The laughter ends and silence reigns again. A heartbeat, then another the floodlights flair back on, crimson, bathing the yard in blood coloured light. The roofs around them now occupied. Vampires. Dozens of them, if not hundreds. There auras wash over the Network operatives. Predatory, hungry, while their eyes gleam with cruel amusement.
Hold formation!” Bernardi shouts “Defensive form...” but he does not finish. Something hits him. A blur of red faster than sight. His body slams in to a wall with the sound of breaking bones and shattering concrete. A man in dark baroque attire standing beside Bernardi's unmoving form. His aura pushing down on them with a force no one of them has felt so far as he is leaning down and grabbing the DTOs head. Under the shocked gaze of the suppressed network operatives the Vampire twists and then pulls as Bernardi's head comes of with almost casual ease. Romy scrams as her gunfire shatters the air and pandemonium breaks out.
“That's not silver” Melissa voice is hoarse. As she pulls back. “No. That's something worse” Alexander answers raising his cleaver as the vampires descend from the roofs. More auras washing over them, cold, cruel and hungry as more gold rank vampires reveal themselves. This is not a fight for them. It is a demonstration. One lands in the middle of a section, a lazy gesture of him and the air detonates. Human body's twist mid air as blood exits their body in a violent torrent. Raining down in slow motion. Another is leaping over the rooftops, grabbing shipping containers with red strings and hurling them like Javelins. Each impact turns armored trucks in to molten shrapnel. A women half made of shadow dances through soldiers and essence magicians in a macabre waltz of blood and darkness. Each step ending another life, adding a note of silence to the battle.
Sound collapses around Melissa, too dense, too loud, too wrong. Her perception power Whispering Words overwhelm. Every vibration like a nail scraping over her skull. Staggering she presses her palms against her ears, tries to dial her perception down but even breathing seems impossible in the chaos. Alexander grabs her by the arm and pulls her back. His enhanced Power attribute treating her more like a doll than a human as he pulls her behind a burning transport. Melissa!” he shakes her “Stay with me!” she staggers, tears running down her face “The sound. Its wrong. They just toying with us” she looks past him over the cover and he follows her gaze. One of the golds shrugging of a magically enhanced artillery shell before he rips through the offending tank. Liquid fire spills across the ground, igniting corpses like paper. “We cant win this” his voice is restraint, resigned. Her Perception settles finally as she answers “then we survive”. They move through a hole that a thrown container ripped through a wall away from the fight. Voices scream in the radio over one another “section four down!” “Sector delta compromised. Loosing containment!” “Retreat! Retreat! All operatives withdraw to fallback point 3!” But orders are useless, no one is listening. The battle is already a slaughter.
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They keep moving, breath shaking as Melissa stops. Through the din, more feeling than hearing. A strange pulse, faint, human. A cluster of survivors, pinned between burning wracks, ruined buildings and other... things. She and Alexander exchange a glance. “lets get them out” she says determined. He raises his cleaver, a tight grin on his lips “That's my girl” he starts his charge, roaring, defiant. A madman between gods
Melissa follows in his shadow, her aura flaring, a crescendo just one tone of. He bursts through a wall, his cleaver falling like a gate, as Unstoppable Force combined with Crimson strike enough to cut the bronze rank vampire beneath it in half Telekinetic Barrages and Shrieking Lances hurl past him, hurting and killing ghouls that want to rush past the fighting mountain. For a few precious moments they stem the tide. Two humans defying the inevitable. Then something is hurled through the building they fight alongside. Stone and steal falling as it collapses, pushing them apart. “Alex!” she screams “Go!” he bellows back. “I'll take care on this side!” She stumbles through the shadow, still looking for a way back. Sounds echoing around her like a maze. Then she feels it. The absence of it, a point of stillness, hidden from her senses. The aura following its discovery is not gold. Its smaller. but its silver rank still towers over her, taunting.
“so the songbird sings alone” he whispers but his words are clear as glass. She stumbles back her voice shaky, terrified under his gaze “then better listen closely.”
