Sidekick by Carl Stubblefield (10 best novels of all time .txt) 📗

her back to the arena. They faced off when they got there and, at the signal, Aurora took off. He had never seen her move so fast. To compound this, she intermittently dropped what amounted to a flashbang before she moved and Gus could not see where she had gone. Solid hits came from behind, his side, and one even atop the crown of his head. He could feel the armor undulating at the sites of impact, spreading the force out over a larger surface area and absorbing a good portion of the force.

Aurora grabbed his arm and twisted, trying to take him down using her momentum and weight. But she only ended up dangling off the end of his arm like he was a statue. Gus tipped his hand down and she slid off as the armor shifted. She couldn’t hold on anymore, the outer coating becoming smooth and almost oily. After sliding off, it reverted to its normal configuration.

An evil grin settled on Gus’ face as he rushed to attack and Aurora barely had time to spring back to her feet. She launched a huge Ion Storm at his chest and the armor began to glow with a purple aura. Leaving off her attack, the armor looked unscathed. Then she aimed for his head, and the mask reformed and encased Gus’ face moments before the shower of colored sparkles washed over him. The view Gus got reminded him of the end credits of Buck Rogers in the 25th Century as sparks blasted against his display. It was oddly soothing. A red blip on his minimap ruined the moment.

“Guess who’s back,” Gus said.

“Shady? Or is it Backstreet?”

“I wish. Looks like they’re sending in a lot more this time. They’re in a formation with two groups, but at least ten total.”

“Let’s see how they like my little friends,” Aurora said with anticipation. “I linked the interface so that I can access them remotely,” she said as she walked to the exit.

Gus followed her and they exited the manor onto the courtyard.

Aurora was continually moving her hands, sweeping left and right, hitting virtual buttons invisible to Gus as she accessed some system she had set up.

As if in response, automated drones appeared on Gus’ display, their icons showing their flight out of the manor. They made a beeline to intercept the supers. A small window showed their viewpoint as they progressed, Gus and Aurora making their way out of the manor.

Due to their small size, the few shots that came their way flew wide. In response, the drones spread apart, encouraging the enemies to waste even more ammo trying to hit the tiny targets.

They burst out the door and Gus activated the blast doors to close. Colorful weapons of different energies flickered in the distance. Since the drones were out of eyesight, Gus had to zoom in his display to see what the drones were doing. There were two clusters of supers, a forward party and one lagging behind. The drones split as well to meet both sets of enemies, his interface highlighting them in the magnified view. Instead of flying at the supers and detonating, they took position about ten feet above them.

“They’ve totally missed them,” Gus complained. “Is the signal too far away?”

“Wait for it.” Aurora held up a finger.

An orange mist emanated from the drones and they dropped among the supers who batted them away as the cloud settled around them.

“What was that?”

“I had the cafeteria cook up some debuff gel pods, then made some diffusers at the Foundry and attached them to some targeted drones.”

“What kind of debuffs?”

“Everyone in that cloud just lost half their MP and their MP regen rate is cut in half as well!”

“Noice!” Gus said in a singsong voice.

“I call it ‘The Showstopper,’” she said with pride.

“They’re going to be pissed!”

A projectile shot out, flying erratically.

“That really threw off their aim!”

“Gus, I don’t think they’re shooting at us.”

The missile hit the mountain in which the manor was encased, rocks exploding off.

“Are they insane? I thought they wanted the manor or something inside!”

“These guys are probably loose cannons, literally. They may not be following orders strictly. These are mercs, remember?”

Another missile shot toward the tower.

“Aw hell to the no!” Gus said as he took off to intercept the missile.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Love Missile F1-11

Reaching the missile, he barely erected a shield as it detonated early against its surface. The explosion shattered the shield and Gus went flipping through the air, barely catching himself activating Advanced Flight before hitting the ground. Gritting his teeth, he flew back toward the supers. Five of them were aboard small craft that looked like flying jet-skis. There were mounts underneath the contraptions that were the source of the missiles.

Gus reached out, attempting to use Absorb, but he was too far away. Krackle, on the other hand, turned out to be very effective. The supers scattered on their jet-skies. He wasn’t sure what to call them but patted himself on the back for thinking of the name.

Krackle appeared to have some kind of homing ability as the balls of energy followed their targets, gradually decreasing in size before winking out. The second wave of supers could be seen behind the first, four supers being ferried by flyers. They were still a way off, so Gus felt pressured to stop this first wave of idiots from firing more missiles.

One buzzed by him, peppering him with some kind of slugs. He expected a burst of pain, but the bullets slowed before they hit and flattened about a millimeter from his skin, hitting some invisible barrier.

Before he could discern what was happening with the bullets, he threw out a Warp bubble on reflex and crushed the undercarriage of his attacker’s jet-sky. It managed to keep flying but it was slowly losing altitude. The missiles, now twisted wrecks, didn’t detonate for some reason.

Gus laughed as the super repeatedly leaned forward, trying to coax a little more forward momentum out of the jet-sky that clearly