You guess?" Porter shot back, fury flying through his veins.

"Sorry, sorry." Ardwen flinched a little within his warmachine "It's just...none of us can handle it."

"You're damn right none of us can."

"But it doesn't do us any good to not handle it," Ardwen finished, trying to regain command over his unit. "I have no idea what's going on with Riya though. I just got hit by this big blast and now she's like this." As Ardwen ended his sentence, a dark gas began to ooze out of Riya's battlesuit, venting from every crack and hole it could find. The shadows began to coalesce in front of The Warlord and it reminded Porter of his time in the Beijing with their unique Goliaths.

The dark cloud began to spread, rising up into the air. It sprouted arms that ended in vicious claws, and then legs, and finally a head. It had no features other than its body shape, looking like a Bahari made entirely of black gas. A few thin trails of the darkness connected to Riya, the only link between the two that showed Porter this bizarre occurrence was at least on their side.

Slowly, the shadowy creature took a step forwards, a puff of black smoke rising up from its foot as it collided with the earth. Wisps of darkness fled its body, fading away into the light around it. It took another step, beginning a walk towards Porter and the waves of Bahari.

Suddenly the dark monster raised its arm, pointing its claw towards a Bahari. Its fingers shot out, stretching outwards and piercing through the beast's chest. The shadowy digits wrapped around the Bahari's core and tore it out in an instant. Porter balked at the ruthless efficiency of the black gas, as the creature hadn't even turned its head towards the enemy as it killed it. Not only was the speed a shock but the fact that a cloud of darkness could actually physically hurt something was tough to swallow. How was it capable of manifesting itself physically in an instant?

A hail of bullets flew towards the black monster, passing through it as though it didn't exist. Only small holes in the gas showed it had been hit by anything at all, and these quickly released. The shadow's arm reached out again, this time at a closer Bahari, and so it didn't have to stretch out. Even though the two were the same size, the gaseous monster seemed to dwarf the Bahari, its hand grabbing on to the creature's head and ripping it off with ease. It then jammed the head back into the Bahari's chest, driving it straight into the beast's core.

Tendrils began to rise up off the back of the shadow monster, shooting out at nearby enemies. Some pierced straight through the heart of the Bahari, while others wrapped around them, crushing the beasts' bodies. Still more sliced the creatures in half, chopping them to bits in a flash.