[Tragedy Strike Countdown: 1 Day]
Early the next morning, before Wally even begins teaching, the students are congregating outside, beginning to actually wake up. James and Chris are struggling with waking up, of course. For all five years at the school they kept on mysteriously getting up in the middle of the night and training. Inside the house, Wally is pouring a cup of coffee for Teether and Birrah. "Thank you." The two brothers tiredly say. "Trust me, I used to be right where you are now. But you get used to getting up pretty early, especially if Ruby would pour cold water on your face if you don't get up on time. " Wally says. "Don't blame me, it's your own fault you would wake up late." Ruby says in a joking manner. "He used to have the whole class outside waiting for him to get up, hah!" Alth says. While the friends are having a good time talking and about to start the day, something Wally and Ruby never expected to happen again happens before their eyes. A tall, humanoid bird soars over the top of the wall, and lands hard on his feet near the students. Jassu. Wally and Ruby are stunned that he's back, and show it through their faces. "Didn't you tell him not to come back?" Tayer asks. "Yes!" Wally and Ruby both say at the same time. Jassu yells from outside "Wally! This is pretty important!" The students are surprised that he's back as well, considering they saw him one time five years ago and he never came back. The staff walk out of the house, and Wally says "Jassu, I told you not to come back." "Trust me, Wally, this is bad, it's Morte." The name Morte echoes in the minds of.. someone in the area. Not Wally or the staff. Not the Kashians. But James and Chris. Their eyes widen with fear, and the boys look as if they have some kind of epiphany. They start hyperventilating. The two boys mutually know that they're both having panic attacks because of hearing this specific, seemingly unrecognized name.
No one notices the mini panic attacks these kids are having, and after about thirty seconds, they calm down, and catch their breath. Wally has visual frustration in his face after Jassu says Morte. Wally says "What about him." "So I was at a bar on Kandonov, right? Just snooping around. And the bartender told me that his sister is dating this chick that's in the oil manufacturing business, and the assistant manager that works there mentioned that they're helping fuel a large rectangular prism shaped ship. I remembered the details you told me, so I met him to investigate, and he says that the oil is being stored on the ship, but is actually being sent off to Tujep." Jassu explains. "What's the important part?" Wally asks. "This. I found order files being sent to that ship, and it's getting a specific type of strong metal alloy. This metal has historically been only used for large scale industrial bombs. And when I say large scale, this can shut down an entire planet for a hundred years, probably more. Perfect for someone wanting to spread their name and take over land." Jassu says as he pulls out a piece of paper with orders listed to Tujep, scheduled today. Wally can't think of what he should do. Ignore it to stick to his promise and let Morte make people suffer, or have the upper hand by knowing, and stop him. Wally thinks for a second, then looks at Ruby, Alth, and Tayer. "I.. I know I promised. I swear if it were anything else I'd ignore it, like I have BEEN doing! But this is nothing like Morte has done before." Ruby walks up to him and says "Wally. I know. You can go if you want, but you know the risks. So promise me, if you go to stop him from building this bomb, you have to win. You have to kill him. If you're confident in yourself enough to do that, then you can go." "Well, are you?" Jassu asks. Wally thinks for a minute, while all the students watch this bizarre encounter happen that they don't quite understand yet. The Kashians also look in confusion, as this is the first morning that they're at the school, and something important is already happening.
Wally looks at Tayer and says "Tayer, we better go now if we want to stop him soon." "On it, Wally." Tayer reluctantly says. He jogs a bit out of the school and to his ship. "I'll be back later, everyone. Have fun." Wally says, acting as if this is a normal occurrence. A loud engine begins to roar from behind the school, and you can faintly hear Tayer yell "Ready!" Wally runs out of the school gates, and around to Tayer's ship. Interestingly, he left his sword in the house. Wally runs up the ramp to the ship, and sits in the passenger seat. The ship fully closes up, and shoots off in the sky. Everyone stands silently as they watch the ship leave the atmosphere. Ruby looks at Teether and asks "You can fight, right?" Teether responds with "Hah! Of course! I'm the one who trained Birrah, and he's the one who helps train Kashia's elite soldiers! Why do you ask?" "Oh.. just wondering. I have a bad feeling about all this. I just wanna make sure we're prepared for anything." Ruby says in a worried tone.
Tayer's ship speeds off out of the atmosphere, heading right to Tujep. As the ship enters free space, Wally gets up and opens a little compartment in the wall of the ship. He pulls out a tiny remote that he puts in his pocket, and a new scabbard which he straps to his back with a new sword inside. "You've been saving that one for a while, you gonna actually use it now? Since Stavil gave it to you just as you started to stop fighting Morte, I assumed you would keep it locked up forever and never get the chance to use it!" Tayer asks. "Yeah, it's made out of better material than my main one apparently, so if I actually end up hitting him with it, it'll do some extra damage along with its main purpose." Wally explains.
