74 A Brother's War II
...Alice's PoV...
The two groups clash, and I teleport away to avoid a slash from Steve's sword. The powerful blade could tear through my shield with ease, so I need to avoid being hit as much as possible.
I growl as explosions litter the battlefield, people who were once friends are now tearing each other apart.
And it's all my fault.
"Why are you doing this?" I ask my son before slamming a bolt of blue lightning into his chest. Steve groans and roll on the floor before sinking in the shadows. His mastery over Shadow Walking has never been good, so I can detect his point of arrival with relative ease and avoid his strike. But I wasn't prepared for him to be covered in scorching flames. My barrier protects me from the spell, but I still feel a tinge of heat.
"Are you seriously asking?!" he retorts before covering his blade in flames.
*Even his way of fighting is becoming similar to his father's!*
But Steve is a pale copy of the original. If he had the same power as his father, then this battle would have already ended. A blade of energy appears over my forearm as I parry my son's attack.
"This is madness! We shouldn't fight in a time like this! We-" I am interrupted when a burst of plasma explodes from Steve's body. The resulting light blinds me for a second, and I feel an intense pressure in my stomach as I am smacked away.
"How fucking dare you! All of this was your goddamn fault! Do you have any idea what it's like to fight in these brutal wars of yours?! I lost so many comrades and friends!" Steve shouts before throwing a large fireball towards me.
I dodge the slow attack, but only realize too late that it was a feint and endure the full brunt of his next strike. My shield groans as the blade slide onto the surface of the barrier.
"Surrender now! we'll show mercy, unlike you!" the rebel leader shouts as he readies for another attack.
I slam my foot on the ground and create an array of lightning tentacles that destroy everything in their paths. Steve screams when a limb hits him, and I stop for a brief second. This second is enough to allow him to kick the hard soil with such force that cracks spread on the mud.
"So you made your choice! I'll-"
"You won't do anything!" a familiar voice echoes and an armored figure emerges from the shadows before blocking Steve's attack. Sparks appear when the weapon slices through the armor, blood sprays when the pitch black blade nearly slices off the figure's arm.
The figure in question is Riley, my other son. His armor is battered and dented; he also looks tired and wounded.
"So you're here, little brother!" Steve exclaims.
"Riley, get out of here! I can handle this alone!" I shout, desperate to at least save one of my children from this madness.
"Don't worry about me!" he shouts back before pulling an odd plastic syringe from a pouch. Riley injects the brown liquid it contains directly into his arm, and bright red threads are repairing his wound while his fur turns slightly white.
His actions make me livid, where did he learn to make such a thing?!
"Don't use your lifeforce like that!" I shout, but I'm ignored by the two brothers who are glaring at each other.
"This is madness; we can still recover so stop this pointless war!" Riley tries to reason with Steve, but he snickers and spits on the ground.
"And what would we recover? The Enforcer system is finished, the constant conflicts between Families have to stop! The Freedom Movement will put an end to this nonsense, so surrender!" Steve shouts.
Riley grits his teeth and I cannot say anything. It's true that the conflicts between Families are not supposed to happen, but what can we do? Changing the system is impossible, and I tried to-
"And what is your alternative?!" Riley open his arms, "Look around you, look at all the death and destruction you caused!"
I take a brief look around me, and I see dead bodies littering the ground while others are screaming in pain. Body parts and entrails are dyeing the ground red, and the stench of death permeates the area. The war is still consuming more lives as soldiers from both sides fling deadly spells at each other. I look at my trembling hands, is the Family really worth this needless suffering? How many lost their lives in this conflict? And how many more will die before it ends?
"This is a necessary sacrifice! We need to rid the world of the Families! A Loyalist like you wouldn't understand!" Steve retorts.
"Stop saying shit like 'Loyalist' or 'Freedom Movement'! We belong to the Wolfheart Family, and we should not-"
Riley is interrupted by a strong attack from Steve; the shockwave sends dust flying everywhere.
"The 'Family' you speak of is nothing more than an army of servants who only exist to serve the ego of its leader! For fuck's sake, open your eyes! How many people did we kill because she wanted to satisfy her greed? How many comrades in arms did we lose because of her pettiness, how much pain did we have to go through just for a handful of Credits?" Steve shouts while pointing towards me.
I want to say something, to say that I had to do it for the sake of the Family so that we could keep up with the others and...
