A set of four small robots were dashing down a hallway, hands above their heads carrying the unconscious and severely damaged Sonaris.

“Quickly! Quickly! We must hurry to the repair chambers!” Squeaked one of them. Sonaris was in bad shape only his upper body returned from his battle. The armor covering was no more letting red vine like structures hanging out from his body. Sonaris let out a low groan, he was barely alive after his battle with Airaxen and his companion Tikai. The little automations swerved suddenly and dashed into a large room, a capsule on an elevated platform in the center of it. Around that were 4 stations where more of the little robots worked. The four carrying Sonaris leapt up to the capsule, “open up the capsule!” Shouted one of them, the capsule’s cover raised up and into the ceiling. They carefully lowered Sonaris onto the bottom of it, and motioned for the capsule to be lowered again. The robots scattered to unoccupied stations, a flurry of typing started up. A moment later an eerie blue light illuminated the capsule, then Sonaris floated up to hover in the center of the capsule.

“Genetic material being added!” Shouted one of the robots.

“Commence the reconstruction!” Another one shouted. A thick emerald green colored liquid oozed it’s way into the capsule. In a few minutes Sonaris was blocked from sight.

“Adding nanobots...” One of them pressed a button causing two small holes to open in the top of the capsule, letting out streams of a nanobots into the capsule. The hundreds of thousands of nanobots swarmed around Sonaris and started to fill in all of his missing parts. Soon the nanobots stopped moving, and began to glow red. The liquid then all started to condense inwards towards the nanobots. Then it all solidified, and within seconds Sonaris had been fully repaired, and regained consciousness. The capsule was lifted up, Sonaris walked out looking from side to side rather annoyed. The little robots noticed this and then parted to let him past. Sonaris slowly walked out of the room, letting his footsteps echo throughout hallways. He turned to his left and entered his private section of the laboratory. There he calmly removed the tattered remains of his armor, then he erupted in rage and screamed so loud that his voice echoed throughout the entire building. Sonaris closed his eyes slowly and let out a long sigh.

<That pest Airaxen would’ve been finished off if I hadn’t lost my concentration and let the imbecilic girl slash me apart. I’m at least 3 times more advanced then he his, yet I lose to a relic and some pathetic organism.> Sonaris lowered his head growling, and started to shake his fist angrily.

“If it wasn’t for that low grade human I would finally have achieved what I’ve been striving for, for the past 6 months!” Then he perked up for a moment, then blinked a few times. Sonaris tilted his head slightly upwards and put his right hand to his chin.

“Why didn’t I think of that before? My arm cannon is powerful, but something that’s much more effective would be a psychological assault...Yes...” Sonaris went over to a computer console and pounded on the intercom button.

“SEND OUT THE GOLEMS! I WANT THAT GIRL CAPTURED THIS INSTANT!”

* * *

Tikai was helping Airaxen repairs, this time not burning him as much with the welder.

“Heh, you’re getting rather good at that,” he chuckled.

“Thanks, sooner or later I have to get it right,” Tikai muttered quietly, concentrating on the task at hand. “Hey,” Tikai stopped welding and put the welding mask away.

“Yes?”

“I’ve been wondering a few things.”

“Such as?”

“Well first one is why did your sword start to glow when I was using it?”

“Hm, well that’s a good question. Honestly, I really don’t know myself. I only know that my sword has very special properties.”

“That’s kinda obvious. Now the other one is why were you pretty much half dead after taking a few hits? I mean last time you fought with Sonaris you were still in fairly good shape, but now you’re like becoming an old man or something,” Tikai put a hand over her move quickly, realizing what she just said was rather offensive, but Airaxen didn’t start yelling, instead he let out a sigh.

“Well, the old man analogy is fairly accurate actually. Each time I have to regenerate a major amount of my body the regenerated part is somewhat weaker then it was before, and it just keeps getting weaker and weaker,” Airaxen raised his right arm slightly, but this caused his ‘skin’ to crumble and fall off, leaving his skeleton-like robotic arm looking naked and bare without any of the blue vines around them. Tikai looked at him concerned.

“Air, that’s not good. You have to make a new body or give your current one a massive tone up.”

“No, it isn’t. But I can’t repair myself that much with the little amount of time I have. And to build an entirely new body would be very difficult because of my lack of supplies and time,” he then stood up slowly and picked up his semi-intact armor and put it on. Tikai placed a hand on his shoulder then spun him around and forced him back down onto the chair he was sitting on.

“Look Air, you can’t go back out there like this! You’ll get yourself killed, and then who’s supposed to protect the city? Or me for that matter.”

