Chapter 20: Pursuing Stars

Cattia, Dana, Jerwon, and Tania all weaved through the infinitely long corridors of Grady Dorina’s underground lair, until arriving at his very door was becoming a fast possibility. The door was locked, naturally, and it was completely bulletproof--but then again, not a whole lot of things were able to stand up to Tania’s mad skills. The girl easily broke a hole or two through the door, enabling her to search around for the knob on the other side.

“That’s amazing!” said Dana in awe. “How does she do that?”

“Like I said, little Tia’s got a few mechanical replacements for her body,” explained the Space Cat. “The explosion we both suffered through gave me these burns and scars, but most of poor Tia was burnt beyond repair--at least, organic repair. Luckily, I was able to give her the best bio-android parts there were, and while bits of her body are now whole, she’s also had some ... erm, well... modifications added to her system.” A pause.

“I see...” whispered Dana. “ ... Well ... I suppose it’s okay if she’s all right.”

“Got it!” piped Tania suddenly, and the steel security door opened for them. Cattia affirmed that she too was equally prepared, and weapons were drawn just in case. The quartet stormed into Grady’s room with their blood boiling, but what they were greeted by made them freeze.

Grady Dorina was a man of old age but stout body. His face was slightly pale and his head was bald, with just a faint bit of white hair snaking down into his short, snowy beard. His eyes were a kind of reddish-brown, and his build was that of a man three-fourths his age. He looked strong enough to wrestle bears, and the black overcoat he wore would ensure him that not even the chilly cold outside would be an obstacle. Grady himself wasn’t really the source of the quartet’s caution; no, it was the immense blueprint behind him.

“Who are you?!” growled Dorina in an earthy, rumbling voice. “What are you doing here?!”

“ ... We...” At a loss of words (for recognizing the blueprint), Cattia kept her frozen face for only an instant longer before she steeled her resolve and aimed her weapons at him. “ ... Ah! We’re here to eliminate you and your filthy computer program!!”

“Are you, now...” he grumbled. The immense Grady stood out of his chair, towering over even Dana (which meant that poor Jerwon was grossly dwarfed by the man) as he stood to his full two-meter height. “And how,” he resumed with his booming voice, “do you intend to carry this out??”

“Why, the old-fashioned way, of course!” said Cattia with a grin. Both of her guns suddenly came out and pointed themselves straight at Grady, with Dana’s baton and Jerwon’s knives emerging a little later. However, the large old man merely guffawed and crossed his arms.

“This is indeed a rather odd turn of events,” he remarked cruelly. “The four of you are bold, but you are also too late. Even as I speak to you, the gears of System GOLGOTHA are turning, and nothing in this world can stop them! I have already been humiliated once; it shan’t happen again, I believe.”

“You sure do believe a lot of junk, mister,” said Dana coolly. “But now I think it’s time to change your faith. Cat, what say we get rid of this old geezer?”

“Great minds do think alike!” remarked Cattia slyly. Grady snarled in a half-smile, half-scowl, then took a single step backwards. The group thought he was going to make a run for it, but instead, he merely pressed a single button that seemed to do little other than activate a very annoying alarm.

“What the devil did you do?!” demanded Jerwon. The immense Grady chuckled again.

“Nothing, really. I just activated the self-destruct button, that’s all. This entire place is going to go up in flames in ... well, less than five minutes, actually. The question is, which is more important to you: stopping System GOLGOTHA, or stopping me?” The bald and burly man smiled back at them cruelly, but thanks to Cattia’s lightning-fast thinking (perhaps only Greg himself had a faster mind than she), she returned his evil smile and pulled out a trump card.

“I think we can do both with our numbers,” she boasted. “Tania! Get a photo of that blueprint! I can digest through it all later! Jerwon! You and Dana make sure that this old man doesn’t go anywhere! I’ll stay here and be on the lookout for anything strange!”

“Roger!” exclaimed Tania with a salute, and she marched over to the blueprint that had first drawn Cattia’s eye. The reason that it had terrified her so was that it was a near-precise drawing of most of System GOLGOTHA’S inner workings, from the CPU to its interior design. A single scan and it was Tania’s to treasure forever.

