The Burning Path
Far overhead relative to her the bulk of Ryza Secundus soared. It glowed like a halo even in the daylight, an artificial moon so suffused with its own lumen-power that it managed to compete with the star burning so brightly overhead. The foundry flames and thundering plasma conduits which constantly boomed and zapped all around the collection of Adept students just added to the heat with their cacophony. Miraxa ignored the noise as her Apollyon enhanced eyes twitched and shifted, cataloging the flow of akasha in the great station's bulk, imagining the flow of vox and tight-band las carrying the energy of enlightenment between the station and the world she sat on. Soon she'd be able to see those too as her mastery of the Eyes matured.
The Adepts around her sat in contemplation, many whispering and buzzing or beeping quietly while they waited. Only her and a few others were taking the time to
truly refine their tools of comprehension in the Runic Realm. Wasteful, she declared it all. It didn't matter that she'd been a
little to eager to talk about her interests in plasma and neon artwork with her sisters and these plebeians when they were all gathered a few days ago. These Adepts were clearly all morons who could not see the Throne.
Especially her gene-sisters.
Miraxa huffed, her akasha stuttering in distraction and displeasure. Looking down from the great orbital she scanned the training area they were all seated in, doing her best to ignore her lesser fellows and reign it back in. They were placed atop the high spine of one of the innumerable forge-works that spread around the City of Endeavour; she thought this one might handle the construction of capacitors for the Mk. II Ryza Pattern Plasma Pistol. They had been waiting for their instructor for the past thirty minutes, going by the chronometer set on a pillar off to one side.
Ahead of them spanned the gateway to the Sun-Temple Course, an archway of metal wrapped all around by neon lumen wires and studded with lux crystals. Past it was a path wide enough for all of them to run abreast, and a cascading tangle of tubing, cooling blocks, cherry red radiator fins and a dozen other devices. The air was thin and hot in her lungs, making it more difficult to grasp her akasha properly. What they had already been introduced to in the Sun-Tempered Temple body was immensely useful in this task and she couldn't help a little bit of giddy excitement for the next leg of the trials to test herself against.
She would prove she was better.
Miraxa sat and breathed and let the quiet murmurs and rustles of the other Adepts wash over her like water as she waited, and when she was almost but not
quite settled, their seniors arrived. The snaps of cloth and the
fwumpf of propulsion fires announced them, followed by the thumps as they landed on the metal plating of the rooftop. All of her fellows fell silent as the pressure of their senior's akasha pressed upon their minds, their robes red and white and marked with sigils of rank and office.
"Slow. But that will improve." The result of failure did not need to be said. "This course is five kilometers long and ends at Pollux Manufactory Gate Five. Finish it in an hour," the one in the lead commanded, voice unidentifiable, a towering figure in a red and white robes whose face was obscured by a blue visor and grilled mask, Sigil of the Gear emblazoned across its forehead. They stepped to one side as the junior Adepts stood, and raised one arm from their sleeves to gesture at the gateway. "Begin!" The senior shouted, a bolt of fire leaping from their fingertip like a las-bolt over the gateway.
Pounding feet filled the course and she rapidly pulled ahead of the pack. She was not at the
head however as her two gene-sisters surged ahead with her, jockeying for position at the lead. Lexi SH-44007 and Domina SH-44133 were dogging her heels as their shoulders bumped and slammed against each other.
"Hey! Watch it!" Lexi cried as one of Domina's elbows landed on her nose with a heavy smack. Miraxa growled as the slim form of Lexi crashed into her, her sister's blonde head nearly colliding with her teeth.
Domina was the tallest of the three gene-sisters, dark haired and also muscled, with a penchant interest for heavy artillery and a similar boisterous attitude.
Domina laughed. "Gotta get ahead of Miraxa, Lexi~! I ain't letting her past me again!" And that was the one aggravating good thing about Domina; she understood that Miraxa was better than her and Lexi.
Miraxa and Lexi's eyes met for an instant as they disentangled from each other and understanding bloomed like a vicious flower.
Domina did
not understand that sometimes cooperation was better than violence. The next thing Domina knew two pairs of feet were slamming into her shoulders and forcing her to her knees so the two could leap a dozen meters ahead over a gap between the rooftops. She quickly righted herself, yelling in fury as she trailed behind, caught in the gap between the leading sisters and the leading edge of the rest of the students. Miraxa laughed as her and Lexi pulled ahead and put their sister out of their minds.
Instead the two sister's attentions were consumed as they ran on and the heat and complexity of the course radically increased.
The air was thin, little ozone to be had because of pollution and their height, and little relief to be had from the weak wind. The machines added their own heat to the burning fury of the star above and made the floors hot enough to fry an egg and boil the sweat that fell from their bodies. The walls and tubes and machinery blocks were no better, every moment of contact forced to be brief else they would burn. Miraxa was unharmed so far, but the effort required to not be hurt left her equal with Lexi and she could not escape the smug girl.
And damnably her gene-sister started to pull ahead when they reached a section of thumping pistons and hissing valves that filled the air with hot steam, obscuring Lexi's form as she darted ahead while Miraxa was forced to slow. Miraxa's grasp of the Unchecked Apollyon Eyes was a hairs breadth behind her sister. And wasn't that galling.
