Chapter 15: Isthus They were all called to the council chambers the next morning. Vu, Tobias, Samantha, Shivana, and Kaitlyn were escorted there by Crash and his buddies. Sven was there to greet them. "I'm glad to see we're all doing well," he said. "I got the results in from those tests you guys took. We're ready to look over them now." He directed them to the main table. They all took seats and waited patiently. "Now, the doctor that gave you these tests was unable to come and give them to you personally..." "Wow," Crash interrupted. "Tobias, we didn't know you had that kind of effect on people." "Anyway, she told me to tell you them personally." He looked at Vu. "You are clean Vu. There is no way you would be able to obtain these abilities naturally." Vu sighed. "Ah well. So I can't read minds." "I see you're taking it in good stride. You also have average resistance to such attacks. You're normal." He turned to Shivana. "They say that you, my dear, are an interesting specimine. You have no abilities in this category. You're, for the most part, clean." "Oh," she said. "So how does that make me interesting?" "You're naturally immune to any attempts on you." She smiled. "Yes, you're ideal for guard detail, if you weren't so wrapped up in your lab work." Kaitlyn chuckled. "That's great. What about me?" "You're resistant as well. Not immune, just resistant. Your talents are non-existant." "Damn. Now I can't go probing through Samantha and Tobias's heads." Swift, who was with them, chuckled. "What's so funny?" "Nothing," she replied. "Speaking of Samantha," Sven continued. "She's been marked for healing." She quirked a brow. "Meaning?" "It's quite simple," Swift said. "You've got some psychic talent in healing. It's probably physical healing only - ya know, boosts in energy - but there's a small chance you can work your talents on mental healing." Sven nodded. "Would you be willing to train her in that, Swift?" She shrugged. "I've got maybe low skill in it. I could only train her so far. Besides, it has to be triggered first. I don't think she's done that yet." "All right. We can handle that." He took a folder from his desk. "Now we come to the part of the show that we're all anxious about." He looked at Tobias. "I'm gonna really torture you, my friend. I'm reading all of the results out." Tobias laughed. "Try me!" "All right!" He opened the folder. "Clairvoyance skills, none. Healing skills, none. Offensive skills, minimal. Telekenisis skills, low. Defensive skills...." He laughed. "Tobias, you've shocked them. They aren't able to chart your potential." Swift smiled. "That'll be a challenge." She turned to Tobias. "Congrats." He smiled. "Thank you. When does-?" He looked over his shoulder. "What's wrong Tobias?" Sven asked. "Did you pick that up?" "Pick what up?" "Swift?" "Yeah," she said. "I felt it too." He shook his head. "It's probably a passing thing. As I was saying, when does training start?" She smiled. "It already has." **************************************************************************** Somewhere deep in Raider territory, within the halls of their headquarters in their chief city of Skorara, a secret council met. They were the council assigned to deal with the menace of Lone Wolf. They waited patiently as a cloaked rat approached the ampitheater where the members sat. He fell to one knee and bowed his head. The head figured, whom was coated in shadows, looked at him. "Did you complete your mission, Iala?" he boomed. "I am sorry Lord Isthus," the rat replied. "He was too strong." "Too strong?" "He posesses psychic abilities. He disarmed my control over the doctor he was seeing." "So it wasn't because of your incompetance." "No, sir. I should have known about his talents. It was mostly my fault." "You are forgiven Iala. You will get another chance soon. You are dismissed." The rat smiled and left. "I so hate it when these sudden turn of events happen." "So what do we do now?" one of the elder members said. "The young human is proving too powerful." "Ah," Isthus said, leaning back in his seat. "That's the beauty part of it. He's powerful. Do you know what kind of damage we can do with that sort of power?" The council murmered amongst themselves. "The only problem is getting him into our custody and then breaking him." "But how are we to do that?" one of the other members said. "He's got more detail on him then the Lupus Theater Commanders. And Tak Norath is impenetrable since he's there." "So we will have to get him out of Tak Norath." "But how will we do that?" "It's easy. Tak Norath is a civilian town, right? If the civilians are getting killed because of the military, the military will move. We'll order strikes on the civilian parts." "Okay. I see how that will work. But what do we do after that? He's got that detail of his. He's too well protected." "I can account for that too." He got up. "Computer, display information on Lone Wolf's detail." An orb appeared in the center of the ampitheater. It displayed the profiles of Crash, Psycho, Bomber, Hack, Wrench, Kaitlyn, Samantha, and Swift. "This is his guard. They all have weaknesses. For example." Crash's profile grew to take up the whole of the sphere. "This one is the leader of the detail. He cannot handle the blasts from stun rifles. He'd fall pretty easily if we hit him with a blast or two." He waived his hand. Bomber's profile appeared. "This one has a slight problem with keeping within our reality. He phases out if he's put under