“I’m fine Tikai, don’t worry I won’t die so easily. Now, where’s that sword of mine?” Tikai grabbed the weapon off the desk and shoved it at Airaxen.

“Fine then! Kill yourself for all I care!” Fumed Tikai. Airaxen raised an eyebrow at her, intrigued by this sudden outburst.

“Don’t worry, I’ll be fine after a few days. I doubt Sonaris will counterattack so quickly.”

“It would make me feel better if you weren’t so reckless with your life.”

“Got to take chances like that sometimes. But they seem to pay off in the end.”

“Well we had better hope that Sonaris isn’t too vengeful at the moment.” Tikai took a seat on the bed and laid down looking up at the ceiling, which was in need of repairs.

“You know Air,” he looked over at Tikai. “I’m just worried about you, I don’t really know what would happen if you...well you know,” Airaxen blinked a few times.

“Tikai, are you alright?” Airaxen tilted his head slightly, his tone of voice very intrigued.

“Yeah, yeah I’m fine, it’s nothing.” For the minutes that followed there was nothing but and awkward silence, until.

“Hey Air?” Tikai stood up and glanced around the lab, “do you hear that humming?” A quiet humming was echoing outside, and it was getting louder by the second.

“Hm, I hate to say it, but I think Sonaris is a tad annoyed to say the least.”

“Just a bit.” Airaxen stood up and drew his sword waiting...

“Air, maybe we should run or something, you know, you’re still pretty damaged.”

“No choice, have to-” before Airaxen could finish, a large green metallic hand smashed through the wall behind Tikai and grabbed her. Airaxen spun around and was about to strike, but the hand already retracted and left the inside of the lab. He flew out the opening in the wall and saw 3 robotic golems, one of them with Tikai in hand. The golems were all generally the same, each was large and had two jet engine like structures for legs. The upper body was shaped like a diamond, but the top was flatter then the rest of it The shoulders were large yellow triangles, the flat side facing outwards. The front of each robot curved out to form a point, and had a set of bars running vertically on it. The head was flat and block-like with a large flat nose, and eyes like little white squares with dots. But, each Golem was different. The one on the right was colored red, and had two large flamethrowers floating on either side of it. The one on the left was colored black and had two large cannons, as well as 5 smaller ones surrounding each of the large cannons. And finally, the one in the center was green and had two large hands with 3 small lasers on each of them; and this one was holding Tikai in it’s large hand.

The Red Golem’s flamethrowers pointed at Airaxen and launched a barrage of fireballs. Airaxen charged at the Golem, slashing apart each of the fireballs with ease. Before he was able to get within striking range the Green Golem’s fist came at Airaxen’s side and smashed him into the ground. Causing all the traffic to immediately stop. Brakes screeched, cars slammed into each other, angry drivers shouted at each other asking why they had stopped so soon. Then the Red and Black Golems landed on a car each crushing them, but thankfully for the occupants they already had ran out. Airaxen stood up in time to see the Black Golem arming it’s weapons. Airaxen formed his arm cannon and shot at the Golem before it could attack. It started to tip over, now unable to counterattack, but the Red Golem moved in front of it’s ally, it’s mouth cover sliding apart revealing a laser cannon. Airaxen stopped his attack and turned his cannon back into his arm. The Golem unleashed a stream of fire at him, Airaxen did a set of back flips to avoid the flames as they followed him. He then landed on the hood of a car and kicked off it aiming at the Golem, his sword over his head ready to strike. The Golem pointed it’s flamethrowers upwards and let loose two jets of fire. Airaxen swung his sword to the side and slashed apart the two attacks. He then swung his sword back around, decapitating the red behemoth. Airaxen landed in front of it, expecting the Golem to fall to the ground defeated, but it didn’t. Instead the two flamethrowers flew in from the sides and clamped onto Airaxen, then began to crush him. The Red Golem’s body was also starting to topple over, Airaxen noticed the looming shadow starting to engulf him, so with a burst of strength he broke free from his restraints and shot forward and out of the way of the falling mass of metal. Airaxen blew a sigh of relief, but was then covered by another shadow from a different Golem, he looked up and this was the Black Golem. Its weapons pointed down at Airaxen and began to charge. He leapt back putting his sword away as well as forming his arm cannon. The many smaller cannons fired rocket after rocket, which Airaxen destroyed with lasers from his arm cannon as well as explosions from nearby rockets. The explosions created a massive cloud of smoke, blocking the Golem from Airaxen’s view. He stood there for a moment, a moment too much. Two large red beams shot out of the smokescreen and straight into Airaxen. A massive explosion engulfed him, his armor was instantly blasted apart, as well as his arm cannon. The smoke was blown away soon, Airaxen stood there his upper body tattered, blue vines showing from patches of missing his “skin”. His left arm now a sparking stomp from the attack. His right arm across his body holding onto his shoulder while leaning to his side, his head tilted to the side while trying to look up at his attacker. With all his strength he swung his right arm to the side and then straightened himself up. When his hand rested against his leg he felt something in his pocket, once reaching in to see what it was he pulled out the seven crystals gathered from around the globe.