She would not have it.
Miraxa's akasha-heart roared as she pushed her muscles faster and faster, heating up her flesh and flushing her eyes with enlightenment. The steam parted before her, both literally as her burning hot body forced it away, and metaphorically as the Unchecked Apollyon Eyes sliced through the obscurement of the steam ahead. She spotted the flitting form of Lexi, who flicked a quick glance over her shoulder and then dove out of the way with a yelp as Miraxa sprinted past like a tank shell.
Miraxa was three steps ahead of her sister when Lexi gave a scream of gleeful rage and righted herself, catching up rapidly. "HAH! I
knew this would be fun!" She sounded
happy, and that just stoked Miraxa's fury higher. Why was Lexi like this? It made no sense. But there she was, a step behind, seemingly enjoying the challenge presented by her gene-sister and not even caring for how
annoying she was.
Behind her, her gene-sister prattled on in excitement, keeping pace with Miraxa. She tried to pull further ahead but the speed she could squeeze out of her body was not enough, not with the increasing effort she had to put into the Sun-Tempered Temple Body in order to protect herself. She had more stamina than her gene-sister, but a gap of one step was not enough in the slightest. Not for wining this, not for the insult given to her artistic abilities, and not for her being so aggravating.
The two of them raced down kilometers of causeway and rooftop, up and over and around hundreds of dangers as Miraxa wracked her brain for a way to get Lexi to lose this race. And lose some dignity. Maybe that would stop Lexi from being so annoying about Miraxa's artwork again.
..."Gene-sister, how goes your latest project?" Her gene-sister exclaimed as she poked her blonde head into Miraxa's workspace. Miraxa jerked up, distracted from her frustrated focus on the toroidal capacitance halo she had created. Its craftswomanship was immaculate and far above the work the lesser Adepts could create. A decorative piece of fashion for the discerning Adept. And it currently wasn't working for reasons that completely vexed her.
Fiddling with it she pushed it to the side and leaned back. "Well enough, though there's something wrong with its coaxial control circuit," she answered.
Lexi shuffled in, looking curiously at the device. Then a wide smile split her face. "Ah! I know what to do!" The other girl said brightly and then reached over and prodded it in two places and adjusted a wire. The dead grey of its inner tubes went a bright, subtle silver-blue that highlighted Miraxa's hair as it reactivated. "There!" She said happily, oblivious to Miraxa's consternation. "I was just dropping by to let you know I've got access passes to the vaults you wanted. We can go any time today!"
"Great...," Miraxa said distractedly, stewing lightly as Lexi waved and left, her message delivered...
Miraxa shook her head violently, casting away those thoughts and ignoring the joyful laughter of Lexi behind her. They were entering a tangled three-dimensional maze of pipes and coolant tanks and her mind coughed up a risky, stupid, idea to fulfill her need. Some of these pipes had valves she could smack off and a brief blast of coolant fluid could cause Lexi to slip at the right moment for Miraxa to take the lead permanently. The pipes would seal off automatically and the damage would be repaired long before it could become a problem.
Ahead of her she could see a steel crevasse, the path leading towards it before it abruptly turned towards a small bridge. The akasha in her heart and limbs rumbled. She had been practicing how to call up flame and fling it at her enemies, and she knew the basis behind self-propulsion. Learning one thing at a time was not enough for her. That's why she'd wanted access to those vaults anyway.
Akasha gathered in her hands, causing them to begin to glow with heat. She could not begin to reach for what her seniors could do, but all she needed was a crude boost across the gap and all of the students of the Omnissiah Igvita knew how to create fire in some form. She leapt forward, her hand smashing through one of the regulator valves sticking out from a pipe right next to the gap. She held back a shriek as the cool fluid spilled over her fingers and arm, but stubbornness and will kept her going as the slick blew out across the path behind her.
That was the thing Lexi did not have over her; she was not as stubborn and prideful as her sister. Miraxa reached the edge of the gap and leapt, flipping forward as she did, akasha gathered in her clenched hands. She looked backed and smiled as Lexi slipped on the oil slick she had made, her gene-sister's face twisting into dumb surprise as she tipped over the edge.
Their eyes met and Miraxa's smile twisted into a grin. Her sister would be fine, but this would smart her dignity for a
while.
"Fuuuuuuuuck youuuuuuuuuu!" Lexi shouted as she fell, her yell slammed to a halt as she caught one of the pipes and stopped her descent.
Take that you
bitch, Miraxa thought smugly as she shot through the air, propelled by her uncontrolled burst of fire. It consumed her vision and seared her hands with its heat but the kick from the explosion sent her over the gap on a trail of smoke.
Clang!
Miraxa yelped as the back of her head smacked into a pipe and she cartwheeled through the last dozen or so feet to land with a heavy thud on the far side. Groaning, she cursed the builders of this place and then righted herself. Desperately hoping Lexi hadn't seen that, head smarting and face burning from embarrassment, she dashed away with the lead firmly in hand.
@Maugan Ra omake for Miraxa learning more about the Sun-Tempered Temple Body (though mostly expressing her displeasure for her gene-sisters) and reaching for the principles of Incandescent Wings of the Phoenix. Any XP I'd like to go into the Incandescent Wings.