Who am I kidding?
Steve has a point. I did order costly deployments out of spite, and more than once. And what good did all the treasures I hoarded in our warehouses do? I was only thinking about Council politics, and never once considered the consequences of my actions.
Riley sinks into the shadows before reappearing behind his brother. He strikes Steve with a lightning-covered fist, and the rebel leader groans as he parries the attack.
"You let John's ramblings get into your head! Think about all the good we did! Think of all the people we protected, all the gangs we stopped!" Riley declares before striking his brother with a mana-infused fist.
"Those gangs exist because of our Rules! We are only solving a problem we caused!" Steve retorts before almost slicing his brother in half. The convulsing Riley somehow grabs another batch of syringes and inject them in his body.
Riley sinks into the shadows and emerges near me. He holds his healed side and makes a wry smile, "Sorry, but I don't think I'll make it out of here alive."
I resist the urge to hug him, but I know it isn't the time nor the place to do so. I growl, "You better survive this, the Family needs a leader. Take the survivors and flee, our safe houses shouldn't be compromised yet."
"But what about you?" he asks, and I can only reply with a silent smile. The battle has degenerated, and the casualties are piling up. I need to act like a leader for once and make the right choice even if I might not survive.
Scratch that, I know this yard is going to be my grave.
"Don't worry about me and GO!" I roar as red arcs of power course over my body.
"Why are you doing this? We can still-" a single glare is enough to silence Riley. The burning lifeforce coursing through my veins feels like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders. My vision is becoming sharper, and my senses are losing the dullness that has accumulated over the years.
But this power is coming at a hefty price, and my whitening fur is proof that I won't be able to stay like that for a long time.
"What are you doing?!" a panicked Steve shouts, "Stop this nonsense right now! You can still surrender, so we-"
"I made my choice, and you made yours. It's too late for regrets now." I smirk and blink out of existence before punching the unaware Steve in the stomach. His armor creaks and the barrier hugging his body almost shatter under the power of my lifeforce-infused fist.
It feels good to move around like I was young again. But I can hardly be happy at the circumstances that led to this moment.
"You always were unreasonable..." Steve stumbles back and spits a glob of blood. I use this brief respite in the battle to check on Riley. The brave Werewolf is doing his best to command the remnants of the Family and the members of our group are slowly disappearing from the battlefield despite the rebels' best effort to kill us.
"What can I say? And it looks like you inherited that trait from me." I smirk as I attempt to strike again, but this time Steve reacts first and a sword-shaped beam of light bursts out of his blade. However, it lacks power and speed. I infuse more lifeforce into my legs and dodge before countering the attack with two lightning balls.
The rebel leader grunts as he endures the attacks, and he struggles to contain his spasming muscles as the electricity courses over his body.
"This is hopeless! Why don't you surrender? My soldiers are still standing while yours are fleeing. You're going to die if we continue this pointless battle!" Steve tries to reason with me, but I shake my head.
It's too late to capture him now, so I need to put him down, or his foolish rebellion will take more innocent lives.
I clench my fist and roar, and a veritable aura of red power surrounds me as I increase the rate of lifeforce that I am burning.
Time to end this nonsense!
...Steve's PoV...
It has been one of the worst battles that I ever witnessed. We almost lost two-thirds of our original force.
But I also lost a brother and a mother today.
That look of hatred and betrayal on Riley's face as he parried my attack will stay engraved in my memory for the remainder of my life. We are now bound to kill each other if we ever meet again. And my mother, in her customary foolishness, is burning her remaining lifeforce with increased vigor.
At this point, I only need to avoid fighting for an hour and two, and she'll crumble into dust. The wind will scatter her remains, and the only remnants of her existence will disappear forever.
But I can't escape even if I wanted to. I might be able to Shadow Walk out of here, but most of my remaining soldiers won't be able to survive, so I need to eliminate her. All of this could have been avoided if she acted reasonably, but she decided to fight despite my warnings.
I didn't want this outcome, I thought I was prepared for the worst possible situation... but the aching in my heart as I raise my sword proves the contrary.
It's too late to back down. I need to finish this for the Freedom Movement, and my guilty conscience. Maybe I won't survive this battle, but survival hasn't been a priority for both of us ever since my comrades broke that barrier.