“Hm, this might just be what I need,” he muttered. He grabbed his sword from his back and placed the two crystals of fire and earth into it’s hilt. Airaxen spun his sword around now with it being ablaze created the illusion of the sword to be a flaming circle. The Black Golem was confused by this, but commenced his attack again by launching another barrage of rockets. Airaxen stopped spinning around his weapon and pointed it straight at the Golem causing a massive wave of small meteors to counter the attack. The two attacks collided causing a massive explosion which blasted the two combatants away from each other. Airaxen took out the two crystals and thought for a moment. He put the two crystals away and pulled out the crystals of lightning and fire and placed these two crystals into the sword’s hilt. The blade soon became fire with jolts lightning circling it. With one mighty swing of the weapon a massive wave of lightning shot out with a tail of fire behind it. The Golem was caught off guard by this attack and struck in it’s mid section, the wave trying to slice apart the automation. For a nearly a minute the Golem emitted a strained grinding noise trying to shake the attack off, but to no such luck, instead the attack was successful and sliced apart the Golem, which instantly exploded. Airaxen fell to one knee using his sword as a support, his body now worn out from the constant fighting. Then a scream from above made him look up.

“AIR! HELP!” Tikai yelled while trying to break free from the Golem‘s enormous hand. He had totally forgotten for the third Golem which still held Tikai captive. The final Golem landed with a mighty crash, then pointing it’s free hand at Airaxen. It began to fire a barrage of lasers at him, who used his sword to deflect them right back at the Golem. The lasers did nothing to the Golem’s armor, this one was obviously stronger then the other two. With of Airaxen’s strength he leapt into the air and brought his sword around to split him apart, the Golem countered him by moving his other hand in the way, the one holding Tikai. Airaxen lost his concentration, his ally now in the way. The Golem then swatted him away and into a building, where Airaxen was sent through a window and landed in a chair next to someone’s desk. The Green Golem smashed through the wall of the building, taking out the floor beneath and above it as well. Airaxen charged at the Golem and jabbed right in the metal grate under it’s mouth which stunned the automation. He then removed his sword and leapt onto the hand holding Tikai.

“Come on! Hurry up! That thing is preparing a counter attack!” Airaxen slashed off the hand letting it fall to the ground, Tikai screaming. But before Airaxen could leap away the Golem grabbed him and threw him into the ground. The Golem pushed itself free from the building and smashed into the ground in front of him causing the ground to rumble. Before Airaxen could even sit up the Golem smashed it’s fist into him. Very slowly it retracted it’s fist, Airaxen now unconscious and severely damaged. The Golem then started to turn around looking for Tikai. Instead it located its missing hand near a trashcan. It picked up the hand and threw it to the side. Tikai was running away from the battle as fast as she possibly could.

<Why is that thing after me?! All of Sonaris's robots go after Air, why me this time?!> She franticly thought. She looked behind her for a moment, no sign of the Golem thankfully. But then a massive black shadow shot straight past her, Tikai instantly skidded to a stop the Golem now looming over her. The Golem shot it’s hand straight at her, Tikai leapt over the hand and then ran underneath it like there was no tomorrow. But try as she might the Golem was too fast, it had already spun around, it’s hand firing at her. The large hand clamped around her, Tikai let out a yelp and tried to slip free from it’s grip.

“HELP! AIR! I NEED YOUR HELP!” Tikai’s screams carried over to the mangled Airaxen. His eyes instantly shot open. He stood back up, now re-empowered drawing his sword. He dashed straight at the Golem’s back he then threw his sword into the air, and took out the other five crystals, leapt up to be level with his weapon and threw them into place on his sword. One in the large blade on the hilt, three in the smaller blades on the hilt, and then one on the bottom of both sides of the blade. The sword’s blade immediately started to glow all the colors of the spectrum. Airaxen snatched it from the air and swung it around before coming crashing down on the Golem, splitting it apart straight down the middle. The two halves fell over, each firing out sparks and little jolts of electricity. Airaxen was exhausted, barely able to stand now, he collapsed to the ground unconscious. Tikai slipped out of the hand now with nothing controlling it, and went over carefully lifting Airaxen up and sat him against a wall, trying to revive him. A few meters away the half of the Golem which still had a hand started to twitch. The wrist joint disconnected itself now the hand started levitate off the ground. The hand shot straight at Tikai and grabbed her once more. Tikai let out a yelp and started yelling for help. This time Airaxen was too out of it to come to her rescue. The hand floated upwards and a small box dropped out of the bottom of it and then started to fly off.