too much stress." He waived his hand once more. Psycho's profile replaced the view. "This one will be our biggest problem. He posesses an immense physical strength and does not go down that easily." "So how do we stop him?" "Have you forgotten the law of body? Strong body, weak mind. Iala may posess some use in this mission." "Okay, we know how to deal with his guard detail. But Lone Wolf is a force to recon with even without them. What do we do about that?" He waived his hand. Samantha's profile came forward. "Lone Wolf is highly fond of this girl. As a matter of fact..." He pushed a button. Samantha's picture was joined by Kaitlyn and Swift's picutes. "He is fond of all these women. But the skunk in particular. If we want to keep him under wraps, we need to get her into our clutches. He'll fall shortly after." He waived his hand and the sphere disappeared. "All we have to do, gentlemen, is get him out of Tak Norath. We shall deal with him after we do that." He turned and left. **************************************************************************** Tobias was called to Sven's office that afternoon. It was urgent business, so his training would have to wait. "What's up Sven?" he asked as he entered. "Bad news," Sven said. "We're about to have company." He turned his screen to him. "We've got underground transports appearing inside the front lines. They're headed this way." "Good," he said. "I haven't shot anything in a while." "I'm glad to hear it. We've re-equipped your jet bike with a special anti-tank cannon. It's waiting for you down in the hanger." "When are the transports due?" "Half an hour. You can intercept them in time, right?" "Of course Sven! You should know me better by now!" He gave an impish grin. "Go!" Sven said, laughing. "Kill something." The plains around Tak Norath were vast and empty. It'd make spotting a fleet of transports easy to find. He scouted overhead, watching patiently for any sign of military movement. "Sven," he called in. "I'm not seeing anything." "They must be underground," Sven replied. "Shoot an EMP bolt into the ground. It should force them to resurface." "Aye sir." He aimed the EMP cannon and fired. The bolt flew into the ground, dispersing upon impact. He waited a few seconds. The grounds soon upheaved as transports of various sizes surfaced. "I've got contacts," he said, arming his anti-tank cannon. "Wasting them now!" He aimed and fired. Transports exploded. He set the cannon to manual aim and spread the joy around. He saturated the area with fire from the cannon. "Sven, there are too many." "Reinforcements en route." "Thank you." He continued to fire the cannon off. Suddenly, transports he wasn't firing on blew up. He looked back towards the city and saw a line of tanks heading his way. "Sven, what are those?" "Tank killers. They've got ammo specially designed for destroying tanks." "Ah." He finished off the last of the transports. "Mission accomplished. Heading back." **************************************************************************** The council met again the following day. "Well Isthus," one of the younger members said. "Your assault on the city worked out well. If they took out that many transports before it was able to reach the outer wall of Tak Norath, we don't stand a chance of assaulting them. So what do we do now?" Isthus growled. "I'm aware of that. I've got a contigency plan on hand you know." "Oh, this better be good." "It is, actually." He got up. "Computer, display cyber assassin schematics." The holographic sphere reappeared, displaying the schematics for a cyborg. "Isthus, I thought you said you wanted to capture him, not kill him." "I am going to do that. Would you like to know how?" "Please." He waived his hand. The cyborg drew two massive cylinders from it's sides. "Our missile assassins are effective. Lupus fears these models because they can take out air and land based support. They will wait for them to come before attempting to destroy these droids." "So?" "But if the base is in the middle of a civilian city..." "That puts the city at risk," a second member exclaimed. "They'll move the base." "Exactly. If we send out a bunch of these assassins without ammunition, they'll assume they're coming for Lone Wolf and move the base. We can recall the droids and go in for the capture." "Perfect! That makes the job easier." "Disperse 20 or so droids. Send them after Lone Wolf. After they move the base, have the droids return." He turned for the exit. **************************************************************************** "I'm sorry to be calling you in this early in the morning," Sven told Tobias the next day as he entered the office. "But we've got a serious problem." "What would that be Sven? More transports?" "Worse. We've got a fleet of cyborg assassins coming this way. I'm assuming they're after you." He chuckled. "I swear Sven, you guys suck at inner security. Oh well, I'll go get my jet bike-" "That's not going to work." "Why not?" "These cyborgs are armed with missile launchers. They would easily tear your jet bike, and you, into shrapnel." "Okay, so what do we do?" "Usually, we wait for the cyborgs to come and take them out then. But that plan has a kink this time." He looked out the window. "The city. They'll destroy it trying to get to me." He shook his head. "Sven, prepare to move the base." "Okay. We can handle them that way. That'll work." "We'll leave Vu and Shivana here. They'll be safer that way. We should also