Tayer sighs and says, "Wally. I know you told Ruby your answer, but tell me for real. Do you genuinely think you can defeat Morte today?" "Maybe. I just need to try like I've never tried before this time. I've been letting him do what he wants for years, who knows how many people have been hurt because of him. And who knows how many more there could be. I'm not going to be held accountable for this anymore. Knowing something bad is happening and choosing to do nothing makes you a part of the problem." "No, Wally, not necessarily. You don't need to put all that weight on your own shoulders. He threatened you, and everything you care about. Me, Alth, Ruby, Thanian, the school… and the students. Anyone would have stopped going after him if he said that." Tayer says. "But, Tayer, are you telling me you wouldn't feel just a little guilty knowing that so many people are dying? That you probably can't do anything about it? I mean, that's why I made the school in the first place! I would wait to finish training these students and then go and fight Morte, but this has been eating at me for years. And I do love these kids, but do I trust them to take down a dangerous threat like Morte? No. I don't. It'll take them well into adulthood before they're able to beat a strong force like Morte. And I don't want to wait that long anymore now that I know Morte's doing way worse stuff. I know you don't exactly approve of me doing this, and I'm sorry. But I need to." Wally explains, Tayer looks at him in silence and then says "I understand, Wally. But remember what Ruby said. You need to finish him off today. No ifs, ands, or buts. You have to kill him." "I know, I know, I'll try my best." Wally says.
An hour passes by of Tayer and Wally in the ship, and the rest of the staff and students are just quietly waiting at the school. "We're coming up on Tujep, Wally." Tayer says. Wally looks outwards towards Tujep with a determined look on his face. "I got this, Tayer. Don't worry." Wally says. "I think you can, Wally, but what matters is you believing in yourself. I raised you, I can pretty much see the self doubt." Tayer says. "Well even if I don't, we're already here. There's no turning back." Wally says. The small ship enters the atmosphere of the small, brown, advanced and colonized planet. The ship combusts into flames as it comes down into the planet at nearly top speed. "Do you know exactly where Morte will be?" Tayer asks. "Umm, no.. Can you fly down to that city and I can try asking around?" Wally asks with embarrassment in his voice. Tayer steers the ship down to a little urban city. Tayer flies over a parking lot of sorts, but as he lowers the ship to park, a red alien looking police officer yells "Ah-ah! No! If you wanna park your ship, go to the port like everyone else!" Wally looks at Tayer confused, "Port?" Tayer asks. "Umm, don't worry. Just open up the back and I'll ask this cop." Wally says. Tayer opens the back, and Wally walks halfway out while still midair. Wally says, "Officer, do you know if any large scale construction started on this planet?" The officer thinks for a moment, and then says "As a matter o' fact, yeah. About, ehh, 300 miles that way and you should find it." while pointing off to the horizon. "Thank you!" Wally says as he backs up into the ship with the back closing behind him. "You heard him, 300 miles that way." Wally says with a stern voice. "On it." Tayer says. Tayer activates the high powered boosters on the ship immediately, which sends the ship flying forwards, and even knocks back the officer on the ground. Tayer accelerates the ship along with the boosters, throwing them forwards even faster. Wally didn't even get into his seat when Tayer went forward, he stood up and withstood the force of the high speeds that the ship is traveling at. After only 15 seconds, Tayer gradually slows down the ship, which stops near the familiar rectangular ship far above them, and many support beams sticking out of the ground, all forming the large outline of a tall bomb, and being manually connected by workers on them.
"Fly us up there, and drop me off." Wally asks. Tayer nods, and flies up near the top of the tower of support beams. The back of the ship opens up, and Wally hops out, sword in hand. He yells back at the ship and says "This shouldn't be too long, Tayer! Remember the plan!" "Got it!" Tayer yells back. The ship closes and flies off a safe distance away from where the construction is. Wally looks at a nearby support beam, walks up to it, and cleanly slices through it with his sword. Exposed wires can be seen from inside, and loud rumbles from throughout the construction can be heard because of the damage spreading to weaker parts. Wally climbs up the beam and onto one above him, and is spotted by a flying cargo truck cruising by, and a few nearby workers on other support beams. The workers frantically grab little radios from their pockets and say "Sir! There's an intruder on the construction!" Inside the large ship above, a man sitting at a desk hears these messages, and begins to get up to tell Morte, but is shaken when he looks behind him, and Morte is already standing there. "I already heard." Morte says to the worker. Morte walks into a large room with many people working at large multi-screen advanced computers on the walls of it. Morte stands on a large circle in the center of the room. "Send me down near the intruder." Morte says to the men at the computers. "Of course, sir. But be careful, the construction is still weak, it could all collapse!" One of the workers says. "I know. That's why you're sending me down there. Now." Morte says yet again with a much more stern tone. "Yes.. sir.." The same worker says as he looks back at the computer, pulls a few dials and presses some buttons, and then flicks a final switch, which engulfs Morte in a bright light. From Wally's perspective, a beam of light shoots down and stops on the construction near him. The beam on the construction and the light inside the ship both disappear at the same time.