A few minutes later a large black shadow moved along the ground towards Airaxen. The shadow rose up out of the ground, it was the same beast like creature from the Forbidden City’s hidden chambers.

“Ahhh, it’s you again, Airaxen,” it picked up his sword from the ground and examined it.

“Hmmm, this one has obtained all the crystals...but I don’t think it’s necessary to take them from him, I believe that this one can be trusted with these forces,” it took the crystals out of the sword causing it to go back to normal, and then threw the gems into the air. The crystals landed in a perfect circle around Airaxen and began to glow each of their own colors. The glowing grew more intense and then a small beam shot out and into Airaxen, his damaged parts instantly regenerated themselves, even his armor was restored. Before Airaxen regained consciousness the shadow had already sank back into the ground and vanished. Airaxen sat up rather dazed at the moment and put his hand to his forehead.

“Ehh, I feel like I just got hit by a bus,” he mumbled. Airaxen stood back up and gathered the crystals off the ground around him, as well as wondering why they were scattered about. Once pocketing them he realized something, where was Tikai?

“Tikai? Hello? HEY WHERE ARE YOU, YOU DITZ?!” He roared as he walked around. Then his foot hit against something. He bent over and picked up the small metal device dropped by the mechanical hand. He looked over it and then noticed a small button. Curiosity overpowered him so he pressed it. The device began to hum, the top of it split open and a beam of light shot up and flattened out into a cone like shape. Then the form of a person started to form, but it was too blurry to tell who it was. Suddenly it cleared up and became a small hologram of Sonaris. Airaxen hissed at the hologram and threw it to the ground. Then a metallic voice began to speak.

“If you’re listening to this Airaxen, well then I must have your little girlfriend in my clutches,” Airaxen started to growl like a savage dog, the projection continued.

“Now, if you want her back I can arrange this. Simply hand over the crystals and I’ll gladly give her back to you. So if you’re interested come to my laboratory before midnight, use the following coordinates to meet me. And you had better hurry.” Sonaris's image flickered and changed into a map of the city, on it a large blinking red light was in it’s top right corner.

“Sonaris, now you’ve crossed the line...” Airaxen growled under his breath. He narrowed his eyes and picked up his sword. “You won’t live past the stroke of midnight...”

* * *

Sonaris slowly walked down a dark blue corridor which was littered with panels for something to come out of the walls, as well there were the bright lights running along the top of the corridor. He stopped at a large door briefly as it hissed open, revealing a large circular room. The ground was part glass and part solid metal, the windows around the room were covered in metallic blinds, so was the floor. In the center was a darkened capsule, from it was a pounding noise. Sonaris snapped his fingers a blue light filling the capsule, revealing Tikai pounding on the glass prison she was in.

“Enjoying your accommodations?” Sonaris asked in a sly tone of voice. Tikai yelled something at him, but the glass was sound proof so none of her curses could reach Sonaris. He chuckled softly at her and snapped his fingers again, turning on a speaker, now all of Tikai’s shouting was instantly heard by Sonaris who chuckled again.

“Insolent human being, be glad I still need your pathetic life,” he said coldly.

“Oh shut up you son of a-” But Sonaris cut her off by turning off the speaker.

“Tsk tsk you should watch your language, very un-lady like. Lets see if your little friend Airaxen will come to your rescue. But it will be hard because of where we are.” The speakers were turned back on.

“What do you mean?” Tikai questioned. Sonaris chuckled again and snapped his fingers once more, the metal blinds revealing their surroundings. Tikai gasped, they were in space on the Moon’s lunar surface.

* * *

It was 9:00 pm at night, and Airaxen had spent the last 5 hours searching the mountains outside of the city limits. The sky was starting to darken, causing Airaxen to start panicking, his time was running out, he had to get to where Sonaris was keeping Tikai or he might...Airaxen shook the thought off, he couldn’t think about it. Airaxen continued to feel around on the mountain wall, looking for some sort of secret entrance. Finally he gave up, spun around and leaned against the mountain...and fell right through. Airaxen sat up rubbing the back of his head.

