[She took What?] - Chapter 89: Davy’s Story – Into Penumbra: I’ve got you now.

“Hold them by the throat.”

Big Red to his lieutenants

| Location: The Ringtail Planet |

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As Davy watched, the second Bird crumpled, he led his greys from the gully; their stolen shields flickering red in the moonlight. Each carried a shield taken from dead reds. A shield that placed a red marker on Big Red’s map, feeding him entirely the wrong picture. But the exact picture Davy wanted him to see.

On Davy’s command, they formed into pre-arranged groups, three greys in each like he’d drilled them. He knew this could alert Big Red, but he was counting on his arrogance. He took Whitey and Becson straight towards Big Red’s Bird. It’s paintwork marking it as special. The rest of the greys started after the line of reds trudging down the valley.

Safe in his Bird, Big Red stared at the map, unable to reconcile what he was seeing. He’d just lost another Bird. ‘And why was one of his teams coming back to him?’ His gaze darted between the map and the valley outside. He saw what he could only describe as a massive grey, running towards the Bird.

 

Big Red glanced at the map which only showed a red marker. Not a grey one. He looks back to the silhouette that loomed unnaturally large, clad in the pelts of its own fallen kin. Two guns gleamed in its hands, and the light caught its eyes, burning with something primal, something unstoppable. “How is it doing that?”

The pelts it wore, they looked familiar. Then he remembered, the talisman left for him to find, the bundle by the standing stone. For the first time, fear clawed at Big Red’s chest.

Two smaller greys followed the large one. More tentative, hesitant. They held back, fearful of his Bird. They were normal greys, not like this demented giant who ran towards his Bird and the small squad of reds guarding his Bird.

Big Red watched the large grey make contact with his reds, their guns dark, failing to fire.

“Damn technology, unreliable” cursed Big Red.

 

The first attacker seemed to collapse against the grey’s outstretched hand that held a hunting knife. The knife’s blade, glinting with light from the alignment, disappeared into the attacker’s body. It was too big to stay hidden for long. That one thrust saw the red lifted off the ground and float as if suspended from the blade which protruded out of its back. It was thrown off to one side, discarded in a single action. The grey turned, picked its next target, took two steps and repeated the action. Seeing this, the remaining reds faltered, turned and scattered.

Big Red, watched as his protection detail fell apart.

“Do I have to do everything myself?” He reached past the flyers, took the controls and started firing the Bird’s guns in the grey’s direction. The grey devil turned and seeing the shots miss, smiled. Big Red fired again, kicking up dirt close to the grey. He adjusted his aim, closing in on Davy’s.

 “I’ve got you now,” he shouted, but just as the red beam was about to touch the grey the beam stopped. Then, once past him, restarted.

“What!” shouted Big Red.

He waved the beam across Davy a couple of times and each time it ceased. He’d seen the beams falter but never just stop.

And then realisation dawned. “He must be wearing one of our shields, a red shield.” Big Red snarled and threw the controls away with utter disdain. The flyers pulled back, trying to gain space between themselves and their increasingly volatile leader.

Then things got even weirder for Big Red. The fiend turned and looked straight at him through the cockpit window. It raised its knife, blood dripping from its point, and made as if to cut its own throat. Then it pointed directly at him.

Big Red snorted, snot exploding across his muzzle, “Really, that’s it?” he said, disdain in his voice.

Davy then went down on one knee and waited for the other two greys to join him. He absently grasped the mote, tied tightly at his neck and froze. He felt the deep connection with Rebecca and saw their beings intertwined, bound between glowing threads of dark energy and light.

A balance of green and purple. But something else too, elusive, almost revered. A song, sung by a choir standing near an infinite void, close to the edges where golden threads of matter shimmered with harmonic vibrations.

 

It was temporal resonance, a thing that Davy couldn’t find the words for, but he felt it like an ancient and infinite song – then the words came. It was Old Music.

Its notes, threading through the fabric of matter and across time, stitched themselves into his very being.

Upon catching up with him, the other two also took a knee. The three forming a small arrowhead shape pointing at the Bird.

Becson looked across at Davy and recognised the glazed eyes, the frozen pose from being around his mother. He gently shook Davy’s arm, it collapsed his state and brought him back to the now. Focus returned and then in unison they started shooting at the Bird.

 

Big Red snorted, and laughed, the two flyers joined in, but it was short lived. One of the flyers caught the faintest whiff of smoke and then, before he could say anything a tell-tale started flashing on the dash. The grey’s beams were licking at the outside of the Bird.

Big Red panicked, “Are the shields at full strength,” he yelled. “They seem to be getting through.” 

One of the flyers calmly replied, “They’re at full strength sir. But our shields seem,” he paused, looking for the right words, “less effective against three co-ordinated beams.”

 

As the Bird’s shields faltered, Big Red’s composure crumbled. “Do something!” he roared, his claws digging into the armrest, slicing into the material.

The flyer hesitated, his voice shaking. “Sir... one of the engines, it’s failing. They’re targeting it.”

Big Red turned back to the window, his gut churning. The grey giant ran closer then knelt again; its unyielding gaze fixed on him. It wasn’t running; it was hunting, hunting him.

“We need to get out of here,” said the lead flyer and then, without even asking for permission, opened up the engines.

 

The Bird leapt into the air and pulled away from the greys’ beams. As it climbed out of the valley, Big Red surveyed the scene below. There were grey beams everywhere, always in threes targeting one red. Why aren’t the mob firing? thought Big Red angrily then remembered how his Bird’s guns had cut out.  “The greys are wearing our shields.” Then, as he looked at the map, his worst fears were confirmed, he only saw red markers. Pieces started to fall into place, but it was too late. The shields stopped reds from shooting reds, but they’d assumed reds were wearing them, and the map markers worked off the shields.

He shook his head, ‘It was that simple.’

 

With their edge gone, the reds were suddenly vulnerable. And, as he watched, the valley began to fall from his grasp.  He recalled Rebecca’s words, realising that the “ruin” Rebecca had predicted was his own.

Big Red watched as his plan collapsed into chaos. Trios of grey beams struck relentlessly at his scattered forces who were unable to respond.

From his high vantage, it was clear; the greys weren’t just surviving. They were winning. He clenched his fists; jaw tightening and forced the words out.

 

“Let's go, we’ve done what we need to here.” Victory or not, he had to appear in control.

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