Old Debts Paid In Full

The alarm blared in the distance, as the two men stayed locked in their stare. Dax stood at the edge of a crumbling plaza, just steps away from the heart of the growing distortion. The air rippled unnaturally, the unstable energy tearing at reality itself, creating jagged rifts in the atmosphere. Waves of heat and cold clashed, and the faint sound of cracking glass seemed to echo around the distortion—a wound in time and space, bleeding chaos into the world.

Reid stood opposite him, his metallic jaw catching the unnatural light. His voice was calm, but his words carried an icy edge.

“You came all this way to fight me, Dax, but it’s a shame you don’t have a weapon…”

“I don’t need a weapon to beat you.” Dax’s voice was firm, cutting through the chaos.

Reid’s laugh echoed unnaturally, distorted by the unstable air around them. “Getting cocky, Vanon? I’d like to see where all that confidence is coming from!”

Without warning, Reid lunged forward, his cybernetic enhancements granting him a burst of inhuman speed. His first punch came hard and fast, forcing Dax to block with his forearms. The impact sent him skidding back, his boots kicking up dust. Reid pressed the attack, his strikes relentless and precise.

The distortion loomed ominously behind them, its pull growing stronger with each passing second.

“You know…” Dax grunted, dodging another powerful blow, “I once thought we were brothers, Reid.”

Reid’s cybernetic arm smashed into a nearby wall as Dax dodged, leaving cracks spidering across the surface. “I once thought so too. But then I realized you would never choose your brother over the Knights.”

Reid lunged again, landing a brutal punch to Dax’s gut that made him stagger back toward the edge of the plaza, dangerously close to the distortion’s pull.

Dax straightened, his teeth gritted. “I would always choose you, Reid,”

“Lies,” Reid growled, “You would have never followed me into the Aequitas.”

“You are not the Aequitas, Reid. And I’m not the Knights. We’re just two brothers that in the end had different ideals.” Dax sighed as he said those words, painful even to himself.

“That’s what you tell yourself. You and your shiny ideals. That’s why I knew you wouldn’t understand our cause!” Reid attacked once more, realizing Dax was merely on the defense this whole time, possibly stalling for time.

The brawny knight took a hard hit to the face, blood dripping from his nose. He staggered back, the distortion’s pull now dangerously close behind him.

“Then tell me! What is that damn cause of yours?!” Dax shouted, his voice rising over the distortion’s hum.

Reid stopped, another metallic laugh threatening to spill out of him, “You want to run back and tell your friends, is that it, Dax?” Reid braced his feet to lunge forward once more, “Is that why you’re not attacking? You want your squad to sweep you out of here after you gather the intel!”

Another hit, this time Dax managed to dodge to the side, flying away from the distortion but instead to a cracked wall a few steps away.

“But you’re not making it out of here alive, Dax.”

“What do the Aequitas want, Reid?”

Reid was relentless, his strikes calculated and brutal. He swung again, his cybernetic arm whirring as it delivered a crushing blow to Dax’s side, knocking him into the wall and destroying it completely.

“Still fishing for info? Fine so be it…” Reid sneered, his voice dripping with contempt.

“We want the hourglass, old friend. And we’ll find it.”

Dax pushed himself to his feet, his breath coming in short, sharp gasps. “The… hourglass? But that doesn’t exist…”

“Is that what the owner told his dog? Well, time to wake up.”

Dax’s head was pounding at that answer, and this time not only because of the blows he was receiving. The Hourglass… The eternal Hourglass… The all too powerful artifact of myth that could presumably manipulate time at the will of the user. No matter the scale. Without any cost.

If the Aequitas got their hands on that legendary relic, then time forbid what would happen…

As Reid advanced again, Mira’s voice crackled in Dax’s ear through his hidden comms. “Dax! Jessie’s got Liriana! Now’s the time!”

Finally, the brawny knight thought in relief as a smirk tugged at his lips. It was finally time to use his trump card.

“What?! Stop them immediately!” Reid spat in his earpiece as he received the same info, “Vanon! It seems your kind is more slippery than I thought!”

The knight however didn’t say a word, instead Dax’s hand slipped into his jacket pocket, his fingers closing around the small device Mira had crafted for him. He pulled it out—a compact chrono jammer, designed to disable all chrono tech in a localized area.

Reid halted, his gaze locking onto the device in Dax’s hand. His smirk faltered for the first time. “What’s that supposed to be now? Some kind of last-ditch trick?!”

Dax didn’t answer immediately. Instead he remembered the talk he had with his squad back at HQ.

“Reid’s enhancements are all chrono tech—his eye, his arm, even some of his neural links. This device will neutralize all of that within a ten-meter radius. No eye, no arm, no tech.”

Jessie grinned. “Level the playing field, huh? Smart.”

Dax had folded his arms, his jaw set. “One against one. No chrono tech. I’m not losing to him in a battle of physical strength, no matter what.”

