Curtis sneers at her, but he makes no motion to lower his weapon from the door, while Kyle stands there, mouth agape.
“Drop the weapon. And tell me who you are, right now, Curtis.” Her grip is dead steady on the weapon. Something slips off his face, like he's been wearing an act the entire time. There’s a manic tint to his eyes and a haggard grin. “Kyle, sorry it took me so long to come around. You were right. We shouldn’t have trusted him.”
“I was just spitballing, who isn’t on these bastard’s payrolls?” he shouts in fury. Curtis smiles evilly, even with a weapon pointed at his face.
“I should have known the traitorous rat would have figured me out.” That lecherous grin is almost enough for her to pull the trigger right now and stop screwing around, let alone the blatant racism. “Bertance had it right. I am ideally placed to be the ultimate saboteur. Val pays good money. Too good to pass up for the new world order, ya know?”
“So, you sold out. When?”
“About six months ago. Retirement was too far away, and bribes were lacking once I was out of SAF. Thing is, Val didn’t tell me about King’s inside man. You guys helped me find him. I should have known King was gonna go soft. Play his fancy little human puppet dance, done the safe route. Course, I knew that slippery fiend might be baiting me with the cameras, and it's why Val isn't busy exterminating all the rats down the row in Missouri. Or you two. How’s that working for ya now?”
The implication he'd send Val to murder the people back home is almost enough to put a bolt through his shining teeth right now, and Kyle's expression turns murderous.
“Joey, kill this sack of shit, don't hesitate.” Kyle grabs the detonator compound that she'd dropped in her haste. She's not quite at that moment yet.
“Curtis, drop the weapon. I know what a single bolt can do at close range with no arcane barrier.” Every bit of fury has been forged and tempered into absolute focus. “Without you two, there’s no invasion. Your plan falls flat. This game is over.”
“No, it’s not.” he tosses the weapon aside, stepping towards her. “King's right. Where we differ is the means to the end. Val does the things that King never would, or could. After all, could you shoot one of your own?”
That psionic connection. It hasn't been her imagining things the last time she's seen him. And she feels that probing for her thoughts, like a foreign worm, trying to will her hand to point–
She focuses her will and shoves that intrusive probe away, and Curtis flinches from the feedback. She'd gotten very good at flinging that invasive, slithery mental thread away when her parents were checking nonstop on how she was feeling. She aims down in a flash and fires. The silvery bolt skewers through his leg, and he screams in pain, nearly falls over, and is propped on one knee, heaving and trying to will away the agonizing injury.
“Don't you EVER.” One psionic trying to breach someone else's mind without consent is considered one of the most taboo and violent things one can do–it requires intent, unlike listening to surface thoughts, which are simply there. “Kyle, get in there and tie up Lavernius.” Kyle grabs the fallen bolt pistol, while she keeps her aim trained on Curtis. She's not surprised by the pain reaction as his body changes to its original form, a brown-furred Kitsune with ochre-colored eyes, wreathed in pain and hatred.
“You stupid bitch! You think you can stop this?!” he screams and holds the bolt where it's entered. “Val's gonna get you and your friends! They're already staging for this massacre! And you throw in your lot with the people who've put our whole race down?!”
“No, Curtis. I'm putting my lot in with people who have done nothing but defend others.” His lower digitigrade leg is utterly ruined with that bolt sticking out. But she's not done with bold moves yet. There is a reason King gave out this hint--their continued survival, she concludes. Which means that the calculus has changed drastically in the last minute. “King, new deal. I changed my mind. Stall these killers, and I'll consider helping you. But this guy is not part of the deal. He's mine.”
“Oh, he's not part of any deal. Val forced my hand.” Kyle eases the door open and Lavernius offers no resistance, while Kyle frisks his pockets.
“Confirm something for me, King. Did you plant that conversation, at the bio wing?” Lavernius nods, as does King. Kyle sighs and keeps his weapon trained on him.
“It was a gambit. One that paid off, as you can see,” King offers.
“Yeah dude, don't be smug about this, you still work with a murderous dragon. There are eight different teleport pads on the cargo system, or more if there are hidden ones in the lower levels, we need to dismantle them now.” Lavernius glances at his partner, with grim determination.
“Your call, King. If we do this, Val's going to have heads on plates–”
“Val’s not going to care if I get the journals delivered to her and Crosomer,” King interjects. “That’s all I’ve ever been interested in.”
“Kinda weird, how you’re willing to sabotage your guys,” Kyle points out.
“Val’s men are not under my control. Decentralized structure means, we each have our independent reporting chain, and Val’s soldiers are through-and-through killers,” King explains. “Miss Pyromist, tie up loose ends. Either put a bolt through that man’s skull right now or render him unable to play a role in this. You have my word that I will pull influence to make sure that the grounds of Asqualia shall not be bathed in blood.”
“King, you traitorous bastard!” Curtis screams while trying to pull the bolt out of his leg without any success, his muzzle in open fury. “When Val hears about this, that singing, dancing dragoness is going to devour you alive! And she’ll break out in verse while she’s doing it!” That has to be the oddest remark she’s heard all day, even given the circumstances.
“Val’s temperament is not my concern at the moment, only results, Curtis. I would surmise that after you killed Lavernius, you would have done the same to Miss Pyromist and Mister Bertance.” Curtis leers at that projection of the living personification of calm. “Don’t act surprised. I do play a deft hand.”