“You loathsome she-devil!” snarled Grady. “You dare have the nerve to face me?! Bah! You think that silly drawing will help you any?!”

“It might,” shrugged Cattia, her aim now focused on Grady once again. The large man grimaced with rage, but perhaps not even he could’ve fought off all four of them. With a sudden slap, however, he launched a sneak attack on Dana, sending her reeling backwards a few good steps. The brief distraction was just enough to earn him a window of escape, which he gladly took.

“Dana!!” Cattia both cursed and screeched as she rushed towards her friend, who was a little bruised but otherwise fine.

“Man!!” scowled Dana. “That old geezer is powerful!!! I think one of my teeth is loose!” She snarled in pain, but other than the purplish-red welt on her face, she was okay. Cattia spat out another curse aimed at the long-gone Grady, and with Tania’s help, she hoisted Dana to her feet.

“Jerwon!” she spat. “Go follow Grady! We’ll catch up later!” The smallish Leduadian hastily nodded his head and scampered after the gigantic man with all the speed he knew. Meanwhile, Dana continued to insist that she was fine, and all the while the klaxons continued to blare as the countdown to destruction drew nearer...

With Klarana temporarily distracting the guards, Zet, Diana, and Greg made a mad dash to where they hoped Lucius would be. Their Sepren “friend” had given them vague instructions, and since the mansion was absolutely enormous, it might’ve taken the gang forever and a day to find the right place. However, it seemed as if the dragon-serpent knew her stuff, and in reality, it only took the trio a few minutes of running to find the room.

After Diana and Greg broke down Lucius’ door, they came face-to-face with no less than thirty armed guards, though it was their luck that less than a fourth of these carried blasters or guns. In the very back of the room was Lucius Natassti himself, smiling grimly at the invaders’ situation.

“Excuse me,” he said politely, “but I cannot stick around and fight you all. I have more important business to attend to, and besides, this suit would get soiled. However, I am sure that these few guards of mine will provide an adequate substitution. Good day.” And without another word, the billionaire bowed out and slipped through a hidden door, leaving the three travelers alone with the guards.

“This is by far a most unwelcome scenario,” murmured Zet nervously. The elfin bounty hunter readied his cannon, and Diana her spear, and Greg his body. His father, the slightly-famous Jerad Rodriguez, had instructed him in basic martial arts while he was still alive, and Greg had went from dojo to dojo to complete his skills, whenever he had the time. Now he was a fairly good fighter, though even with Zet and Diana, the odds seemed rather unfair.

“Let’s see what these people can do!” leered a guard menacingly. Zet, brave as a lion, stepped right in front of Diana and aimed his cannon directly into the other man’s face.

“I would not make any more advancements if I were you!” he threatened. “This is an extremely dangerous weapon, and unless you want it used on you, I suggest you all leave at once!”

“Get this!!” laughed the men. “The elf here thinks he can take us all out! Ain’t that rich?!?!” The guards all bowled over with laughter, making Zet’s fair face turn quite red with anger. Greg knew that his elfin ally had a short temper, which was not that beneficial in most cases. However, this time, Zet’s anger was directed towards the trigger of his cannon, and the powerful weapon launched a gigantic sphere of energy that decimated part of the crowd before him. Needless to say, the other guards quickly learned their lesson.

“He’s serious!!” shouted one. “Let’s make him pay!!” The guards immediately surrounded Zet and his buddies, and a free-for-all melee was conducted. The room became drowned in a deluge of confusion and war, and perhaps even Diana felt overwhelmed.

Outnumbered ten to one, and with Zet’s preemptive attack doing little to help them, the three travelers could do little except fight their very hearts out. Greg started the battle by tossing everyone that his hands grabbed a hold of, excluding his allies (though even at times he messed up with this). He knew that he could only get so far by just grappling, but he didn’t want any unnecessary death on his hands. Meanwhile, Diana had flown above the massive chaos and was preparing one of her deadly magic spells. This one, she hoped, would encase the entire gathering of enemies in a large dome, where they would remain until she saw fit. Diana might have had a bitter attitude, but she was definitely not a killer.

