Chapter 3 : (Re-)Discovering himself

Simon's head whipped back, soon followed by the rest of his body crashing into the ground. The Terran eyed the supposed corpse warily and after a short deliberation, decided to empty the energy cell into the traitor. His vision filled with the white light of the energy bolts firing toward the Empire's enemy.

When only a small 'click' without any more 'pew' sounded, the soldier looked at the surely dead man… Only to be petrified. He expected to find a mess of flesh and searing holes, smelling like bacon (though he wouldn't be able to tell). Instead, Simon seemed to… twitch from time to time. Did he suffer from an epileptic episode or coming down from a massive orgasm ? The Terran wondered to himself before realizing the horror of the situation.

Not only was the traitor not dead, he was immune to energy bolts. In fact, it was yet another thing to add to the things the monster/traitor survived : the explosion, the crash/fall, the toxic atmosphere… and now energy weapons' fire. Was it possible that he was immortal ?

After a while, Simon stopped twitching, sighed and slowly got up.

« That surprised me ! Never would have thought that the reason I wasn't afraid was… this ! It was like… I don't know. Is this what taking drugs is supposed to make you feel ? It was rather enjoyable ! »

As he stood back up, his gaze fell on his suit… or rather, what was left of it.

« Man, it's a mess ! »

Unlike him, the suit hadn't come out the shooting unscathed. There was smoke coming out of several large holes all over his chest and a few on his legs. It barely covered him anymore. He shrugged and dusted himself lightly. At the moment, only his back was mostly protected from the elements, but… Well, it didn't really bother him. Perhaps if there was a police officer, he'd get arrested for indecent exposure… On this rock however, it wasn't a problem. Still, he noticed something strange :

« Am I more… muscular ? » He muttered to himself.

It felt like he'd gained a few pounds of muscles, which was weird. Not as weird as surviving a fall from several thousand meters of height, but weird nonetheless ! He looked back at the soldier who was still watching him, standing in place and trembling. It was obvious the man (or woman) couldn't move. With a frown, he told him (or her) :

« See what you did ? I've nothing else to put on, you know ? »

At that moment, Crys talked to him in his mind.

I think I can build something with these parts. Unfortunately, the FTL-drive is unrecoverable… Still, we might be able to leave this moon and broadcast a distress signal.

« A distress signal, huh ? I don't really want to hand up back in the hands of the Terrans… »

Not a problem. This region of space doesn't belong to them or have you forgotten ?

« Right… »

Crys' memories were basically his, it was silly to have the crystal remind him of something he already knew. His mind might have been more affected by the past couple of hours that he realized. Was it shock or another side-effect brought on by his bonding ? Time would tell, he supposed.

Meanwhile, under the helmet, the soldier was bewildered by the fact that the enemy was talking to himself. Perhaps, he wasn't as undamaged as he looked on the surface. Maybe it was his mind which was broken… He still needed to die, though ! If his energy weapon didn't work, he would use his hydro-cutter. The hydro-cutter was a rather impressive weapon shaped like a knife and used water pressure to cut. In order not to spray water everywhere, the flow of it would be contained behind some kind of force field that wouldn't hinder the cutting power. In short, it resembled a lightsaber somewhat, but with water and probably a little less effective.

Simon looked at his opponent who was now taking a close-quarter weapon and shrugged. He still didn't feel threatened. Idly, he wondered to himself whether he should trust this odd feeling. What if it was wrong ? Wouldn't that cause his death ?

As he did however, the Terran had already closed the distance between them and stabbed the cutter right toward his face. Briefly, Simon tensed up, only for the water blade to stop right on his eyelid. And it did so, without the slightest pain for him at all. On the contrary, he experienced once more this feeling of pleasure rushing through his body, albeit on a smaller scale.

It didn't deter the Terran just yet, though. For almost five whole minutes, he swung, stabbed, slashed, stroke with the pommel, his feet, knees, elbows, fists, even his head… And Simon just took it all. Without even moving.

The Terran couldn't understand… The sensation when he hit him… was odd, to say the least. If his opponent didn't feel any pain, then at least, he should ! Yet, it was like… he hadn't hit anything. Not like he swung into empty air but more like his movement was suddenly stopped by a wall of air… or his momentum was suddenly cancelled perhaps. To be honest, the Terran had never experienced something like this and it left him stumped !

