Aetheral Space

Dragan was dead. Bruno and Serena too. Ruth just knew it.

She let out a guttural howl as she charged across the roof of the car, aiming for the Fifth Dead's heart with her claws. This blow, like all the others, was repelled by a lazy swing of her opponent's quarterstaff that felt like a gunshot. She staggered backwards, her feet failing to find purchase on the car's slippery roof, and a backhand from the Fifth Dead sent her flying off the side of the vehicle.

As she fell, she dispelled her claws and grabbed onto the underside of the car, clambering around underneath like some kind of spider, like some kind of insect that couldn't even save it's friends.

A lashed corpse strapped to a post, tears and hope still in it's eyes. A pile of bones, still smoking with plasmaburns. Failures, failures, always failures.

She'd let it happen again.

A roar of frustration burst from her throat as she pulled herself up into the opposite side of the vehicle, blinking the tears from her eyes. The Fifth Dead looked up from his current task - he'd ripped a hole in the roof with his bare hands and was looking down into the back of the vehicle. Roz was visible down there, lying in a heap, and as the Fifth Dead reached down to grab him the Umbrant's eyes gently fluttered open.

She'd get him with a swipe from behind, then. She'd cut his head off with one smooth motion. She'd rip his damn throat out and have him choke on his blood. She'd pry his ribs apart and stomp on his heart. She'd tear off his arms and beat him to death. She'd make him pay, she'd kill him, she'd kill him!

Her opponent saw her coming. With one smooth but lightning fast motion, the Fifth Dead stood up to his full gargantuan height, turned his quarterstaff in his hands, and swung one end of it right towards Ruth's temple.

That was fine. She had methods to deal with people who attacked that way.

With a flare of red Aether, she switched her Skeletal mask for her Noblesse helmet, the metal grin replaced by a blank marble visage.

Skipper had walked her through the creation of this second set of armour shortly after they'd first met, to provide her with a way to defend rather than attack. Each piece of the Noblesse set shattered after a single blow, but in the process it reflected that impact back upon the attacker - opening them up to retaliation. It had never failed her before.

And it wouldn't fail now.

The second the staff struck her helmeted head, the marble shattered like glass - and a second later, the Fifth Dead was sent staggering backwards from the rebound. A grunt of annoyance escaped from his throat, and the giant adjusted his stance to swing the other side of the staff at Ruth's exposed throat.

He didn't get the chance.

"Ruth! Hold on!" screamed Skipper from the driver's seat below - and, operating by instinct rather than conscious planning, Ruth squatted down and plunged her claws into the roof of the car like hooks into a fish's mouth. The Fifth Dead cocked his head at the incongruous movement.

And then Skipper flipped the car over.

Ruth suppressed nausea as the car turned, tried to ignore the pain in her arms as they became the only thing keeping her attached to the car, her legs finding only empty air once the car turned fully upside down. Her claws would slide out before long, though - they were too damn sharp for their own good - and this barrel roll was taking way too long. Why the hell didn't these people design limo's with stunts in mind?!

Compared to the Fifth Dead, though, she was doing great. The moment the car flipped over, the man fell straight down into the abyss below like a rock dropped into the ocean. That should have been cause for some relief, but…

...but the Fifth Dead just looked up at her with that impassive expression the whole time he fell, making direct eye contact without the slightest hint of fear - until he was out of sight.

Ruth let out the breath she'd been holding - and then immediately lashed out a hand to catch Roz by the back of the collar. The poor bastard had fallen out of the hole in the roof of the car, and now he was kicking and screaming as he got a top-down view of the great city of Taldan.

"Skipper!" Ruth half-roared, half-sobbed up into the vehicle. "Flip the damn car! You got him-"

Suddenly, the hairs on her body stood up, goosebumps conquering her skin in one second flat. The instinctual fear brought on by a predator's gaze.

"Summon," came the Fifth Dead's voice from below, sounding somehow both far away and right next to her ear. "Transportation Eagle."

Deep down in the abyss below, there was a glint of orange light - and a second later, the Fifth Dead was right behind the car again, floating in empty space as two huge bursts of orange Aether sprouted from behind him.

At first, Ruth though the man had grown wings - then she realized that it was somehow worse.

Just like the swordfish that had impaled Dragon's hand, the Fifth Dead's Aether had spawned a living organism - a great bird that was carrying it's master, talons gripping the Fifth Dead's shoulders tightly.

Ruth gaped at this sight - and even Roz seemed too surprised to scream.

The Fifth Dead, for his part, simply hung there as his bird carried him, both hands clasping his quarterstaff like it was a magician's cane. His expression still hadn't changed since he'd been sent flying off the car in the first place.

"Summon," he said again, voice still a businesslike monotone. "Penetration Swordfish times ten."

