Page 88 of Silent Lucidity

Tenthil hit the ground hard on his shoulder and rolled, his momentum stopping only when his body struck another stationary vehicle. He shook off the pain; his armor had absorbed the worst of the impact, and he could not allow himself to be slowed by anything. Not until he was holding Abella again. He shoved to his feet, letting the auto-blaster fall away and hang by its shoulder strap, and drew one of his blasters and an arc grenade.

The footsteps of the advancing acolytes were almost silent—butalmostwas not enough to save them.

He activated the arc grenade and tossed it toward the approaching acolytes before ducking around the backside of the vehicle he’d landed against. A frenzy of hurried movement preceded the detonation. The garage was lit up for a fraction of a second by an intense white flash accompanied by the sound of crackling, buzzing electricity.

Tenthil drew a second blaster and stepped out from behind his cover to advance deeper into the garage.

Two acolytes writhed on the floor beneath a thin cloud of smoke. Three of their comrades lay nearby, their contorted, unmoving bodies covered in electric burns from which curled fresh wisps of smoke. The sizzling of their flesh was audible. Tenthil swung his attention away from them, turning toward the movement at the edge of his vision. He fired before allowing himself conscious thought. His shots ricocheted off the armor-reinforced hood of one of the vehicles across the garage, catching the acolyte hiding behind it in the face, but his other shots were too high to strike his secondary target.

Several shock-orbs darted toward Tenthil. He ducked under them—their electric thrum lifted his hair with static as they darted overhead—and hurried along the wall, directing his blasters toward the rows between the stationary vehicles.

The two nearest acolytes, kneeling behind separate vehicles on opposite ends of one of the rows, seemed unprepared for Tenthil’s aggressiveness. He fired a torrent of bolts at them with both blasters, enough to overwhelm their armor and ensure they wouldn’t survive the resulting wounds.

These assassins had been taught that planning and patience were the best means of achieving the cleanest possible kill, of reaching maximum efficiency, of guarding the Order’s secrets. Perhaps that was what they’d expected from Tenthil—clear-headedness and calm in the face of danger; a cold, methodical approach; an attempt at efficiency.

They’d likely expected him to creep into the temple like a shadow.

But he was no longer a shadow; he was a fiery harbinger of vengeance. He was the antithesis of the Void.

He continued his advance, swaying aside to avoid another acolyte’s shot before squeezing off five plasma bolts in quick succession; three struck his target’s armor, dissipating harmlessly, while the final two hit the acolyte in the face.

Tenthil swung his arms to his right, toward the movement in his peripheral vision. A pair of acolytes charged toward him along the wall; they fired their shock cannons just as he fired his blasters.

He had only enough time to heave his weight away from the wall and release the blasters—if his body seized, he’d risk shooting himself—before the shock orbs struck him in the chest. Electricity arced through his body, locking his muscles. He hit the ground hard, fingers clenching, back arching, and head tilting back against the concrete.

Growling, he forced his arms down, flattened his palms on the floor, and pushed himself up. Physical pain was meaningless to him; nothing they could do would compare to the anguish of losing Abella. Just the thought of never again seeing her, never again speaking with her, holding her, or touching her, was more than he could bear. He wouldn’t accept it.

The first of the advancing acolytes rounded the vehicle behind which Tenthil had thrown himself, holding his shock staff as a melee weapon—a pulsing beam of energy ran along its shaft from one end to the other, several centimeters away from the grip.

Tenthil slammed the heel of his boot into the side of the acolyte’s knee.

The acolyte lost his balance, his upper body tipping in the opposite direction of his buckling knee, and planted the butt of his weapon on the floor in an attempt to right himself. Scrambling to his feet, Tenthil grasped a handful of hair at the base of the acolyte’s skull. He kicked the bottom of the shock staff, avoiding its energy beam by a centimeter’s space.

With his only support knocked away, the acolyte fell forward, and Tenthil shoved hard to help him along. The acolyte’s face smashed into the next hovercar hard enough to leave a large dent on the door.

The second acolyte leapt over his collapsing companion and thrust his shock staff toward Tenthil, likely hoping to capitalize upon the relatively narrow space and catch his foe unable to maneuver away.

Tenthil grunted and twisted aside. The shock staff zipped through the air a hair’s breadth from his face; he swung a hand up and wrapped his fingers around the shaft, ignoring the thrumming of the energy beam near his fingers and nose, and pulled.

Off-balance after his attack, the acolyte stumbled forward. Tenthil thrust his free hand out and caught the acolyte by the throat, digging his claws into flesh. He squeezed.

The acolyte released a gurgling choke, released the shock staff from his nerveless fingers, and crumpled to the floor. Tenthil tore his hand away and flicked his wrist, splattering blood and a few tattered chunks of flesh onto the concrete. He tossed the shock staff aside with his other hand.

Without hesitation, Tenthil crouched and collected his discarded blasters. He dropped one into its holster and opened the other’s breach, dumping the partially depleted power cell and replacing it with another from his belt. Once the breach was closed, he continued along the wall toward the garage’s interior door. The remaining acolytes fired at him from the opposite side of the garage; they were clustered around one of the larger vehicles, using its bulk for cover.

Tenthil extended his right arm and squeezed off a few shots, forcing the acolytes to duck behind the vehicle, while he dropped his left hand to his explosives case. He withdrew a fusion charge and threw it across the garage. It bounced once and slid to a stop under the large vehicle. He lowered the barrel of his blaster and fired one more bolt—this time at the charge.

Tenthil dove behind the nearest hovercar as a pair of explosions boomed—one immediately after the other—and sent heated air, and melted, smoking debris outward from their point of origin. The red light of the detonating charge mingled with the blue of an exploding antigrav engine to briefly color the wall. Keeping his attention on the door leading into the temple, he drew and reloaded his secondary blaster one-handed. Pieces of the vehicle from across the garage clattered to the floor around him and thudded atop the hovercar at his back.

When the explosions’ echoes finally faded, only the sounds of crackling flames and the muffled, pained moans of the wounded remained.

Tenthil rose and proceeded toward the temple door. He encountered no other acolytes along the way.

The door was unlocked, and the dark hallway beyond it was deserted. He holstered his blasters and swung the auto-blaster to his front, taking it in both hands and steadying it against his shoulder. His heart pounded as he stalked the silent corridor; this battlefield was very different than the garage. Within the temple’s relatively tight quarters, amongst its abundant shadows, claiming the element of surprise became a matter of caution rather than aggression. The entire Order knew he was here now, without a doubt. The outcomes of his encounters within these walls would be decided by who detected their foe first—and who acted quickest.

The vestibule was also empty, and the double doors to the courtyard stood open. Tenthil kept against the wall on which the doorway was positioned as he approached the opening. He leaned to the side to check the corners in the cloister before stepping through.

Silence reigned in the courtyard. The dark, false sky loomed above, bearing no trace of its usual stars and galaxies. Tenthil walked forward. His skin itched with the sensation of being watched, of being too exposed, but he refused to stop. This was for Abella.

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