“Eh, looks like I found the entrance to that lab,” he mumbled. Airaxen stood up and turned around to face the entrance to Sonaris's lair. In front of him stood an enormous mechanical door, Airaxen drew his sword and with a few swift motions the door fell apart into a pile of sparking metal on the ground. He stepped over the debris and entered a hallway only lit by an eerie red light. He glanced from side to side, didn’t look like there was anything hidden in the walls. Airaxen began to walk very slowly down the hallway, his footsteps echoing loudly.

<Hmm...This is much to easy, Sonaris is planning something I can feel it,> the hallway ended and led off to a massive circular room. Upon setting foot inside the room bright lights turned on illuminating the room. There was nothing in the room, no weapons, no robots, nothing. But what caught Airaxen’s attention was that in the center of the room there was a large hole. Before he could ponder the thought more the sound of whirring machinery was heard. Airaxen formed his arm cannon and placed the crimson crystal of fire and the dark purple crystal of gravity into his weapon. Finally a platform had raised to be level with the rest of the room, standing on top of it were ten dozen of Sonaris's small robot servants. Airaxen blinked a few times and stifled a laugh, but couldn’t help but chuckle.

“What are you laughing at?!” Squeaked one of them. “We are Master Sonaris's faithful servants, you should show us more respect!” Another one added.

“A-hem, yes well I need to see your boss Sonaris about something, so out of my way,” Airaxen demanded.

“We won’t let you get to the transporter!” A few shouted in unison. A sudden uproar ran through the crowd of little robots. They all pointed their arms at Airaxen and started to fire off a barrage of small purple lasers. Airaxen dashed to the side running at top speed and gained up enough speed to run along the side of the wall, zigzagging up and down it dodging the countless lasers from the attacking robots. He pointed his cannon at the robots, firing a single large fireball into the mass. The fireball then started to split apart, first into 4, then 16, then 256 miniature fireballs flew at the mass. The little projectiles bombarded 17 of the robots and instantly destroyed them, 17 down 103 to go. Airaxen fired off another 5 fireballs at the robots, which split apart and took out a good 60 of them. Then he leapt off the wall and into the center of the room raining down an inferno onto the robots destroying the last of them. Airaxen landed a few feet away from a massive pile of scrap metal his arm going back to normal, pocketing the crystals.

“Well, that was relatively easy,” Airaxen started to walk to the door on the other end of the room, venturing onwards. But a clanking noise stopped him. He turned around to a mortifying sight; the robots were rebuilding themselves. Except they weren’t rebuilding to become the mass of robots, this time the parts were combing to form one robot, a very large robot. Airaxen formed his arm cannon again, and placed all seven crystals into it and began to charge an attack. The parts had finished reassembling themselves, the new behemoth was tall enough to reach the ceiling, it had three large heads with two sets of enormous arms, it’s body looked too small compared to it’s arms, in a way like a twig with a thick redwood branches sticking out of it. It swung the two lower arms at Airaxen who leapt up and onto one of them. It raised it’s upper arm and tried to smash him into the ground, but again Airaxen was too fast for the hulking machine and leapt into the air, the robot destroying it’s own arm. He spun around in mid-air drawing his sword, and threw it at the behemoth the weapon flying right through it. Airaxen landed gracefully on the metal floor in front of the behemoth. Airaxen spun around his cannon, pointed up at the machine’s head; but he stopped and started to lower his weapon, reason being was that the destroyed arm was rebuilding itself. Each part slammed onto the damaged arm until it had rebuilt itself into a cannon which instantly began to charge up. Shaking himself out of his paralysis Airaxen pointed his cannon at the center head and began to finish gathering the energy for his attack. The two combatants were ready to unleash their assaults at the same time, and that’s what they did. A massive blast of red energy fired out of the robot’s cannon, and an equally as massive multicolored beam shot out of Airaxen’s cannon. The two attacks collided emitting blinding white light, as well as letting off a loud crackling noise. Slowly Airaxen’s beam was being engulfed by the robot’s beam. Airaxen’s feet were digging into the metallic floor.

“Stupid pile of scrap metal! I won’t be defeated so easily!” He roared, Airaxen’s beam suddenly doubled in it’s size totally engulfing the robot. It started to fall back from the force of the beam, it tried it’s best to stay upright but was rapidly falling apart in the beam, and soon was totally disintegrated. Soon the beam died down an enormous hole in the opposite wall facing Airaxen. He stood there motionless for a moment, as if frozen in time, then his arm cannon started to fall apart, piece by piece the powerful weapon crumpled into scrap metal onto the ground the seven crystals lying in the scrap. His arms fell to the side, then he fell to his knees exhausted.