At his command, ten spheres of orange Aether began orbiting around him - changing shape a second later into ten copies of the swordfish that had originally struck Dragan. He nodded towards Ruth, and their eyes flicked as one to fixate on her.

"Fire," he said, and the onslaught began.

These swordfish were no ordinary projectiles - just like the animals they were based on would swim through water, the constructs flew through the air in complex patterns. They weaved around both obstacles and each other, each one leaving a faint orange trail - meaning that, before long, it looked like a great orange scribble was heading towards Ruth.

"Skipper!" screamed Ruth again as the swordfish grew closer. "Flip the damn car!"

She heard a grunt of frustration from above her. "It won't flip!" Skipper shouted back. "I'm gonna, uh, I'm gonna try and bypass it! Just hang in there, yeah?"

Don't have much of a choice.

She faced the onslaught of swordfish with a grim expression. What could she even do? One hand was busy holding onto Roz - who'd started screaming again, which wasn't helping - while the other was preventing the both of them from falling into the abyss.

She didn't have the strength or the angle to throw Roz back into the car. She didn't have any comrades who could provide covering fire. She didn't even have Skipper's help - he was busy being the worst damn driver in the world.

Ruth Blaine took a deep breath. All she had was herself. That was fine.

She'd been there before.

She let her claws disappear - and, in the second before she fell down into the city below, she grabbed onto the hole her claws had made with her hand. Roz yelped in surprise at the sudden lurching motion, and his sudden thrashing didn't do much to help Ruth keep grip.

The first wave of swordfish was upon her - two aiming for her face and throat, another two making a beeline for her legs. Not the easiest targets, but she just had to shut up and deal with it.

With a crackle of red Aether, Ruth brought her clawed gloves back - but this time, she put them on her feet instead of her hands. Roz's scream cut off as those claws appeared dangerously close to his face, and he fell back into blissful unconsciousness.

Ruth grunted from the strain. Squeezing her feet into a pair of metal gloves wasn't the most comfortable sensation, but it was the only way she was going to get out of this. If her hands weren't free, she'd just have to use her legs.

She struck out with two lightning-fast kicks - shattering the swordfish that had been aiming for her feet. The remaining two swordfish didn't seem to have the capacity for fear or even caution, as they continued their flight towards her face as if nothing had happened.

The angle of their approach meant that her feet couldn't reach them, no matter how high she kicked. A different strategy was needed.

This was where she thrived. Ask her to come up with a long-term plan, or to understand what someone else was thinking, and she was useless. But a situation like this, where she had to adapt second by second to stay alive … this was her nirvana.

Ruth took in a deep breath - and a second later, spat at the first swordfish. The spittle flew out like a bullet, crackling with infused red Aether, and struck the swordfish in the skull, shattering it. The second projectile simply swam around the quickly dissipating remains of its companion - it was too close for the same strategy to work.

Fine. That wasn't her only trick.

With another heavy exhale, she dissipated the entire Skeletal Set she was wearing - and remanifested it onto the unconscious Roz. This wasn't something she could usually do so easily - the slightest movement on the part of the target could cause the armour to dissipate during manifestation - but the direct physical contact and Roz's unconsciousness made it easy as pie.

With a roar of exertion, she swung the armoured Roz up like a flail, smashing the swordfish between him and the car's roof. If not for the armour, that would have smashed Roz's spine, too.

As the remaining five swordfish surged towards her - the original four had clearly been a means of testing her reflexes - there was a shuddering movement from above. A second later, the car flipped back around to its original alignment, sending Ruth and Roz falling down onto the roof of the vehicle as the swordfish passed harmlessly overhead, impaling an unfortunate traffic drone.

"Took you long enough," growled Ruth, returning the Skeletal Set to her own body as she regained her footing.

"You're meant to be nice to the driver," said Skipper from below. "I think that Noel kid was trying to hack the controls, mess us up. I switched it to a manual setting, though - now you can enjoy my expert driving interruption-free!"

Ruth went to roll her eyes, but stopped midway through the motion.

Dragan was dead. Bruno and Serena too. She'd managed to keep the thought at bay while fighting, while distracted, but now there was a lull in the action it smashed back into her full force.

The Fifth Dead stared at her impassively as his Transportation Eagle continued its pursuit, his body swaying like a pendulum as the chase went round corners and through roundabouts. Ruth wondered if he'd been expecting her to deflect his ten swordfish - she honestly couldn't tell what this guy was thinking from his facial expressions.

Wait. Something was wrong there.

He'd fired ten swordfish. She'd deflected four, then five had hit the traffic drone. That still left…

The last of the orange swordfish lunged out from the underside of the car, aimed straight for her exposed temple. Given its speed and obvious strength, it would drill through her skull and pierce her brain without much trouble. A lesser fighter wouldn't even have seen the projectile coming, much less be able to dodge it.