Morte is no longer inside the ship, and now stands before Wally. He appears on the same support that Wally stands on, just slightly above him due to the diagonal angle. The two stare at each other silently for a long time. Morte is slightly shocked that Wally even showed up, and Wally's excited to get his rematch and possibly win against his long time enemy. The workers on the construction look at them in confusion, but also with a sense of curiosity. "Long time no see, Morte." Wally says, breaking the silence. "Yeah.. long time.. Let me ask you, why are you here? Today specifically." Morte asks. "I know what you've been doing. And I've been hiding for long enough. I'm ending your whole faction today, here and now." "Sounds fun. Start when you're ready." Morte says. The workers look back and forth at the two when they talk with suspense filling the air. Wally slowly takes a few steps forwards, assuming his offensive position. Morte walks towards Wally as well, and pulls out his sword from his scabbard as he walks. Wally quickly and fiercely dashes 10 feet forward at Morte. This doesn't give Morte time to react with his sword, so steps to the side to let Wally go past him. As Wally slides past Morte, he kneels down a bit and leaps forwards with even stronger force than before. Morte has time to react now, and blocks Wally's sword with his own, making a loud metallic clang that echoes through the construction. The two jump back from each other a bit, and begin to go back and forth with each other, clashing their swords with purpose. Wally throws Morte off a bit, forcing him to take a step back, and loose his balance slightly.
It takes Wally a few steps to regain his balance, and when he does he jumps up to a nearby beam, climbs up, and starts rampaging on all the supports. Slicing through as many as he can, baiting Morte to try and follow him. The more supports that are cut through, the less stable the structure is, which makes every passing footstep shake the entire construction site. "He's serious about this, seems like he decided to forget my warning." Morte thinks to himself. Morte leans down a bit as if he's about to jump, and pushes off the ground and essentially flies right to Wally. The push-off he did created an aura of white, blue, and pink around him for just a second. The force of the jump also knocked down the support they were previously standing on, causing a domino effect of support beams to collapse and begin falling in the section that the two were previously fighting. When Morte reaches where Wally is, he immediately swings his sword at him, going for a fatal strike. Wally ducks down, and goes in for a kick at Morte's feet, which does nothing. Morte looks down on Wally, and says "I told you already what would happen if you tried to set my plans too far back. I warned you. You listened for a while, but a while isn't enough. You've messed up the construction and I deem that as too far."
Morte lifts his free arm up and aims it at Wally. "Morte.. What are you going to do? I don't think you can actually kill me. You would have years ago if you really could. I think you're weak." Wally says with a slight smirk and a drop of sweat going down his face. "Say what you want, Wally. I know I'm stronger than you and your attempts at getting me mad won't work." Morte says, but Wally counters his statement with "I know, but that isn't what I'm trying to do." Morte just looks at him slightly confused, and then suddenly Tayer's ship rises from below, creating a deafeningly loud roar from the engines, and stops rising right behind where Morte stands. The back of the ship opens up with Tayer standing at the end of it with a rifle, aiming right at Morte, while holding a little remote that's connected to the rifle in his other hand. Morte turns around and says to himself "What the hell is he gonna do?" Tayer shoots the rifle at Morte, and Morte reacts by attempting to deflect it with his sword, but Tayer uses the remote to move the bullet around Morte at high speeds. The bullet's too fast for Morte as it speeds back forth around him, making it impossible to successfully block. Eventually, the bullet finally hits Morte right in his stomach. This nearly knocks the wind out of him, as some smoke rises from his chest, the only visible wound being tears and rips in the spot of his clothes that were hit. Morte rises his head to glare at Tayer and says, "You're dead. Both of you."
Tayer closes the ship and drifts away from the construction. While Morte is distracted by Tayer's reckless stunt, Wally throws his sword as hard as he can, with the blade pointing right at Morte. Morte is able to hear the throw and almost dodges it, but is cut alongside his arm which rips up his right sleeve and leaves a long open wound pouring out blood from his arm. Since the sword didn't hit Morte, it continued to fly forward and got lodged into a nearby support beam right behind him. Wally frantically pulls out the remote that he earlier stuffed into his pocket and pressed the button on it. "He wouldn't.." Morte says. He looks at the sword lodged in the beam, and notices that it begins to glow, with only a second to react, Morte puts his sword away in his scabbard, and makes a shield for himself, made purely out of energy that he produced hands. The sword self-destructs, creating a large explosion that Wally is just barely far enough from to be unharmed. The supports that Morte is standing on are now burned to black, and breaking apart. Morte continues to stand in the smoke left behind by the explosion, trying to process what happened, and listens to the construction he worked hard to get fall apart around him while he grows more and more angry. More and more loud bangs and tumbles can be heard from the supports going on around them both. Luckily, Morte staying in the smoke is exactly what Wally needed. Wally runs head first into the smoke, and grabs a hold of Morte's left arm while he couldn't see and couldn't dodge.
