Out of the Black - Lee Doty [71]
"I asked if perhaps the damper isn't at full power."
"I just turned it off so I could hear you."
Exasperating. For what seems like the twelfth time today, Ivo tries to marshal enough energy to get angry with his son. No use. He ends up laughing. "All right, if Issak is crazy enough to let him go, you guys can hang out at my house tonight."
"You hear that? Movie night!"
Oh no, not that again. "Maybe you should go to Issak's penthouse?"
Those two and a movie could mean only one thing. Ivo would end up stuck between his sons, watching Roy Batty crush the head of his creator, a mad genetic engineer type named Tyrell. During the uncomfortably long scene, his two sons would steal partially concealed glances at him and each other, it would be a big menace-off, replete with sneers and winking until one, then both of them started laughing like the loveable buffoons they were.
The things we do for love.
"No Blade Runner!" Ivo decrees, gesturing emphatically.
"You hear that, Bro'? Dad says it's Blade Runner night!" Roy laughs, steering the car left and reaching for the damper, mission accomplished.
The end of the world- you'd thik it would crowd everything else out of his mind, yet here he sits, mind lingering on his wonderful, frustrating sons. Ok, he's glad they could spend some time together tonight. Together, they will save the world somehow, but Ivo is only concerned with saving it for them. What's a world for without those you love?
Ivo uses the remote to kick up the music in the back seat- just in case Roy's got any more plans. The Ganja rock resumes with an unfamiliar and jarring crash. Glass and some type of dark powder fill the air. There is an instant of Disneyland-abstract uncertainty, followed by the steely reassertion of his disciplined mind. He dives sideways toward the floor. He also dives inward and feels the lightning filigree of the Loom stretch up from the Underworld, branch out through his clothes, and out into the Overworld.
The two-shot salvo has left gossamer ripples of power in its wake. The Shield that should have protected them was dissolved by the chaos the bullets carried. Cracks extend from the bullets down through the Underworld, through the Loom. No Cast could have stopped them. Ivo recognizes this chaos, knows things are about to get much worse.
Tracing the bullet trails back, he finds that a round has missed his head by less than three centimeters. There's something else that he knows, something he can't think about because now is the time for action, not for...
He moves his Vision away from the slowly rolling car, back along the path of the bullets until... there! In a tuft of Otu on the side of the hill next to the road are two shooters with military sniper rifles. Not for long.
The two fly through the air, their rifles wrapping around their necks, not too tight though- he wants them to feel what comes next. Up three meters then down as hard as Ivo can will. The bodies yield far more than the pavement, which craters under the impact.
There are three groups of four each moving in from different directions. No flesh puppets yet, but they'd be coming soon. Shells tear into the roof from above, but they never make it through the cloth on the inside of the car. They ricochet away from Ivo's hastily constructed Shield. There is a larger, two-part impact on the roof as two assailants drop from the bridge above. The fabric of the Shield sizzles and parts as a Forged blade slices through the roof. Ivo quickly compensates and redirects the Shield's power flow before the Cast can unravel.
That's not powder, Ivo realizes as the deep red aerosol begins to settle wetly on his face and clothes. Don't think, don't think. Act. It's not too late. He's used the Loom to mend many serious injuries in the past, and his heart is singing with a desperate love. The Loom's power seems to swell and crystallize around him- clearer, more pure in response to the purity of his need to help his wounded son.
The roof explodes away from the car under currents of power welling through