Ruth Blaine reached out and grabbed the swordfish with her hand, it's nose an inch from the side of her head. It tickled against her hair.

Squeezing slightly - just enough to break off the thing's fins - Ruth looked up at the Fifth Dead. Still, his face hadn't changed. He'd killed Dragan, driven Bruno and Serena to get themselves killed, all with that damn blank look on his face.

She narrowed her eyes. She'd make sure he kept that face as a corpse.

With all her strength, and a flare of red Aether, Ruth hurled the swordfish towards the Fifth Dead like a dart, the projectile moving so quickly that it was barely even visible.

The Transportation Eagle flapped its wings, ascending a little higher into the sky, only to be struck by two more projectiles - impaling each of its wings. The clawed gauntlets of Ruth's Skeletal Set protruded from the bird's wounds, red Aether still glowing around them, and as the bird screeched in agony tiny fragments of its body fell down into the abyss below like sand.

It was a mistake to assume Ruth could only use her armour as armour. She'd always found that anything sharp could be thrown, if it came down to it.

The Fifth Dead's eyes widened, just slightly. Ruth grinned.

Gotcha.

Finally, after a moment of trying to retain its form, the Transportation Eagle shattered into glass and it's master went falling once again into the abyss below.

The shaking of Ruth's legs finally reaching a crescendo, she collapsed to her knees and lay there for a moment, panting for breath. Loss and victory mingled together into an emotion that didn't quite have a name yet, but was without a doubt unpleasant.

But she'd done it. She'd done it.

"Summon - Transportation Eagle."

There was a flare of orange light from below, quickly growing brighter as it's source once again ascended.

Ruth almost popped a blood vessel. The Fifth Dead could spam that shit?! Was there anything about this situation that was fair?!

She had to get up. The fight wasn't over yet. Given the Fifth Dead's obvious abilities, it wasn't even close to over.

But her legs wouldn't do what she told them. They simply sat there, quivering, rendered useless by exertion and stress. Gritting her teeth, Ruth thumped her thigh with an angry hand, as if it were a machine that could be shocked into motion.

Useless. Useless!

Ruth squeezed her eyes shut, and the wet tears she felt there only made her more frustrated. There was nothing she could do. There'd never been anything she could do. Not once in her life.

She prepared herself for the end. Dragan, Bruno and Serena. She'd let them all down. Skipper too. She should have known it would end like this from the start.

Useless…

A friendly metal hand patted her on the head, and she opened her eyes again to look up. Skipper smiled down at her cheekily.

"You doing alright there, kid?" he said. Roz was tucked under one of his arms, and with that same hand he was tapping away at a script.

Slowly, shakily, Ruth shook her head. "I-I couldn't … I wasn't…"

Skipper shrugged. "Ah, well. Don't beat yourself up about it, yeah? You did your best. That's why we're about to win."

She blinked. The words Skipper had just said … they didn't make sense. They were about to win? No, they weren't. That wasn't … that wasn't possible.

As the orange glow beneath them intensified - the Fifth Dead was nearly upon them - Ruth's gaze drifted to the script in Skipper's hand. The program he was tapping away at … it was some kind of remote control. He was manipulating a diagram of … a car?

Their car.

Skipper grinned, raised his eyebrows. "I know, right? Your old man's not just a pretty face. You good to jump?"

Again, she mutely shook her head. An involuntary sniffle was the only noise she made.

"The things I do for you guys," sighed Skipper theatrically. He reached down and picked her up with one hand just as easily as he'd grabbed Roz. "I'd close your mouth for this part, kid - don't wanna eat any flies, yeah?"

A nod. A grin. A fire in her eyes.

Skipper smiled softly. "That's my girl," he said, and jumped off the car.

As they fell down, passing the ascending Fifth Dead, Skipper tapped one last time on his script. Above them, the car lurched, adjusting it's angle - to point directly at the man flying towards it.

And then it accelerated.

A giant of a man and his pet bird flying upwards at incredible speeds. A half-wrecked hulk of metal and fuel flying downwards at incredible speeds. A collision was inevitable, and the results?

Spectacular.

Ruth stared up at the fireball in the sky as they continued falling down towards the nearest pedestrian platform, Skipper firing Heartbeat Shotguns downwards to reduce the speed of their fall. As they finally made contact once again with solid ground, Ruth collapsed into the floor, still staring up.

"Do you think we got him?" she said quietly, eyes scanning the crash site for any signs of movement.

"Not a chance," Skipper said, grabbing her under the arm and pulling her along as he continued running into the city's alleys and streets. "Winded him, maybe - but you don't kill a legend like that! I should know."

As they retreated into the shadows, Skipper too looked back at the explosion, a pained expression on his face.

"Hang in there, kids," he muttered. "Hang in there…"