“Well, that wasn’t so bad,” Airaxen muttered wearily.

* * *

Sonaris slammed his fist into the computer console after watching his drones fail in their mission. He slowly removed his fist from a large dent in the console which began to send jolts of electricity in all directions.

“I...I CAN’T BELIEVE THIS!” Sonaris shouted. “Fine then, I’ll just have to prepare myself for our last encounter.” He turned around and walked towards a panel in the wall next to the door.

“I didn’t think I’d ever have to use any of these things again, but I suppose I was wrong,” but before he could open the panel sirens started to scream from all over the complex.

“Feh, Airaxen is moving very quickly tonight, almost made it to the transporter. Doesn’t matter he’s just running to his demise,’ Sonaris coolly walked out of the room and back to the center of the base, preparing for his encounter with Airaxen.

* * *

Airaxen slowly walked down a hallway, away from the large room he had just fought in now thoroughly exhausted and using his sword for support as he went. He exited the hallway and entered a small room with a slightly elevated glowing platform in the center of the room. Airaxen paused for a second wondering if he should step onto the platform, after remembering the time he decided for it and walked onto the glowing platform. It began to hum oddly for a moment then Airaxen felt like he was being taken apart on a molecular level but before he could do something to react he started to get sent flying straight up into space as a beam of blue light. The beam quickly exited the Earth’s atmosphere and arched high above the planet and headed straight for a building on the Moon’s surface. The beam stopped at another glowing platform inside the building and then expanded into Airaxen’s form and finally reverted back into him.

“Well, that was definitely an interesting experience,” he said while looking around the new room. The room was like the other one, small and dimly lit. He walked off the platform and looked to the side out a window, surprised that he was now in space. After regaining his focus he exited through a large metallic door. Then a slight click stopped him, suddenly a voice spoke over an intercom system, and it was Sonaris.

“Well, well, you finally made it Airaxen. I was starting to wonder if you would even show up,” a quiet chuckling echoed throughout the complex.

“Where are you Sonaris?!” Airaxen shouted.

“Here, let me help you out a bit...” Suddenly a row of lights lit up leading all the way down the hall and straight to a large metal door. Airaxen charged forward, his sword arm behind him ready to strike.

Sonaris stood in the center of the large circular room, the capsule with Tikai next to him. Tikai was still pounding on the glass trying to get out, but couldn’t do anything to escape.

<Any second now,> he thought to himself, <and then I’ll end this rivalry once and for all.> A loud metallic clang rang throughout the room, the metallic door falling apart into two pieces on the ground. Airaxen stepped over the slashed apart door and towards Sonaris.

“Nice to see you again my old friend, how have you been?” Airaxen spun his sword around once and placed it back in it’s holster.

“What? Don’t tell me that kidnapping your friend has hurt our relationship,” Airaxen stopped a few feet away from Sonaris and pointed his finger at Sonaris's face.

“Let Tikai go,” he said calmly. Sonaris chuckled at the idle threat.

“Now you know I can’t do that unless you hand over the crystals first.”

“And what makes me think I should trust you?”

“I have no use for the girl when I get the crystals, no point in killing an innocent in my opinion,” Airaxen was strangely intrigued by that but shook it off.

“And if I don’t give them too you?”

“Then I’ll have to do this...” Sonaris snapped his fingers, the capsule suddenly fell straight into the ground through a hole in the floor.

“What did you just do Sonaris?!” Airaxen demanded.

“That capsule is heading to the center of this base when the capsule gets there it’ll trigger a self-destruction sequence which will cause this base to explode in one hour.”

“You’re insane! You’re going to destroy all of us!” Airaxen shouted, Sonaris chuckled again.

“Wrong. You see with that 1 hour I’ll take the crystal from you and then have enough time to just stroll on out of here. Now if you want to survive you can just hand over the crystals. And now a choice, give the crystals up now and you’ll all survive, or try and make it to the core and save your friend and somehow escape back to the Earth in the endless void known as space,” Airaxen gritted his teeth and growled menacing. He slid his sword back into it’s holster and dashed out of the room.

“And the game begins...” Sonaris chuckled.