Dax’s smirk widened as he pressed the jammer’s activation button, and a pulse of energy rippled through the air. Reid staggered, his robotic eye flickering and his arm spasming before going limp. The sudden loss of his enhancements left Reid momentarily stunned. Though he could still move his robotic arm, its enhanced power was no longer there.

“What… what is the meaning of this?!”

“Just evening the odds,” Dax said, wiping the blood from his nose. “Back when we were kids, you could beat me with just your fists. Let’s see you try now.”

Reid barely had time to react before Dax charged, his fist connecting with Reid’s jaw in a powerful, clean hit. The impact sent Reid stumbling backward, his human movements sluggish compared to the precision of his enhancements.

“Dax, you…” Reid stammered, his eye narrowing in anger. He thought his opponent was on the back foot, completely out of it, yet there he stood before him, tall and strong, his injuries seemingly not phasing him at all, “You sly bastard…”

That’s when Reid realized. That he was being played like a fiddle this whole time. Dax’s request to see the girl. His constant defense until she was secured. The Knights had outplayed him.

“You can’t win now, Reid. You know why?” Dax growled, his voice rising with determination as he advanced. “Because ever since the day I lost my brother, I’ve been training hard. Harder than you could ever imagine. There’s no way I will lose to you, after all this time. Not after all those years.”

“Nonsense! You were always beneath me! Always one step behind me!”

“Not anymore, Reid. While you were busy being turned into a machine, I was fighting to not lose another comrade again!”

Reid swung at him wildly, but Dax blocked the strike with ease, countering with a heavy blow to Reid’s torso. The former knight doubled over, gasping for breath as Dax grabbed him by the collar and hurled him to the ground, kicking up dust. Reid struggled to rise, but Dax was already on him, pinning him down with a knee to his chest.

“This is what strength looks like, Reid,” Dax said, “Not manipulation. Not fear. Strength in fighting for something real.”

“You mean to say I’m weaker?!”

Reid glared up at him, his human eye blazing with anger and defiance, as he managed to push his opponent off and take another shaky breath.

“You’ve been relying on the power given to you this whole time, old friend. The Reid I once knew would never rest until he obtained that kind of strength himself.” The knight stood tall and unyielding as he prepared another attack. He was short on time, since the jammer could only work for so long, “And that’s where you lost.”

With a well placed kick to the ribs, and another hook to the jaw, Reid once again stumbled.

“I’m ending this, Reid.”

“Hehe…” Reid’s metallic laugh returned, this time more paranoid than malicious. His voice slipped back into his human form, instead of robotic and clinical, his tone seemed more human. More fragile.

“Let me guess… For the Knights, Dax?”

“No… This one's for me.” With a final hit to the face, Reid crashed against the ground, his body limp.

Just in time, Mira’s voice crackled in his ear again. “Dax, Liriana’s secured. We’re heading your way!”

Just as the knight felt the relief wash over him, the crackle of the distortion behind him suddenly erupted into something more violent. Dax turned, his brows furrowing at the sight of the distortion about to go wild.

“Shit… why now?!”

Dax glanced behind him as the Strider came into view, its engines roaring as it rushed towards him. Mira’s voice crackled through the comms once more.

“The distortion is growing more dangerous by the second Dax! Move aside!”

◔

Back at the Strider, the squad hunched close to the front seats, eyeing the distortion in the distance.

“This doesn’t look good…” Jessie winced, “Like at all…”

“It’s growing with each passing second.” Rhea affirmed, “It will most likely tear through the whole of Pyrite Reach if left unchecked.”

“CAN we even contain such a huge anomaly?” Talia asked, eyes narrowing in disbelief.

“The data is… alarming.” The drone said flatly.

“I… can.”

Liriana, suddenly said amidst the silence of the Strider, the squad turning to look at her, their eyes bulging out in stunned silence.

Of course the first one to object was Rhea.

“Absolutely out of the question, we’re not using your abilities on that distortion like the Aequitas—”

“But it’s not the same, Miss Rhea…” Liriana looked up, her eyes set in determination, “I want to help. I know I can.”

All the squad could do at the face of the little girl’s courageous declaration was stare.

Rhea’s gaze locked with the child’s, her stomach churning. She knew she couldn’t put her in harm’s way. That would go against her code. Her beliefs. Her reason for becoming a knight.

However, deep within her gaze, she saw herself. She saw a younger Rhea, clutching a chrono anchor. An anchor that could have saved the knight who gave his life for her. But wasn’t allowed to.

Yet this time was different. If only she let this little girl help them… Then maybe her past self would be saved too. But what about the knight who saved her? His wishes of protecting children?

There wasn’t any time to lose. There was only one answer.

Rhea heaved a sigh, and despite her better judgement…

“Okay… We’re sealing that distortion… With Liriana’s help.”