Interludes
I-4
NYSSA
Nyssa cursed as she fell.
The valley was steep. And it was slippery. The rain lashed incessantly around her. She rose behind the giant rock that had slowed her fall. As the pain shot up her legs, she closed her eyes. After about a minute she felt better. The pain vanished completely. Her clothes clinging to her wet skin, she started back up the hill.
She used the form to climb. It was a long way up and she would be needed at camp soon.
Nyssa liked to train alone. Although she had been assigned the rank of Captain, the Fell Guard had insisted that she keep her squad small. At the moment her crew had eight members – a squad big enough to commandeer a fast vessel. A fast vessel was quite small, but could be swiftly maneuvered in dangerous situations. It caused maximum damage with limited crew.
Compared to a foot soldier, the skills of the naval crew in weapon training were limited. Her crew didn’t really care about that. In fact, if a naval soldier left the safety of his vessel during a battle, he would be crushed in seconds by the enemy foot soldiers. Chealena had a very strong Naval army. Their vessels were the best in the world. But when it came to survival skills, her crew had none. She had watched her previous captains and fellow mates die in the battles before. It hadn’t really bothered her. That was a bit cold. Now that she was the captain, she needed the responsibility. Not for the crew, but for herself.
She dropped the form, her energy renewed. She liked engaging two weapons asymmetrically at once. The shadows returned around her – four of them. She ripped one of the ten needles stuck to left ankle with her left arm, while the right hand grabbed the long knife behind her back. She tightened her grip on the knife, taking a slight jump to her right and swinging around to the left. Wet dirt splashed her robes only to be washed off by the lashing rain. She stuck the knife into the ground, the wet mud parting easily under the pressure, and did a back flip. The knife slid further into the ground and she abandoned it. She completed the flip and slammed the needle with both hands into the first shadow’s head. It disappeared.
The other three shadows shifted their positions and circled her. They resembled tall humans and were projected by her form. Nyssa dug her wet hands for the needles by her ankle again and picked two needles by their edges – one in each hand. She twisted them together to make a single weapon and ran for the shadowy figure right in front of her. The other two outlines moved in step to the center, taking rhythmic steps at a constant speed. She would have to fix that bug and make the attacks completely random. The attacks were too easy to anticipate.
The second shadow crept back as Nyssa swung the two-edged needle at it. She ignored the figures three and four and rolled over ahead. The force needed to kill the second shadow was larger than the first, that was how her simulation worked. Each kill intensified the strength of the remaining copies. The total energy was the same – it was just that the strength of the four shadows from earlier was now distributed between the remaining three.
Nyssa ducked under the sword of the third figure and skidded to a halt. The second one had stopped moving and all three silhouettes again formed an equilateral triangle around her. Predictable.
She ran to her right, making for the center of the one side of the triangle, a shadow on each side. The figure on the other end would have to catch up. Since all three of them moved at the same speed toward their quarry, the closest two ran to her at the exact same time. Nyssa lunged with her renewed strength and twisted in the air. She smacked the closest two together with her stretched arms, knocking their heads together in the process. One of them caught her leg and pulled. Nyssa crashed to the ground as the two shadows fell behind her.
The last dark shape was still running at her. She unsheathed her second knife from her back crouching on her left leg. Her right foot shook from her fall, the silent ringing continuing up her leg. Using her right hand and left leg to move, she approached the running shape and swung at its torso. The shadow cut her deeply across the face rather than defend against her attack. Another bug. She thrust her long knife further into its belly, making it completely disappear. The forms on the ground recovered faster, their strength enhanced further from the death of the second shadow.
Nyssa breathed. Her leg was healing but it was a slow process. The cut on her face stung. The form could only heal one wound at a time. And it was slow. The wounds healed in the ordered they were mapped. Yet all projections of the form, including the shadowy figures of the simulation, recovered fast. It was unfair.
She shifted her focus from the metallic smell of her blood to the two shadows in front of her, ready to face them. Before she could make her move, however she felt the nudge of the form – a warning. The dark figures disappeared and the form spoke in her mind.
Not alone.
It was weird that Novius, the form, thought of her as being alone when he was with her. But that was how he thought. For him, they were one being. Nova was part of Nyssa.
“Who is it?,” she asked.
Clasira.
The reply was quick in her head. Nova preferred to respond non-verbally, even though he could engage her in a normal conversation. It often made Nyssa think that her mind had a parasite. Fortunately, Nova kept out of her thoughts.
Clasira was one of her crew mates. She was probably looking for Nyssa so the crew could walk up to the commissary for dinner. Nyssa appreciated Nova for stopping the training. She was exhausted and would need food and rest to complete the healing process. Additionally, it was imperative that no one knew of her training or her form. Her abilities would raise more questions. Well, Nova’s abilities.
Nova shuddered. Although he was not human, the way he expressed himself was becoming more human in the last few days.
“Don’t worry. No one is going to find out about you,” she said softly.
Nyssa heard Clasira calling out to her in the distance. She was wearing her usual uniform with a tight cloth wrapped around her head. In the rain, she just looked like another dark silhouette to Nyssa.
“I’m here,” Nyssa said. “Coming.”
As she walked to where Clasira stood, Nyssa realized that the young girl had been running. She had a round face and long auburn hair.
“Captain,” the girl murmured. She held her hand to the stitch on her side, panting. “Captain, its … your face!”
Nyssa grimaced, realizing how she must look with the cut across her face. She brushed her hand against the cut, wiping some of the blood.
“It’s okay, Clare. Barely hurts anymore,” she said. Healing the cut now would not be wise. She stopped the process.
“If you’re sure, captain. Come, we need to hurry. It’s happening again,” the girl said. She motioned toward the camp.
the Broken Dragon 