Unity by Carl Stubblefield (epub read online books TXT) 📕

Darik excelled at, it was scrapping. He and his brothers loved to wrestle and often the bouts escalated to actual blows until their mother came out to lay down the law. ‘Beat the hell out of each other, but don’t make more work for me. Either by bloodying your clothes, or making a mess.’

Roughhousing was strictly forbidden for that reason. The large field behind their house had the ground constantly churned up by their incessant bickering. A smile of anticipation curled the side of Darik’s lip.

Darik’s spatial awareness had grown by leaps and bounds since he had left the Academy. As such, he was always aware of anyone or anything within a certain space around him. The super who thought he was being stealthy didn’t realize that he displaced air with his movement, giving it a different density and thus changing the feel of the ‘field,’ as Darik liked to think about the space around him where he could move and maneuver with almost subconscious skill. The further removed the space, the more difficult it was, but up close, that was his wheelhouse.

He effortlessly calculated where the exit portal should be and when the attack came, it was easy to connect the two. The attack that was meant for his ‘unprotected’ head was redirected as he opened a portal behind him, allowing the punch to connect with Razor’s jaw. The ferocity of the attack surprised all involved. Darik narrowed his eyes. So they weren’t pulling any punches either, eh?

Everyone sprang into action simultaneously. The super behind Darik lunged and grabbed his arms, pinning them behind him. Another took the opportunity to punch him hard in the gut.

Darik just rolled his eyes as the punch was redirected into the kidney of his captor. Expecting the momentum to push him forward, he opened another portal right below him. It swallowed both him and the super holding him much less tightly after the unexpected hit from behind. The sensation of falling caused him to totally let go as he spun his arms to regain his balance.

Darik was used to the feeling and opened another quick portal. It winked closed as his previous captor passed through the air in its wake… landing on top of one of the others. They crumpled to the ground in a tangle of arms and legs.

He oriented the portal’s exit so he would be propelled horizontally to the ground, and aimed to kick another super in the back. When he thought he should connect, he just sailed through the form and landed badly on the ground, right in the center of the group. As he scrambled to get his bearings, his shoulder and back exploded in pain. It felt like he had been hit with a cannonball. The force of the impact pushed him down and he slid face-first into the dirt, plowing a small furrow.

A well-timed kick spun him around and he curled in on himself. As he rolled onto his side, he saw Razor’s eyes, wild and bloodshot. Blood dribbled down one side of his jaw and it definitely looked like it wasn’t hinging correctly.

“Your mouth can’t stop writing checks that your ass can’t cash!” Razor taunted. A neon blue glow emanated from his knuckles and Darik tried to shy away from the blow, but was not quick enough in forming his portal. The impact forced him eight feet into the ground, his portal tunneling downward. Without the time to create an exit portal, he was forced to ‘hold’ the material, a process that chewed up a huge chunk of his MP as the dirt and rock below him were displaced. He strained to open a portal at the limit of his field and forced out the dirt and rock, but the damage was done.

The effort caused him to spasm, and was akin to a dry-heave from hell. Blood vessels burst in his eyes, turning them a bright red, giving him a demonic look. At last he expelled all of the material, but it had taken a lot out of him, physically and mentally. He lay panting at the bottom of the hole and one of the supers began stomping, caving in dirt that tumbled down the incline.

Darik began to paw at the dirt like a dog, trying to make it out of the hole and push the dirt aside as it tumbled inward; while he was not claustrophobic, he didn’t want to be buried alive. He only had 25% of his MP left, and might not be able to force a portal if enough material surrounded him. He quickly realized that he was not going to make it.

Yuki turned and dove off of the branch, forgetting the physics of this world. She was coasting downward, but the lowered gravity was almost lazily pulling her towards the ground. The rabid lemurs were not hindered by this at all. They pulled themselves along branches and tree trunks, moving in short hops. They stopped on the branch she had just vacated, with more and more populating the space. There were hundreds of them, and their savage faces looked out of place on their fluffy, skinny bodies.

Yuki tried swimming through the air, pulling in a breaststroke that made no apparent change in her speed. She floated over the top of one of the smaller trees, its top barely slipping past her fingertips. She tried again and was able to grasp a little bit of a thin trunk and she yanked. Her hand stripped off the leaves and slid off. She was rewarded in gaining a little more downward momentum, but no trees were around her now. A loud Jurassic Park bellow from behind her made her look over her shoulder.

No, Yuki. Never look!

The rabid lemurs were gripping each other, holding tightly as their conjoined forms created a large gorillemur, for lack of a better term. The last few lemurs crawled into place on the head. Once again it threw out its chest and roared. The AI environments were