A flurry of rapid punches takes me out of my thoughts, and I do my best to parry the numerous strikes. But I'm unable to see most of them, and the pain caused by an attack barely has time to reach my brain before another strike hits me.
I'm thankful for my father's armor, without it I would be long dead. But even this fantastic artifact has its limits, and each attack I receive puts a big dent into the finely crafted armor. The shield protecting me is now a distant memory, so I can only rely on the bare metal to defend my frail body.
I barely dodge a beam of plasma that is so hot that the ground underneath instantly turns into glass, and slash the air with my sword while pouring a large amount of mana into the blade. It creates a circular edge of pure energy that goes through everything in its path, but my mother avoids the strike with ease.
My heart beat increases as another gigantic fireball is thrown at me, and I can barely react before a pillar of magma emerges from beneath my feet. I grit my teeth as I feel the tips of my fur burning, I'm lucky that the armor has a form of temperature control, or I would already be a pile of charcoal.
I pant and avoid another strike, Alice seems not tired at all as she jumps before kicking the air and rocketing towards me at tremendous speed. I Shadow Walk out of the way, thus dodging a strike that creates a crater of molten glass.
Seeing the effects of the strike makes me gulp. I knew my mother was powerful. I heard the stories about her past battles. But seeing her deploy her full might in person is something else.
I take a deep breath and create a small mana explosion behind me as I kick the ground. This trick that I learned from John during his fight against Edmund comes in handy since the resulting shockwave increases my speed and slightly changes my trajectory. My mother, who wasn't expecting anything like this, misses her attack and I get the perfect opportunity to slice her exposed side.
Sparks fly as the blade creates a deep gash on her side, she grunts and kicks me in the face before focusing her lifeforce onto her wound. My jawbone was almost turned into a fine powder, so I also use a basic healing spell to calm the throbbing.
I teleport to the side to avoid a charging strike, and a beam of lightning pierces my arm before I can dodge it. The unpleasant feeling of electricity coursing through my body makes me grit my teeth as I grip the handle of my sword with both hands to parry yet another attack. Pain coursed through my joints as the ground sinks a few feet while massive cracks spread around me.
Deep sadness swirls into Alice's eyes as she kicks me as hard as she can. I am sent flying while screaming in pain as I try to heal my legs, which are bent in unnatural ways.
"This is the end..." Alice mutters between two heavy breath as she appears near me. From her dirty and tired looks, she's starting to feel the consequences of burning her lifeforce. If only I were able to survive for a few more minutes, then I would be able to-
In my desperation, my eyes catch the sight of something that might be able to save me. The discarded barrier-breaking device lies here, a few feet away from me. I grit my teeth and focus half of my remaining mana into my sword before waving it around. The resulting beam doesn't have a lot of speed, but it shines brightly and blinds my mother for a brief moment.
I use this opportunity to Shadow Walk near the barrier-breaking device. I grit my teeth as I infuse mana in my broken legs to grab the heavy equipment before pouring all my remaining mana into the modified artifact.
"Your struggle is futile, I-" she is interrupted when I jab the device into her torso with all my strength. She must have lowered her guard since the device connects with her body and shines brightly before create a loud explosion.
I close my burning eyes, the only thing I hear is a loud ringing in my ears. I open my eyes a few moments later, and the sight that greets me is beyond gruesome. The upper half of my mother is lying in a pool of blood, and small arcs of red energy are trying their best to stop the massive blood loss. I crawl towards her; she barely registers my presence until I am inches away from her. She extends her trembling hand and ruffles my hair.
"I'm sorry..." she says between laborious breath. "I'm sorry for everything... I love you." Life leaves her body as she finishes her sentence, and her body turns into a pile of dust a few moments later.
Tears are rolling down my face, and I cry like I never cried before.
We won, but I can't be happy with this victory.
I open my eyes and stare at my hands; I killed my mother. The realization of what I've done just starts to sink in, and the world seems to turn black and white.
Nothing will bring her back. I killed her with my own two hands.
And this is all the fault of the Families. If it weren't for them, then we wouldn't have to revolt and lose even more people.
A group of wounded soldiers emerges from over the horizon. They are slowly approaching me, and cheers erupt in the ranks when they realize that I survived.
I need to act as a proper leader, so I wave and smile at them while burying my anguish as deep as possible.
The Freedom Movement won, but I lost things far more important than a battle today.
