The Pursuit (8)
"Sir." In the Miniknog's fleet, the pilot turns to look at his Captain, "Their spaceship is picking up speed."
The Captain frowned and looked at spaceship slowly getting further from, "Tail them, maintain the same speed. If they speed up, we speed up. If they slow down, we slow down. Until we figure out what they are planning, maintain a safe distance."
"Yes, Captain." The pilot acknowledged the orders and relayed the message to the other spaceships.
...
"Protector, missiles incoming." SAIL warned with the robotic and emotionless voice.
"Lenny!" John called out in his PIPS.
"I have my eyes on them." John sighed in relief when he heard Lenny.
...
Lenny was on top of the spaceship, without a single piece of clothing or device to protect against the natural hazard of outer space.
But as a Novakid, he didn't need it. After all, he could easily survive in an environment without oxygen and fuel for long periods, and neither would his body suffer from the lack of gravity.
His body was only able to keep itself together because the metal 'Brand' on his face was made of a unique metal that creates a high magnetic field around his body that keeps his plasma within this thin 'skin.' Such skin would never be able to keep the hot plasma within. It needed the help of something else, and there comes the magnetic field that keeps his inside together and also prevents the high temperature of his inside to influence his surroundings.
With a rope that toes himself on the antenna that was on the spaceship, Lenny was watching as the missiles approached through the scope of his completely black energy sniper rifle.
Although he prefers standard weapons with matter projectiles, in the outer space, energy weapons reign supreme.
That's why despite his dislike for energy weapons, he brought himself to use one to save their skin in such a dangerous situation.
As he focused, the world seemed to slow down by a notch.
After going separate ways with John, Lenny trained his skill with the information he got from making John his guinea pig on the Iron Fist Arena.
It didn't take long before he somewhat mastered this ability of his, and now he got used at will without too much backlash.
*Bang*
Lenny pressed the trigger and sent a red laser flying towards one of the missiles, but he missed.
He wasn't bothered by the miss because to take down those things, Lenny would miss a couple of shots as he couldn't predict the random movements of the missiles and John's evasive maneuvers to dodge the barrage of projectiles and laser beams.
Lenny calmly focused once again and looked through his scope.
There were about eight homing missiles locked-on the spaceship, it would take a few seconds before they reach the spacecraft, Lenny had to take them all down before that could happen.
*Bang*
*Bang*
*BOOM*
Finally, after missing three shots, Lenny managed to destroy one of the eight homing missiles.
This was a huge step forward for him, as the previous time, Lenny missed a lot more shots before destroying a missile.
As he completely cleared his mind and only focused on the task ahead, the world seemed to disappear right in front of him.
In such a world, he created there was only him and his seven targets remaining.
*Bang*
*BOOM*
With a blank expression on his face, he calmly pressed the trigger as soon as the missile entered his crosshair again.
Lenny's whole body became like an emotionless machine that only knew how to shoot.
*Bang*
*BOOM*
There were only 5 left.
Lenny lost himself in that world of his that he didn't even felt the speed of the spaceship gradually increasing.
The other ships of the fleet also sped up, and they were now trying to catch up while throwing everything they got on John's ship.
But all this was nothing for Lenny that only continued to aim, shoot, destroy, reload robotically, and repeat.
He didn't realize at all that every time he pressed the trigger, at least a missile was destroyed.
The increasing number of homing missiles being thrown towards John's ship as they couldn't allow them to escape didn't bother at all the current Lenny.
The Captain of the fleet was swift to understand that their target was trying to run away and not planning some kind of trap, that's why he sent the order for the spaceships to go full force forward and destroy the spacecraft before it could get away from the FTL Jammer's reach.
...
"Lenny!? Lenny, do you hear me!?" John tried to contact Lenny, but despite them still being a call, he couldn't hear at all Lenny.
It was like he was dead. Still, John knew that it wasn't the case since he could see from the situation behind his spaceship that the missiles are destroyed before they could even get closer by some kind of red laser being fired from on top of his ship.
...
"Lenny..."
"Urgh..." Lenny slowly became aware of his surroundings when he heard a faint voice calling his name.
"Where am I?" He scanned his surroundings while asking himself. Lenny was sure that this wasn't where he was just a moment ago; after all, he was in what appeared to be a completely dark room without a single source of light beside himself.
As he was wondering what was happening, the place suddenly brightened up.
Lenny was surprised for a moment before taking in the changes.
It appeared that he was in some castle, right at a throne room.
There weren't many details he could see because the images he was seeing were very shadowy, barely visible.
In front of him, three figures were talking with each other.
Two of them were kneeling on the ground, while the last one was at the throne, looking down at those two beneath him.
"Your Holiness, you must kill him." One the shadows kneeling said with a slightly distorted voice, "Even though he's your brother, he cannot be allowed to live any longer."
"I agree." The one beside the shadow that just spoke agreed with him, "He's gaining too much support lately. He's going to tear the empire in two if this goes on."
The shadow in the throne stayed silent for a few seconds before speaking, "I'm the Cultivator now. I can't intervene with worldly matters; you two know this very well. As long what he does don't put us in the risk of extinction, I'm not allowed to make a move. I can't go against the old texts and rules written by the First Cultivator."