Monkey Trick

The Eye, predictably, made the first move, continuing her tuck and roll while drawing two knives with diamond blades, found her feet and lunged for the hovering spellcaster. In the fraction of a second she was in mid-air, her precognitive senses registered the danger, but gravity and momentum had sealed her fate.

She ran into a ward, a circle of symbols projected onto the ground by Demonslayer's will, that discharged their curse in a corona of coded light. Every nerve in the Eye's body registered pain; her muscles cramped, and she fell to the ground, writhing.

Demonslayer casually ignored the two lightning bolts that crackled past her head and turned to face Thresher. She floated towards him, her hands crackling with malign power. The running lights on Thresher's cyborg body flickered, dimmed, and went out. His internal stabilizing gyro kept him upright for a second before he tipped over to fall on his face. Another pair of lightning bolts whizzed past the hovering Demonslayer, struck her ship, and discharged into the ground. She turned to face down Jolt.

"You play at competence, Jolt -- in reality, you are a fool. You don't know how your powers work, do you? You can't hit me with your lightning because I'm not grounded."

A hand grabbed Demonslayer's left boot.

"What, like this?" said Arsenal, eyes closed, crawling on the ground. Demonslayer hissed as one of Jolt's bolts hit her dead-center, discharging into Arsenal's arm. She fell to the ground and collapsed.

Arsenal sat up and shook his smoking forearm. "Ow."

Demonslayer was lying, still and seemingly unconscious, on the ground. Jolt watched her carefully as Arsenal stood up and blinked his eyes. "Oh good. I can see. I'm gonna go reboot Thresher before he suffocates."

He walked over to his cybernetic comrade, opened a panel in Thresher's chest, and pressed the recessed reset button. Thresher's cybernetic body beeped once, and his running lights came back on.

Jolt scowled at the old woman lying on the ground before her, as the Eye rose to her feet and rubbed her neck.

Jolt said, "All right, let's get her into a holding cell."

A few moments later, Honor Guard met with Orest Kelrast in his office. The Captain was livid.

"What is the matter with you people? We're supposed to hold a spellcaster? How!?"

They were watching a view-screen provisionally attached to the stained grey wall with a few lumps of poisonous-looking neon blue putty. On the screen, Demonslayer lay motionless on a sick bed, dressed in a paper hospital robe. Around her bed, monitoring equipment relayed data to the base's computer systems. A small window inset into the video stream showed her psi activity, heart rate, and respiration, a gently fluctuating set of undulating lines.

The Eye looked at Demonslayer's vital signs and frowned. "I don't see any signs of shock. It looks like she's sleeping. Were there any electrical burns on her body?"

"Nope." Kelrast frowned. "Her skin-suit had a conductive layer. I don't think that lightning bolt did a thing to her."

Jolt looked annoyed. "What? But why did she go down?"

Kelrast snapped, "Who cares!? The problem is, what do we do when she wakes up?"

Arsenal looked at Kelrast coolly. "Let's sedate her and send her up to the star-port on a shuttle. They have proper holding cells and competent staff."

Kelrast's eyes narrowed and he scowled at Arsenal. Arsenal appeared completely oblivious to the fact that he had insulted the Captain. "You arrogant chunk of vat-meat, you're calling me incompetent! Get out of my office!"

Arsenal turned to Jolt. "I'm going to the shipyard, and see how the repairs are coming along."

Jolt nodded curtly, and Arsenal left. Kelrast settled back in his char and said, "Looks like you losers will be staying here and looking after your prisoner. Now get out!"