He holds on tight, and Morte tries shaking Wally off of him, while yelling, "What are doing?!", but Wally stays silent. The smoke clears around them from the wind coming by. Wally looks right into the white void of Mote's eyes. "You're done." Wally says with pure confidence and cockiness, as he lets out an aggressive yell, and a powerful gust of wind is emitted from his body, and neon yellow light exits and flows around him. His chemical power. Wally lifts off the ground by a few inches, and his grip only strengthens from here. The aura in Wally's hands gripped to Morte grows, as Morte's face looks more and more furious. "Why can't I...move?" Morte asks as he then feels little sparks of pain in his arm, like stings from wasps. The pain intensifies. Morte feels powerless, and feels like he's getting weaker. He can't fight back anymore. Wally yells out one more yell of determination, and loud sounds of thunder and a blindingly bright light erupt from the two. The blinding light lingers for a moment and then slowly fades away. Wally deactivates his chemical powers, and drops back down. When the light is cleared, Wally sees that Morte is now on the ground on his knees. Morte is breathing heavily, his voice seems to have changed. The cut along Morte's arm is a scab now, but isn't completely healed. Morte looks up, and his hood is filled with darkness. His white voided eyes and mouth are no longer there, and his clothes seem slightly more baggy, as if they didn't quite fit, but only barely.
Since Wally no longer has his sword, he lifts his leg to kick Morte access the face, but Morte catches his leg, and pushes Wally away. Morte slowly stands up, but Wally grabs the top of his hood, and says "Who… are you?" and pulls the hood down, but the head beneath the hood is covered by a tight black cloth covering. Wally attempts to rip that off as well, but Morte stops him before he can by grabbing his arm and throwing him over his shoulder to the charred part of the beams, but then loses his balance and falls down and lands on one knee. His energy is gone, and he can barely function. Tayer's ship flies up to where Wally and Morte are at. The back of the ship opens, connecting a ramo from the beam to the ship. Tayer walks out with the rifle, but the remote is disconnected this time. "Finish him, Wally. It's all over." Tayer says as he hands the rifle to Wally. Wally aims in at Morte, and as he presses the trigger, Morte acts fast as he frantically gets up and steals the gun out of his hands, and smashes it across Wally's head, and knocks him off the construction. Morte pulls out a thin card with buttons on it from his pocket, and presses one of the buttons while aiming it at the large ship above. The same light beam that placed him down there shoots back down to pick him up. Tayer jumps back into the ship, and flies it down as fast as he can down to catch Wally. Morte steps into the light which then disappears. He is now inside the ship above, making his escape. Tayer flies his ship fast enough to be below Wally While the back of the ship is still open. He manages to reverse the ship so Wally falls in through the back door and lands semi safely.
The entire construction site is collapsing around them, and Tayer sharply maneuvers out to dodge and escapes the falling debris. He successfully flies out of the construction and just floats about 30 feet away from where Wally just fought. Tayer gets out of his seat and walks up to Wally, who has a black eye, and cuts on his face, and a sprained left arm. Luckily Wally's right handed so he can still fight. "Geez, Wally, are you okay?! I'm so sorry!" Tayer asks frantically. "I'm fine… except that my arms hurts like a bitch and this headache sucks. But I'll manage." The two get into the driver's seat and the passenger's seat. Both silently staring out the window, watching the large menacing ship float over destroyed debris of what could have been a planet ending device. Morte stares right back at Wally. Both of their resentments for each other only growing. "Tayer… was this a victory, or did we lose?" Wally asks. "Depends." Tayer says, "Depends on what?" Tayer is silent for a moment. "What determines something to be a victory or a loss... is only what happens next." Tayer explains.
Inside Morte's ship, a worker asks Morte, "Sir, should we open fire?" Morte just raises his arm a bit, and does a hand gesture for no, by waving his hand side to side with his palm facing down. "Let's go home, you need some ice packs and some rest." Tayer faces the ship upwards, and blasts off into the sky, leaving the atmosphere, and heading back to Oxys. While on the way back, Wally explains that his Alpha Human power is to remove the magical essence out of anyone he touches, and if that person wanted their powers back, they'd have to kill him. Wally and Tayer return quietly back to the school. Tayer helps Wally limp back to his bedroom to let him rest, and then informs the rest of the staff on what just happened, including what his Alpha Human powers are.