* * *

Airaxen raced down a flight of stairs heading to what he thought was the core of the complex. The stairs led to a vast room filled with machines and metal railings near the bottom of the room. The area was shaped like a large cylinder with the railings going down the length of the room, at the very bottom was what appeared to be the capsule. Airaxen entered near the top of the room on a large steel grate floor without any path leading to the lower levels. He drew his sword and was about to slash apart a piece of the floor, but before he had removed his sword three beams of light warped into the room, one a golden yellow, one grey and the last one a deep red. The yellow beam turned into a short yellow robot. This robot’s body was made out of a yellow sphere with two smaller spheres sticking out of it with a bit of cable and an raindrop shaped foot. The shoulders were half orbs with cables attached to them and a sphere with the ends of a magnet sticking out of the sides for hands. The head were like the hands but a larger version and with two black dot like eyes. The grey beam formed into a tall metallic warrior carrying a sword with a horseshoe magnet for a hilt and a large metal shield with a gold jewel in the center. This robot’s body had two parts to it, the top was like a box with a pointed end that was cut off, the lower part was a smaller version of the upper body an axle through it connecting to two circles with two metal posts for legs, the end of the bottoms were slanted to form something of a foot. The shoulders were two large horseshoe magnets the curve facing outward, the arms were connected to an orb behind magnet and were generally just poles with hands on them. It’s head was another magnet with a metallic fine on top with a mouth plate rather then a mouth. Finally, the red beam formed to a medium sized robot. The body was like the yellow one’s, it was made out of a large red orb with a magnet around the collar, it’s legs were connected by red posts and had the same raindrop like feet but were flattened at the top. The shoulders were connected to the body by metallic cables and had very large hands. On the back of the robot were two large sets of red angel-like metal wings a circle with the letter “N” on one of them and the letter “S” on the other. It’s head was rather flat, a box with a slight point on it and a black visor with two white eyes and a red fine protruding out of the top of it’s head. The trio assumed battle positions.

“I am Beta!” Shouted the yellow one with a electronic voice that echoed strangely.

“I am Alpha!” The grey one said with it’s sword raised in it’s metallic voice.

“I am Gamma!” The red one announced with a stern voice.

“Together we are the Magnet Warriors!” They said in unison.

“Marvelous, good for all of you,” Airaxen mocked while drawing his sword. Beta pointed his hand at Airaxen, jolts of electricity sparking from the magnet ends, then a blast of lightning shot out at him. Airaxen leapt to the side while the lightning blasting apart a piece of the steel grate. While Airaxen was distracted by Beta’s attack, Gamma flapped his wings flying into the air, then another flap and he charged at Airaxen and slammed his fist into his face sending Airaxen into a wall. The blow disoriented him, but he recovered before he hit the wall and used his legs like a set of springs and leapt off the wall at Gamma. Alpha lunged at Airaxen and struck him down with his sword. Airaxen fell to the ground his chest plate fell to the ground in two pieces. Beta pointed his hand at Airaxen again and fired a blast of lightning which destroyed the steel panel under him and blasted Airaxen into the air and he fell through the hole and landed on a steel railing a few meters below. He groaned and stood up slowly, using his sword as support. A shadow started to engulf him and he leapt back just before Gamma would’ve smashed his head in with his fists. Airaxen quickly placed the crystals of fire and earth into his sword’s hilt and spun around firing a barrage of small flaming meteors at him. But Alpha leapt down in front of Gamma and blocked the attack with his shield. He swung the shield out of the way and slashed apart the metal railway in front of him causing the part Airaxen standing on to start to drupe and fall. Beta then leapt down and fired another bolt at the end of the railway causing it to explode and break free from the wall, causing Airaxen to tumble to a lower railway. Luckily for Airaxen he leapt up before the railway began to fall, and landed gracefully on a lower railway without getting crushed by the falling one. Quickly, he removed the earth crystal from his sword and placed in the bright green wind crystal, then pointed his sword straight up creating a fiery cyclone of fire to shoot up underneath the three combatants. The cyclone died off a few moments later, the three robots left smoldering and burnt black, as well as melting apart the rest of the railway which caused them to fall. He then leapt up in front of the Magnet Warriors as they fell and unleashed another fiery blast of wind at them. They were blasted back and smashed into a wall, then slid off the wall and tumbled on all of the railways until they landed on another large steel grate floor sparking from most of their joint connections. Airaxen landed on the steel grate soon after ready to end this scrap. The trio got up slowly, emitting a loud grinding noise.

“We aren’t finished...” Gamma strained to say.

“We’ll see about that,” Airaxen placed the remainder of the crystals into his sword. Suddenly beams of light sliced apart the three robots and they suddenly broke apart into pieces which all flew up into the air. They suddenly started to reform and create something. The arms reconnected and formed large arms with enormous gauntlets for hands, the legs reconnected and out of the feet flared to life a set of rockets. The parts of Beta and Alpha that were still left connected to form a new body, this one much larger then the others. The majority of Gamma turned into a new set of wings, these much larger and more angelic. The last pieces which were the heads of the trio started to connect, Beta’s head split apart and connected to the flat sides of Gamma’s head then Alpha’s head connected to the back of the body of the new creation, the spike connecting itself to the new head. Finally all of the pieces combined together, a yellow coat of armor covering the red face of Gamma’s old head. The new robot landed on the steel grate roughly, now double the size of Airaxen.

