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

tiger leaping toward him, some of the neon light glinting off the metal fangs rapidly approaching.

“Aww, crap…”

Chapter Forty-Nine

Eye of the Tiger

Gus tried to dodge out of the way but the tiger was so massive it still bore him down. He was carried backward with the momentum and his head hit the ground with enough force to make his vision blur. Nausea swept over him as his headache returned in full force. His hybrid armor had shielded him somewhat, protecting his head enough so that it didn’t crack like a watermelon. He felt shaken, but not winded from the impact.

A high-pitched squeal emanated from his shoulders as the tiger flexed its claws, only to find them scraping harmlessly on the gunmetal gray of hybrid-Nth concentrated there. Gus could feel a low rumble through the legs of the tiger as it turned toward him and began to growl.

Gus felt a hot and humid breath on his neck as the tiger bit down, trying to clamp down as Gus’ hybrid armor moved to resist the killing force. The tiger tried to reposition its jaws but was thwarted at each attempt. Then it targeted his neck. Despite his armor’s best efforts, each time the tiger clamped down, the force of its jaws closed his airway as the pressure encircled his entire neck. If the tiger had only closed down consistently, Gus would have been choked out in no time.

His hands flew up, his right arm finding only short bristly fur. He punched at the creature but it did no damage from his prone position. His left hand slapped against the metal housing on the tiger’s chest and side, ripping and grabbing madly for something to gain some advantage, but the metal casing remained intact, protecting the delicate components inside.

Gus saw that his shroud only had 5% battery life left. They would be exposed and detectable as supers regardless, so might as well use his powers. He activated Xyzzy for the first time in what felt like forever. As expected, both he and the tiger teleported, but Gus used a push from Advanced Flight to spin them so the tiger was underneath. While he hovered there, the tiger fell away from him.

Instinct took over and the large cat tried to twist to land on its feet, but the distance was too short and the large beast landed right on its shoulder, mid-turn. There was a crunch followed by sparking and a scraping sound as the tiger’s right foreleg collapsed.

Suddenly, the tiger turned and a beam shot out of its eye. The red blast bore straight into Aurora’s back and quickly tunneled through her to shoot out the other side. She dropped and her electrical attack at Kenway pop-fizzed into nothing. She fell hard to her knees, gouts of blood starting to pour out of the wound in her abdomen. Gus tried to fly over to help, but another angry red beam sliced through the air, bringing his attention back to the animal.

How did it have enough intelligence to do that? Was this a hybrid gone too far, rather than a cyborg tiger?

Before he could think too much, the tiger spun and began to charge, much more quickly than expected with its damaged leg. It leapt into the air and before Gus could review his abilities, he activated Zeno Effect. He had only used this once before, but it froze the tiger midair, and it was easy to sidestep its trajectory.

The eyes of the tiger rotated to watch him as Gus cycled through his abilities. When this was all over, he really needed to focus on using every one of his abilities and training them to be used more intuitively. Finding one he liked, he activated Ice Shard. Two daggers of ice appeared, clearing the air of a good portion of its ambient fog. Gus plunged them into the tiger’s side and sliced.

One broke off at the hilt, hitting a rib that appeared to be reinforced with some metal as well. The other sunk home and the tiger erupted in a closed-mouth roar, still unable to move. He sawed it back and forth, trying to do as much internal damage as possible, but his overzealousness caused the blade to break off within the tiger.

Damn it! This would be a different story if Jet was here.

He held a hand out and activated Krackle. Balls of energy formed in his hand and Gus scrambled up to aim them at the tiger as his body went rigid and the ability fizzled out. Gus collapsed onto the ground, face falling into a puddle as his body continued to buck and tremble. He could see Kenway pointing finger guns at him, the ends sparking with blue electric energy, before turning to face off against Tempest again.

His display showed a stunned debuff and a counter with fifty-seven seconds remaining. Gus looked up at the tiger suspended above. It was watching him with anticipation as it hung in the air. It could have been his imagination, but he thought he saw the tiger smile.

Another wave of pain stabbed into Gus’ brain as he lay there in the dirty rainwater. The exertion and use of his powers flared his headaches to life like a beast awoken. With the pain, Gus found that he couldn’t focus on his abilities at all. They felt slippery and unmanageable.

The more he reached to activate something, anything, the deeper he felt a hot poker of pain stab into his temples. Letting go for a bit, the wave of pain receded. When he tried to focus again, he couldn’t even open his display. The countdown timer for his debuff appeared to go even slower. Forty-nine… forty-eight… forty-seven.

Hazarding a look, he saw that the tiger was in a different position, but as he kept his attention on it the movement slowed. Looking at the tiger’s debuff, he was reminded of what Zeno Effect’s conditions were:

Zeno Effect: Focusing on the quantum state of an object or target will freeze its