Ambush on a Sentinel

Ignacio lay back in his Cypher, letting out a sharp breath. The arms closed down on him with that robotic whirr, electrodes lowering to his scalp.

We got this, he told himself. We can take them.

He craned his head forward, catching Daichi’s eye as he stood in the corner of the room, his hands clasped. A charge-pistol was holstered at his hip, probably the same type that Koharu had used on Ignacio the day he’d arrived. He gave a nod, and Daichi nodded back.

Everything was done. There was nothing left to do but go in, and get Celeste back. Or die trying.

Koharu’s figure loomed over him, staring at him upside down. “Hey,” she said.

“Hey,” he said.

She chewed her lip. “Be careful.”

“You too,” he said. “Just stay close to me.”

She shook her head. “You know it hasn’t even been a week since you came here.”

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

“You don’t get to give me orders, soldier,” she said.

He smiled. “And yet, you’re still listening.”

She held his face with both hands, her finger tips sending goosebumps across skin. She pressed her lips against his cheek, their warmth sending his heart into a frenzy.

“Be safe,” she said, combing his hair.

His cheeks warmed. “You too.”

She smiled, and walked away. He sighed, closing his eyes with a lopsided grin.

You tell her to be safe, a voice said. You, the same man taking her to her death.

He clenched his jaws. He reached down the side of the Cypher to push the switch down. To try and talk her out of it. To get Daichi to go with them instead. But the necklock closed around his throat.

“This is it, Genesys,” Ezequiel barked. “No noise, and keep your movements slow when we get in. This is our only chance to make this work.”

Ignacio swallowed hard, throat muscles straining against the necklock.

“Lock and enter on three,” Ezequiel barked. “One!”

You want to burn, don’t you Ace?

“Two!”

Ignacio… Keep her safe.

Ezequiel took a deep breath. “Three!”

Ignacio’s eyes snapped open, gasping as he sat up. The grass around him had a golden tint to their blades, swaying silently. The breeze cooled his face, his eyebrows raising as he spotted a hill in the distance. It had the face of a king carved into the grey stone, its beard so detailed the strands could’ve bristled in the wind.

But beyond it, around the curve, towered a building unlike any he’d seen. It stood above the hills curving the landscape, turning rivers to rivulets, forests to mere carpets. It was many miles away, but Ignacio could make out two dark figures standing on either side of a gargantuan pair of doors. Statues of men in dark hoods, their heads down, hands resting on the hilts of swords planted in the bases. A crown of horns curved around the top of the building, purple lightning crackling between them. It stood in the middle of nowhere. No other buildings around it, just the Sanctum standing alone in greenery. Further beyond it, mountains etched the horizon, thick clouds covering their tops. Some kind of creature flew around the building, like ribbons squiggling the air. Maybe Cypher users, maybe some kind of fauna Ignacio didn’t know of.

He turned as a hand rested on his shoulder, and Beltran held a finger to his lips. His hair was a little shorter, but curly with a lock falling down the side of his face, a top hat perched on his head.

He gestured for Ignacio to follow, and the two crawled hands and knees along the edge of the plateau they were on.

They reached a dense brush with red berries sprouting between dark purple leaves, and Beltran pulled one aside for Ignacio to crawl behind.

Kiyomi sat with her legs crossed, tome open on her lap. Ezequiel crouched behind her, peering between the bushes.

“Where’s Koharu?” Ignacio asked.

“Scouting to see where she’s going to set up her portals,” Kiyomi said, blue eyes lifting from the tome. “You can’t use her blue-light, remember? Only one Aspect at a time.”

Ignacio nodded, looking up to try and spot her. But all he found was the deep blue sky, clouds streaked across it.

Beltran sat beside him, clasping his hands together. He slowly opened them, and from between them spanned a little black bird. It chirped, wings flitting, head tilting side to side.

Beltran whispered something to it, then cast it up in the air, watching as it flew away.

“That’s a scout,” Beltran said, leaning back on his hands. “I can see what it sees. One is with Koharu, that one is going to fly towards the Sanctum, and-”

The fiery hiss of Koharu’s light streamed closer above them, her blue glow radiating over the grass, turning Beltran’s hat silver. She landed from the opposite direction of where Beltran’s bird flew, the glow fading.

