But not for long! Still upside down, Ali had freed the lower part of her bruised body. I heard her scream before she got rid of her last shackles. Her legs clamped the shoulders of the grunt who tried to molest her a few seconds earlier. With her thighs around his jaw, she broke his neck which snapped like a dry twig.
On his throne, King Xiao startled. Roaring like a tiger, he immediately ran to Zéphyr to collect the remote control. But the cyborg with the night skin had fled her own chains. A skillful acrobat, she was standing at the top of a column, a sly smile almost erased by rage.
"Nothing can surprise you anymore, eh? You son of a bitch!" the androgynous thief shouted, holding Ali's zapper firmly in her free fist.
Meanwhile, my partner took advantage of the chaos. She slipped into the back of her attacker with his trousers down and grabbed the weapon from the belt near his heels. Clinging to the corpse's shoulders, she fired several shots towards the godfather. She shredded the hand with which he had grasped the second switch.
The last bullet of the salvo pulverized the inorganic brain of the robot butler. A mechanical click followed and I was set free. Free to jump on the Tak Khunn's neck before furiously nosediving into his sweat-soaked dress. Not without a few scratches, I had reached his feet where I could grab Zéphyr's remote control after deeply biting his Achilles tendon.
It was time to flee the premises. But that wasn't the objective of my human. Like a wild beast, she twirled from one henchman to another, throwing them to the ground one by one with her fists and knees. My partner emptied the magazine of another submachine gun into the nearest meat bags. Even the two cybernetic sentries went down without the slightest resistance.
I had never seen her in such a state before. There was no more life in Ali's eyes. She had snapped the moment Xiao mentioned his link to the Moon and the Niku-dolls. Amid the tornado of fire and blood, my only reason to breathe no longer existed. An incommensurable rage took over.
It was a massacre that the Emperor of the Outer Worlds could only witness helplessly. The godfather was riddled with stray bullets as he tried in vain to take cover. When all his men had fallen, he rushed towards my human to fight hand-to-hand.
"Watch it, Ali!" I warned her.
Alas! It was an unequal battle. None of the attacks made by my sapiens, even with all the fury she showed, seemed to hurt the monster. Those of Xiao, as powerful as a nuclear warhead, reached her every time. "You fool! Miserable Lunar whore! Even the Heavenly Ones fear me! I am Wrath!" After several blows, my partner collapsed against the edge of the fountain, her body and face entirely covered in blood. Tears traced paths of despair along her cheeks, bluish with the slaps.
"Don't you dare touch her, pathetic jerk!"
I dashed, but Zéphyr beat me to it. Armed with a ceremonial qiang that she had torn from a wall, our friend struck King Xiao just below the right shoulder blade. The cyborg's body wasn't a fighting model yet the spear pole passed through our enemy's abdomen and was driven into the scarlet ground.
Unfortunately, it had no effect. The Tak Khunn withdrew the weapon as one removes a splinter. He broke the wooden handle on his skull before sending the titanium point into the Maiden's belly, perforating it.
"You'll fight better if you let go the remote control," Xiao said before tearing off the top of his robe.
His wounds stopped bleeding as the Kevlar fiber muscles were convulsing with the injections of chemical agents held in the microcapsules surrounding his vertebrae. This titan had very little human left.
Zéphyr didn't stand a chance against him; moreover, with only one hand and no speed-hacking. But, against all odds, the thief obeyed him and dropped Ali's remote control. An explosion sounded as the androgynous thief's thumb released the button.
"Zéphyr! you—" I shouted as I witnessed the unthinkable.
Blood splashed on King Xiao's back but it wasn't Ali's. My human had ripped off her necklace, shattering both her nose and jaw in the process. Her face all torn up and blind, she had then pressed it against our enemy's ankle.
Howling, the Emperor tilted backwards and collapsed into the fountain basin, twisting his spine against the rim. Too heavy, he couldn't get up on his last remaining leg as my partner crawled on his chest. With her hands on the monster's neck, she held his head under the foam with all her might. The water turned into the color of blood as her opponent struggled furiously. It lasted far too long. Then it was just silence.
When the Tak Khunn, a glorious title for a pitiful Lunar puppet, let escaped its final air bubble, my associate fell backwards over his corpse. She was picked up in time by Zéphyr, just before she hit the water's vermeil surface.
The cyborg went to retrieve the godfather's FID and the encrypted hard disk that was floating in the current flowing from the crumbling fountain. She ultimately put my unconscious partner on her shoulders, forgetting about the gaping wound in her belly.
We were able to leave the red fortress without any further resistance. A disemboweled cyborg and a cat, both covered with the blood of their superior, had to terrorize the servants and the last henchmen of the Lost Triads. An organization that had once and for all disappeared with its master.
"How is she doing?" I asked Zéphyr after having programmed the automatic pilot of a small freighter for a return to Thebe.
At her side, on one of the transporter's crew mattress lay Ali. She had opened her eyes, but was looking vacantly at the ceiling.
"Physically, she'll recover even if that asshole did damage her," the thief said, passing a trembling hand over my partner's face. "However, …"
I sighed. "Yes. I had lost my human again. But believe it or not, it was worse when…" I stopped, closing my eyes.
"What Xiao and his men have mentioned…" began the Data Maiden. "The Lunar Niku thing…" She hoped to address the tattoo's question. Lunapolis.
"Whatever you imagine, you're light years from the truth." I explained. "For your own sanity, you should forget about that. About us. And move along… as far from the Moon as you can."
After a brief hesitation, our friend got up and climbed the ladder leading to the cockpit, a haunted thousand-yard stare crossing her face. "Ali… Lee… I'm sorry."
"Silly you," I replied as the cyborg had stopped, her head down. "None of this is your fault."
She left after coming back to scratch me behind my right ear. This trustworthy half-human wasn't so bad. I hope she was going to stay with us a little longer this time.
Back on Thebe, Zéphyr and I stayed alongside Ali for the following nights, hugging her and binge-watching as many Betamax as we could.
Life was about moving forward while getting punched in the face. But my partner made every second of it worthy. And our friend the Data Maiden shared this feeling.
Ali finally spoke after two Jovian weeks. The sweet smell of Zéphyr's berry waffles may have brought her out of her lethargy.
"Ali! How are you? Do you need anything?" I said, full of joy.
"Lee?" she answered as she stood up, removing the bandages holding her healing gelmask.
"Yes?"
My partner smiled at me. She was as beautiful as the first day. Her eyes shine, mixing sadness and relief. Pink spots around her nose and her chin were the last remnants of her surgery. My human, a Moon's tank-grown Niku-doll or not, was indestructible.
"I figured how to beat the shit out of that bitch of Balmorya. We gotta go back to the arcade."
"Of course, partner! Forgotten Quest. Here we come!" I concluded before she took me in her arms for the biggest hug I have received in a long time.
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