Chapter 413

Thousand Mile Astrologer slapped aside the chain and raced toward Beaumarchais as fast as her legs could carry her, but Alain was in the way faster than the span of time between two heartbeats, his sword thrusting at her nonvital places, driving her back as his speed continued to increase.

Tenjho landed behind her from somewhere, his arms came out to bind her body in an embrace that even she knew she couldn't have escaped. Dropping down, she pushed out with her legs and rolled away. "So you're not being controlled, are you?" She narrowed her eyes.

"No!" They said all at once.

"Then you really are traitors, all of you." She came to a halt and rose to a crouch. "There's three of you, and you're fast, but that won't be enough!"

"We're not traitors! We're trying to save the Theocracy!" Tenjho cried out, "Just come with us! Come with us and see!"

"Never!" She snapped and went on the offensive, Tenjho's fists came down in a blur, his bare hands were a problem, but worse was Time Turbulence, his speed was on another level. He wasn't One Man Army or Strongest Human, but he could control the flow of time around his body, giving him speed far greater than he had any right to be in other circumstances. While Beaumarchais worked at medium range and could keep her badly off balance.

The chain came out, again, and she made herself scarce. The dirt exploded where her foot had been, 'They're trying to disable, not kill, I have to bring them down… haul them before the Cardinals and beg for them to only be imprisoned!' She arched her back, and another explosion of earth from Tenjho's fists striking where she had been a moment ago reminded her that doing that wouldn't be easy.

Alain came in from the flank, and again she was forced to bob and weave back and forth to avoid the blur of strikes that went for her joints. "How are you dodging this?!" He demanded, and it brought a little smile to her face to hear his frustration.

Where she could not match his speed, she did have one advantage. Her ability to see far, also let her see slightly into the future, not enough to be of much use. But enough that she could avoid, if narrowly, most of the blows that came her way.

Most.

Not all.

It was Tenjho who connected first, his fist struck her kidney, and her back jack knifed, but true to the skill and arts of the best of the best, she did not fight the pain or the blow, but went with it, rotating her body away from the strike and bringing her own fist around, up, then down across Tenjho's face. He too, proved his worth by allowing himself to go down, catching himself on the ground with his hands, and sweeping his leg against the back of Thousand Mile Astrologer's legs, sending her tumbling onto her back. Again she avoided the chain of Beaumachais, but could not avoid both that, and the thin piercing blade of Time Turbulence, whose tip struck her at the joint of her elbow, piercing the bone and causing her cry of pain to similarly pierce the air.

It was all downhill from there, as far as Thousand Mile Astrologer was concerned. She attempted to escape… and one of the three forced her back, she tried to leap into the air, and the long chain would drag her back or force her to give up and avoid it.

For a common man, the length of their struggle would have been a death sentence even if no blow were struck, sheer exhaustion would have crushed the heart or broken the body.

But for the true use of weapons and pain, for the Black, it would have been no more than an intense training session, and the two sides continued to rain blows on one another that, little by little, began to rob Thousand Mile Astrologer of her strength.

For all her skills, she was most useful in scouting, and her combat skills would struggle against any one of the trio, only desperation kept her lasting as she did… but desperation did not keep her heart from racing, her breast from heaving with the desperation for just a little more air, nor did it keep the pain at bay nor the blood from leaking out from each fresh wound… and each wound or bruise by fist, chain, or sword, weakened her a little more…

Until at last she stood on shaking knees, hunched forward holding out a hand to call for a truce, as she gulped for breath amidst the tumbled and broken sacred trees, smashed and shattered limbs, and holes made by exploding earth from blows the ground was not meant to take. The chain was briefly lowered, the sword tip pointed skyward, and the fists opened into palms that showed blood where nails ripped through skin.

"Will you surrender? Come with us. You need to see what we saw!" Alain, 'The Time Turbulence' all but begged her. "None of us suffered any lasting harm, trust us! We're your friends!"

She could feel it. "We." She gasped. "Never." She heaved. "Surrender!" She cried…and her eyes rolled back into her head as at last, Thousand Mile Astrologer fell forward with a thud into the mound of dirt that was the floor of a sacred forest.

"When she's right, she's right." Beaumachais said, and removing a set of enchanted manacles, he brought her hands behind her back to secure her, then repeated the same to her ankles.

"Come on," Tenjho turned his head over his shoulder to look toward the city, "we need to get to the extraction point before it is too late. They'll be waiting on us."

"I know, I know. You don't have to tell me, but by the purple asses of all the gods," Alain said and rubbed his aching jaw, "she hits hard."

"Tell me about it." Tenjho said and rubbed his own in the same way. "She missed her calling as a brawler." He chuckled and then hefted her up over his shoulder like an unfortunate sack of potatoes, and with that, they began to run as fast as their legs could carry them.