“I hope you circled wide enough not to be spotted,” Kiyomi said, glaring up at her.

Koharu placed a hand on her hip. “Low and wide, like always.”

“Did you see them?” Ignacio asked.

She scratched under the choker around her neck. “No, which is a good thing. They’re likely going to have a Raven Aspect like Beltran scouting ahead.”

Ignacio glanced at Beltran. “Won’t they realize your bird is a scout if they have Ravens of their own?”

Beltran wagged a finger. “I use Jackdaws, not Crows or Ravens.”

Something cawed above them, and Koharu dropped to her hands and knees.

Kiyomi glanced up. “So I assume that’s not yours.”

Beltran shook his head. “That ain’t a Jackdaw.”

Kiyomi’s tome flipped its pages without her touching it, an ethereal red glow emanating from it. Red needles of light splayed around it, the glyphs on the page turning from black to gold.

“Mirror,” she said.

Ignacio flinched as a fractured glass bubble expanded around them, passing through him like it was air. He glanced over his shoulder. The sky appeared blurred. Segmented into shards and shapes, like they were inside a giant diamond.

“Now they won’t be able to see us,” Kiyomi said.

Ezequiel looked up, nodding. “How long does that last?”

“About twenty minutes, like most of my abilities, Zeeq.”

“Oh, sorry madam,” Ezequiel said, his boyish voice mocking her. He combed his thick black hair. “What’s taking them so long?”

“We’re early,” Koharu said. “It’s going to take a few more minutes at least.”

Ignacio watched Beltran as he lowered his head, eyes closing. Then they snapped open, and they were inverted. White pupils on black.

He stared at the ground, Koharu and Ignacio staring at him.

Koharu lifted her chin, resting it on her hand. “You okay?”

Ignacio nodded. “Always. You?”

She chuckled. “Always.”

Beltran blinked, his eyes returning to normal. “They’re here.”

Koharu frowned. “That was a little quick, no?”

Kiyomi groaned. “I was hoping we overshot our entry. We may have undershot it.”

Ezequiel peered between the bushes. “Oh, look at that.”

Ignacio crawled over to him, parting the bushes with a hand.

“They can’t see you two through my mirror field,” Kiyomi said.

Ignacio frowned, as he saw something long stride past. And his eyes widened as he raised them to the behemoth of a creature that walked around the side of the carved hill.

It walked on four legs, but had a human torso like a centaur. Its skin, though wasn’t skin at all. It was stone brick, the kind used in the walls of a castle. And its head was a tower of some kind. No eyes, no mouth. Just the doors to the tower, which were sealed shut, a fiery glow emanating from inside. And atop its head, like a crown, were the battlements around a platform. A dead tree grew from its right shoulder, roots seeping between the seams of the brick. Its tail was the dark orange fabric of gigantic curtains, the rest of its horse-like body sprouting bushes and trees, most of which were also dead.

“That’s a Sentinel,” Ezequiel said, his dark brown eyes lifting as he grinned.

“It’s… huge,” Ignacio said. “I’m going to take it.”

Ezequiel shook his head. “That Sentinel could be as useless as a pile of boulders against some of the other things they’ll have.”

Ignacio nodded. “I’ll wait for you to draw them out.”

The Sentinel carried a giant battle axe made of the same stone in both hands, its dark-stone hooves leaving clouds of dust as it walked.

A large wagon rolled down the thin dirt path further down, its frame made of wrought iron or some kind of dark metal. Scythe blades jut from within the wheels, straight from the axle. Six creatures pulled it, their wings pinned back.

Pegasus, Ignacio thought. Except these were black, their fur more like dark stone, wings like those of bats rather than birds.

Crows flew ahead of it, heads turning left and right, searching for threats.

“Surely that isn’t everything,” Koharu said, crouching beside Ignacio.

He narrowed his eyes, spotting movement on the Sentinel's head, in between the battlements.

“On top of its head,” Ignacio said. “More Cypher users, I assume.”

“Ah,” Koharu said. “Well spotted.”

Beltran groaned. “I can see… four people atop the battlement.”