The father-daughter superhero duo of REDEMPTOR find little peace following their defeat of the wicked wizard, General Gorchen. Little do they know that the prison city they left behind has descended into civil chaos. And it's about to get worse. Onl...
Another blast and jagged jade pieces skittered across the capstone chamber floor. Tossing the empty plasma launcher aside, the Guild leaders came charging in some berus behind Scythia, while Rozy stood floating over her in front of her. Rozy titled her head to one side, looking down at her. Only yesterday her Sheriffa was knocking Rozy off her aerocycle to her possible death in pursuit of Scarthroat. But look at her now.
Rozy exhaled.
"Don't think you don't owe me," Rozy said, leaping down from her aerocycle and raising her sizable blaster at the men in capes. She laid out strafing fire across the floor of the chamber. The Guild leaders stopped running just short of getting their bare feet blasted.
Her blaster held before her, Rozy marched confidently toward them, "The only thing more fun than a revolution—stopping a revolution."
"Join with us, Mandias," the Takke Guild Leader said, "Y-You could be Sheriffa in New Tetrapolis. All the Sirens under your command."
"You don't say." The nine men stayed where they were. If they rushed Rozy Mandias, they could easily take her, but Mandias knew how rich men think: none of them wanted to be the one to get killed by her one last shot as she went down. Mandias kept her blaster trained on them, but looked back over her shoulder as Scythia lugged Gorchen laid out belly-down across the back of the aerocycle. Scythia levitated the aerocycle up with a quick thrum. Rozy smiled up at Scythia.
"Do it!" the Factory Guild Leader shouted. "Before they get away!"
Rozy winked at Scythia, then turned back to here so-called superiors.
"Maybe I just do it to you instead," Rozy sneered. She fired her blaster, taking him in the shoulder. He fell back with a shout. And then there were eight men in capes trying to take over the city.
Angling the aerocycle down and with a twist of her wrists, straight down into the chasm between the supertowers, Scythia Salve flew.
Back on the balcony, "My-my shoulder! You witch! You sh-sh-shot my shoulder!" the Factory Guild Leader wailed from the floor in over-abundant agony.
Rozy guffawed, "Oh pipe down, you big baby. It's only a flesh-wound."
"First that spider-witch kicks me, now this witch shoots me," bemoaned the Factory Guild Leader, "I'm never coming in this room again."
Takke Leader kicked Factory in the jaw, knocking him out and he flopped silent. Again, the Takke Leader addressed the rogue Siren: "It-It's not too late, Mandias. You don't want to be left out of the future of this city." His knife raised before him, he made a show of tossing it aside.
"Future, ha. What future?"
The Takke Leader took small, slow steps toward Mandias, his open hands before him. They were trembling, but his eyes were keen, sharp, steady with purpose.
"We're going to loose the Conquering Winds," he said. "Like Gorchen planned. We'll bring the Tetrapolitan way of life to the whole world of Fait. A tall, black supertower at every shore. Every species under our command. It's going to be beautiful, Mandias. Can't you see it? The future... The future is franchise!" He held his hands out before her, his eyes now wild with urgency and glee. He stood before her, his hands entreating her. It was all up to her. The future of their world. Theirs to define. Theirs to control.
But Mandias yawned. And struck him across the face with the butt of her blaster. Down he went, unconscious.
And then there were seven men in capes trying to take over the city.
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
These seven rushed Mandias, but she flipped easily to the side, and blasted another in the leg, and another in the other leg, and she was just about to run for the hall when another man tackled her, and she fell, and her chin hitting onto the top of her blaster, and as she winced she pulled the trigger, and the blaster went off, and the shot rang out through the smoky air, and the shot struck the black throne, and the black throne did crack, and the black throne did thunder, and the capstone chamber shook with great welling fury, and so the Conquering Winds were loosed, and that was that for Tetrapolis, and for all of Planet Fait.
"Wuh-oh," Mandias said. Everybody froze as the throne shattered into a million black pieces and ten million boggis flew free, in every direction at once.
Out from the Jade Pyramid.
Into the sky.
No master. Not one wizard. Not nine men in capes. No master at all.
They were laughing, these countless ghostly demons. For the future of Planet Fait was theirs.