On the other side, Simon was just as confused as the Terran. He watched him swing his blade and his limbs, yet when they touched him, there wasn't much strength behind them, if at all. Maybe the person wasn't very strong but still ! He should feel pain… Not that he wanted to, it was just… The situation left him very confused ! Moreover, the sensation from earlier continued and seemed to increase gradually with each hit. So much so that a grin started to stretch Simon's lips before he could help it.

Finally, after a while as the Terran pilot was getting winded, Simon lightly brushed the back of his hand against his opponent's forearm. It was just to stop him from stabbing him for a second and place a word or two… Only, as his hand made contact, he barely felt himself touching anything. He only heard the loud crack followed by the yell of pain of the pilot.

« Ouch ! Sorry about that ! I really didn't mean to. It's just… » Simon stopped. It was just what ? Even he didn't know. He felt… supercharged, maybe ? With seemingly boundless energy and strength. Instinctively, he started to realize that maybe he absorbed the energy from the shots and strikes and harnessing it somehow. In this instance, it directly translated by a sharp increase of his strength. So much so, in fact that a slight brush had broken the opposing Terran's arm.

In the past, or rather Simon's past life on 21st century Earth, Superheroes were a big thing. They had basically replaced religion for a certain part of the population… And he, too, rather liked those stories of people so much stronger than regular human as to seem being able to do anything they wished to. Perhaps, because he felt like he had no actual control over his live and he felt his time slowly ebb away toward his own end… In any case, he used the Internet to read comic books (or graphic novels) and watch movies about Superheroes (and their counterparts : Supervillains). He also regularly consulted the wiki pages about them or about superpowers in general.

So, he was slowly understanding what was happening with his body. He looked down at his hands, muttering to himself :

« Some kind of Energy absorption power ? The acid atmosphere hasn't killed me… Same for the shots and strikes. Chemical, light and kinetic energies… »

The so-called energy weapons were akin to blaster pistols and rifles, meaning they fired laser bolts, hence why it was light energy. But it probably wasn't just light…

« Maybe radiation and heat, too… »

To be honest, Simon never really paid much attention to the technical aspect of his weapons and even if he did, the Terran military kept a closed lid on their secrets. Their weapons and how they functioned were in that category, among many other things. Now, however, he was curious to know more… If his power was something related to absorbing energy, he needed to experiment and understand how it worked. Unfortunately, it was also extremely dangerous.

« Though, I do have this weird sense… »

He was feeling as if it was telling him that he wasn't in any danger. In his mind, it was kind of the reverse spidey-sense. How would it work if he was in danger ? Would it just go silent ? Moreover, unlike how it was portrayed or described in the comics, his sense wasn't like a buzzing in his head or a tingling or anything like that. No, to him, it just filled him with boredom. If he was more active or if he didn't pay attention to it, he probably wouldn't even have noticed it.

The young man was brought out of his musings by the groans of pain of his Terran compatriot. Well… Former compatriot.

« Again : sorry about that. I am… stronger than I remember. Probably a consequence of surviving a crash-landing on a desert and deadly moon without a protective suit… » Although he was letting his mouth run off on him for no reason, inwardly he was thinking hard about the situation.

The Terran was probably too injured to fly his starfighter off the ground, much less break free of the moon's orbit and bring himself (or herself - he still wasn't sure…) back to the Empire. Still, his fighter should have one of those emergency medical nanopack so he could probably patch the wounds up a bit for him/her to leave. The question now was : should he do that ? It was obvious by the reaction his mention of leaving the military had drawn out of the person how fanatic these people were. By these people, he also counted his/her buddies from the earlier chase in space. From what he could remember, there were four other starfighters… Probably just half a squadron. But if the person came back with news that Simon was alive, and worse, was deserting ? Not only the whole squadron, he risked having the research team dispatching more forces to find him, and possibly, Crys !

Simon didn't notice but when his mind reached this conclusion, his gaze hardened and he looked at the writhing person on the ground like a dead one. It was only Crys' voice who prevented him from just killing him or her.

It was not really a voice, or transmitted thoughts. It was more than that… and less. Like Simon, himself, was thinking to himself, yet he knew it wasn't himself at the same time. Probably another consequence of the bond that it was confusing to discern his own thoughts from the crystal's…

Nevertheless, Simon understood… For some reason, Crys didn't want him to kill the Terran. While before, the Terran conditioning made him a killer, now if he killed the person at his feet, it would make him a murderer.

So, instead, he asked him where his starfighter was and easily hoisted the writhing person on his shoulder before heading there. Then, he went back to the large crash site. That's when Crys went to work…