“King, you still have a massive problem with that device,” Joey points out. She’s still got control of this situation, for the moment. It’s time to figure out what King’s motivation is, he’s too focused on not trying to decorate the landscape in bodies. “You are carrying monumental risks, letting Valosterla anywhere remotely close to this kind of power. What it’s capable of is impossible, unless it’s tearing a hole straight through the aether. Activating it again could lead to disastrous results.”
“Hence, the need for Volkir’s journals,” King states candidly, and his eyes flicker to Curtis, who grits his sharpened teeth. “I don’t do things without a plan, you know. The Conclave has to go, and to do that, the groundwork of their destruction will require due attention.”
“What’s your angle, anyway?” She doesn’t trust King much, but he’d also put out that one hint that had just saved their lives–if temporarily. He has an agenda that will likely benefit him in the long run.
“Mana is dying in the world, Josephine. The crystals aren’t growing like they used to. We patched a wound just now with the device, but we are depleting it faster than it grows. As an expert in magical creatures, you likely have seen some of the–”
Curtis screams in agony as he pulls the bolt in one sickening motion, and lunges with the projectile at Kyle, blood dripping off of it and grabbing Kyle and pinning him against the frame of the shack. Joey fires but misses in the panic shot, and–dammit, the primer didn’t trigger, the next bolt didn’t rise onto the rail! She drops the pistol and grabs Curtis, who is a bear of a kitsune if she’s ever seen one, and lands a crippling kick at his injured leg. He howls in agonizing pain, but still is standing.
He promptly elbows her in the head and she veers to the edge of consciousness, staggering backward. Kyle uses the brief window to brace the pistol into Curtis’ stomach and tries to fire, but the bolt isn’t primed. Curtis bites down with his muzzle at Kyle's outstretched arm, and Kyle is in agonizing pain, trying to wrench his arm free. Joey recovers and grabs her compact staff, clicking it to full length. Lavernius is standing there, unable to figure out just what he’d supposed to do.
Joey lands one good hit on Curtis, staggering him with the blunt of her staff. A follow-up blow catches and cracks his muzzle and he lets go, Kyle toppling back and nursing the severe bite wound on his arm. Curtis manages to get an arcane barrier up and deflects her follow-up attack, the shield barely holding. He grabs the staff and tries to wrench it from her grasp.
“Val told me to keep an eye out for troublemakers like you!” he shouts, broken teeth slurring his words and blood dripping from his muzzle. “She’s spent a long time wiping out threats like you, and she told me the stories of those who defied her. The Luminaires and the Valkyries are the sole reason this world isn’t hers yet!”
“Lavernius, we still need to get ahead of this! Get moving, stall the teleportals, Val’s men are on the move and staging heavy mechanized troops!” King breaks composure and shouts out instructions. “Joey, the lower vaults, you’ll need Drenar!”
“Kinda busy!” Joey snarls–this just went off the rails in an instant, and Curtis leers at her, trying to grab her weapon away. She’s not about to let that happen and lands another brutal kick at his injured leg, and he howls out in pain–the arcane barrier softens the blow, somewhat. “Why Drenar?!”
“This was the plan! I needed someone Volkir would trust, and he’s got the heart of a Luminaire, same as you! Val would have to tear the place apart down to the bedrock and kill everyone inside, and risk compromising the future of everyone! There are bigger cogs in this machine than you can know, now go!” Even King is showing a little tension, safe as he is in his secret lair.
Lavernius hits a button on his arm and a shimmer of light wraps around him–the optic camo that had allowed him unfettered access before. King’s projection fades into blue motes, but Joey can't be bothered when she's got this intrinsic threat trying to tear her apart. She pries the weapon away and lands a blow on his ribs, and he staggers back. He blocks the second blow even as he's recovering and draws a combat dagger, trying to cut at her. She deftly avoids and keeps him at a distance.
She feels her danger sense trigger–an invocation! She dodges and rolls to the side as he aims a beam of fire at her with his free hand, a verbal spell she almost had missed. He uses her distraction as an opportunity to launch a second invocation, the words a slither through the air that throws her to the ground–a kinetic blast! She rolls with the momentum, gasping when she smacks into the side of the shed.
“You’re not stopping this invasion! This plan has been a long time in the making, and no rat is going to get in the way of that!” He pins her against the frame, and she deflects the thrust that still cuts a narrow slice into her shoulder, and she cries in pain. Adrenaline keeps her hand in firm control, fight or flight driving her strength and keeping him from cutting further. She channels a charge to her staff and strikes right at his groin, the force amplified. He howls in pain, reeling backward for a split second.
Kyle takes the opportunity to prime the detonator, and jumps on his back. He stuffs the deadly explosive down his vest, and Curtis flings him off, trying desperately to get the gleaming red ball of death out in time. Joey sees her opportunity and throws another canister–a shape-force blast that concusses him backward, into the shack. She staggers over to Kyle, and puts her arcane barrier around both of them to maximum force by the corner of the stone wall.
Curtis’s last scream of terror is followed by a deafening blast, fire wrapping around the corner of the wall. The force of the blast shifts the wall, and it begins to topple. She covers Kyle protectively and flares her barrier to life with every bit of strength she can muster.
The world goes dark as the wall collapses on top of them.