bring only one unit with us in case the cyborgs decide to attack the city anyway." "Understood. We'll prep the base for movement." The base rolled out of town shortly after that. The group went with it. A highly trained unit was due an hour after they set up camp. Tobias, Samantha, Swift, and Crash decided to watch over the entire scene from the hill they were settling around. "Are you sure this is going to work?" Crash asked. "I'm positive. The droids aren't due for another two hours. The unit we've got coming this way is well trained and will be here before then." "Yeah, but can we handle that?" "Dude, don't forget who knows how to control the rail gun. And don't forget how powerful that thing is." He laughed and layed back on the grass. "I know. I forgot. You're right man. I'm not gonna worry about it." He smiled and turned to Swift. She had a worried look on her face. "What's wrong Swift?" "I've got this bad feeling something's about to happen." "Oh?" "Yeah. I get the feeling they wanted us to move. The Raiders are about to pull the dirty on us. How, I don't know. But I know they will." He nodded. "I noticed that too. We'll have to keep our guard up." **************************************************************************** "Lord Isthus," a messenger said, opening the chamber doors. "What is it?" Isthus growled. "We just got word on the Lone Wolf situation. The base is parked outside of Tak Norath." "YES!!! Have them prepare my transport, boy. Tell them to put my highest skilled unit on it and arm them with stun weapons. And when you're done with that..." He tossed him a bottle. "Enjoy yourself. Take the week off." "Yes sir! Thank you sir!" He closed the door behind him and raced down the hallway. Isthus looked into his vanity mirror. "Lone Wolf, your mine now. You will work for us. I will make sure of it." He put his uniform jacket on. "Mine to control. I will rule this planet in a month!" **************************************************************************** It was 15 minutes until the unit arrived when Swift's ears twitched. She looked around. "What's wrong?" Tobias asked. "Did you guys hear that?" she asked. "No," Samantha replied."What was it?" Her ears twitched again. "There it was again." Tobias nodded. "I felt that too. I don't know what it is, though." He got up. "I think we should go find the others. We should be around them if anything happens." They all got up and started down the hill. They found the others and went to the mess hall. Tobias cooked a meal for them and they sat down for a peaceful meal. The peace was disturbed, however, by a sudden tremor. "What the hell was that?" Crash asked. "It's happening again," Swift said. "I'm getting that bad feeling again." "I'm getting it too," Tobias added. "Something's up." He picked up his rail gun and put it on his back. "Guys, are you ready to fight?" Psycho laughed manically. "Ready to crush and grind." "Good to hear." The ground trembled again. "It's getting closer. Everybody outside. Samantha, Kaitlyn, you stay behind us. Swift, get your psy talents ready. Everyone else, be ready to fight for your lives." It was high noon. They all had their hands near weapons, ready to strike. The ground tremored once more. "Swift," Tobias said. "Are you picking up anything?" She looked around. "Nothing. I can't detect- wait, hold on...." Suddenly, Psycho grabbed his head. "GHAH!!!!" He fell to his knees. "There's a psychic imbalance," Swift said. "It's coming from beneath the hill!" Tobias drew his rail gun and shot at the hill. It exploded. "That should take care of it." "No, it's still there!" Just then, the ground upheaved and an underground transport rose from the ground where the hill had been. "It looks like one of those NOD transports from my game," he commented. He aimed his rail gun. "But it won't live very long." The transport door opened and expelled a stream of stun gun blasts in their direction. "AGH!!!" Crash screamed out as he fell to the ground. Bomber, Hack, and Wrench followed after. Psycho wasn't going to be any help. So it was just Swift and Tobias. "Ready Swift?" "As I'll ever be." She concentrated and fired from her hand a beam of some sort. It flew into the transport. "That should do it." The beam suddenly came back and struck her. She fell. The transport started to shake and troops began to pour out. Tobias aimed the rail gun wildly, but didn't pull the trigger. The last person to come out was a massive lion. He wore some sort of metal face plate and wore what appeared to be an officer's uniform. Tobias aimed the gun at him. "Who are you?" The lion chuckled. "I am Lord Isthus, high council of the Raiders. You're coming with me, Lone Wolf." The rail gun charged up. "Not if I kill you first, Isthus." "Oh, I wouldn't do that if I were you." "TOBIAS!" Samantha cried out. Tobias turned. A soldier had her in a headlock and had a pistol to her head. "Don't you dare," he growled, drawing his own pistol and aiming. "You shoot, I'll kill you." "Try me," the soldier said. "Try me!" Tobias growled and started to press the trigger. Isthus, however, had snuck up on him and dealt a blow to the back of his neck. His expression went blank and he dropped the gun. He fell to his knees and then face first on the ground. "TOBIAS!!!!" Samantha cried. "He'll be fine, my dear," Isthus said. "Load them all onto the transport. Set a course back to home. We got what we came for." He turned back for the transport as the troops gathered the fallen.