Zet, however, was actually trying to shoot the men attacking him, and soon it became obvious that Mr. Rodriguez should do more than just flip people around. He actually performed the moves he had learned, though there was nothing exceptionally lethal in his arsenal. The elfin one was not blasting in order to stir up a massacre; he was hoping to crack open the ceiling and force the debris above to fall on his attackers, or else use his gun as a kind of club and smash at the attackers.

Of course, considering the fact that they were outnumbered, the trio also took a lot of hits themselves. Greg got pummeled more than once simply because there were too many people around him to fight off; Zet was bruised and even cut in a few places while he fended off his attackers, and while Diana was flying in the air, she had received a few scratches while still on foot. Suddenly, as she was completing her spell, Zet’s eyes widened in horror as the gunners of the group all aimed their weapons up at the flying lady.

“NO!!!” he shouted. “You shall not harm her!! Begone, you evildoers!!!” With a yell of strength and ferocity, Zet launched another powerful cannon blast at the gunners, obliterating them in just a single blow. There were others in the group as well, already firing off a few shots, but they were all mercilessly picked off by the elf.

“I will not allow her to see any harm!!!” he screamed. “Destruction awaits you, foul beasts!!!” The enraged elf continued to blast until every other gunner was gone, which gave Diana just enough time to complete her spell.

“ ... Great protectors of the four winds!” she called. “Hear my cry! Encase our enemies in a dome of restraint until I see fit to release them! NET OF WHISPERING WIND!!!” Before any of the guards could even make a move, a bright green light encased the whole room, making everyone blind temporarily. When vision was restored, the guards had all been trapped inside a greenish dome, one that was impossible to get into or impossible to get out of.

Luckily, both Zet and Gregory had been out of range once the spell struck, but the same luck could not be said about Lucius’ guards. They screamed and smashed and shot to their heart’s desire, yet for all their efforts, they couldn’t break through the dome. Diana let out a weary sigh of satisfaction as she hovered back down to the surface, and a curtain of sweat was wiped off of her brow.

“It’s been awhile since I used magic,” she said wearily. “I’m just glad it worked.”

“You mean that there was a chance that it wouldn’t?” asked Greg. She shrugged.

“There’s always a chance. This time, it was a pretty slim one, so let’s count our blessings.”

“Yes,” agreed Zet. “Speaking of blessings, perhaps we should take this lull in activity to pursuit our foe? There is no doubt that he is very far away by now, so if we have any hopes of catching him, we should leave now.” The other two agreed and began walking towards the secret door that Lucius had previously used in his escape, but just as he took his next step, Zet tumbled to the ground and let out a single groan of pain.

“ ... Augh! AUGH!!!” His fair elfin face grimaced in terrible pain, and Diana and Greg instantly rushed over to his side.

“Zet! Hey, Zet! You all right, man?”

“Zatore! What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” Zet grunted out in pain, but managed to force his eyes open and smiled at Diana.

“ ... L ... Lady Diana ... Are ... are you ... concerned about ... my well-being... ?” The redheaded demi human blinked in confusion and was taken aback a little, and the smallest traces of pink could be seen on her face. She quickly hid the quasi-blush by lowering her face to the floor.

“ ... Yeah, well ... uhh ... hey, I guess, I mean ... I really would be a monster if I didn’t care...” She mumbled something else, but Zet merely chuckled at her attempts.

“I understand perfectly well,” he said. “You do not need to say anything else. I am your bodyguard, milady, and I would gladly suffer any pain to see you safe. Besides, this is just one injury that I have suffered, and no more. I shall recover in time.”

“Even so, you’re staying here,” pointed Greg. Zet gave his human ally an indiscernible look, one that was mixed with perhaps more pain than his injury itself.

“I ... will be fine...” he managed as he stood--and subsequently fell over again. Diana frowned with a bit of sadness, but let out a gust of irritated air before anyone could tell she was distressed.

“You big fool ... Here, hold still for a minute. I can heal you, but I’ll need that bullet out first.” Zet sighed, smiled, and let out a thanks to the dragon-like demi-human. Without wasting any time, Diana produced her spear and ignited the very tip of it with some weak fire magic.