“Well that’s pretty cool,” Airaxen muttered, sword glowing again. “Ok...Alpha, or Beta, or whatever your name is I’m going to slice and dice you.”

“I am Valkyrion, and I will destroy you!” He moved his hands together, forming a ball of lightning between them then pushed his hands forward firing the lightning at Airaxen. He leapt over the attack which blasted a hole into the grate, which Airaxen slipped through and landed on a railing far below. Valkyrion jumped up and tried to go through the hole, but got stuck because of his wings. Airaxen leapt down from the railings and in front of the capsule with Tikai in it, she was sitting down looking at the ground. She looked up for a moment, then her face lit up with joy.

“Air! You’re finally here!” She shouted.

“Heh, sorry about being late traffic was horrible,” he joked despite the situation. “Stand back,” Tikai pressed up against the back of the capsule Airaxen brought his sword around, but before he could swing the weapon Valkyrion broke free overhead and was smashing through the railings going straight for Airaxen. He leapt to the side again and spun around throwing his glowing sword through the wings of Valkyrion and shattering them into a hail of red metallic shards. Valkyrion was knocked off course and sent tumbling the rest of the way to the ground, landing just in front of the capsule. Airaxen jumped over to where his sword had lodged itself into the wall and jerked it out. Valkyrion was weakened, but still had plenty of fight left in him, he moved both hands back over his head and pulled out his sword, it was a combination of Alpha’s weapons. The shield had split apart and was attach to the hilt of the sword, as well the blade wasn’t made out of metal anymore now it was pure electricity which was crackling loudly in the air. He swung his saber at Airaxen a whip of electricity lashing out at him, he parried the attack with his sword but was still knocked to the side from the force behind the attack. He was barely able to remain upright from the attack but was still standing none the less, Valkyrion attacked again this time swinging from above slashing apart the rest of the railings above them causing them to rain down as debris. Airaxen parried the move again and used the force to his advantage, swinging himself to the side and out of the way of some debris.

“Alright, I’m finishing this once and for all!” Airaxen shouted. He lined his weapon up with Valkyrion and moved a set of two fingers along the blade causing it to emit a bright light. He brought his sword high above his head then brought it down with a swift motion sending a crescent wave of energy at the machine. Before he could react he was cut apart, a microscopic line dividing the two pieces, then the pieces started to glow white signaling an impending explosion. Airaxen dashed over to the capsule and smashed it apart with his gauntlet then grabbed Tikai and leapt onto the lowest railing right before the regiments of Valkyrion exploded in a mighty blast which shook the entire complex.

“Well, that was a nice way to spend a day,” Tikai said weakly, still a tad shaken up from barely escaping her demise.

“Oh yes, we should do this EVERY day. But we aren’t out of the woods just yet.”

“What’s left now?” Tikai asked not wanting to hear the answer.

“Well when your capsule arrived here it triggered a self detonation sequence which would cause this place to explode in an hour,” he explained while leaping up more railings Tikai still in tow.

“And I was there for at least 15 minutes.”

“Which leaves us with 45 minutes to find a way to escape back to the Earth.”

“Marvelous.”

“Very.” They had made it back up to the steel grate at the very top of the room and were running up the set of stairs that led back to the main room which they all met up for the first time.

“Alright, we just have to find a way back to Earth and we’ll be home free,” Airaxen said while looking around the room.

“Hey Air...Where’s Sonaris?” Tikai asked nervously.

“I don’t think you want to know.” At that moment the doors around the room slammed shut and sealed themselves, Sonaris standing in front of the door which they came in.

“Now isn’t this nice, we’re all back together again,” he scoffed. Airaxen assumed a fighter’s stance but Sonaris but up his hands wanting a moment to speak.

“Come now, we’ve known each other for so long don’t you think it would be nice to just talk for once?”

“And what exactly would you have to say?” Tikai said with plenty of spite.

“Well nothing much really, just think your friend over there might want to hear a few history tidbits.”

“And what would these tidbits be?” Airaxen was now intrigued, just how much did Sonaris know about him?

“Well, first off did you know that we’re related?” Sonaris grinned.

“We’re what?!”

“Oh yes, we were both created by the same scientist, why you could say that we’re...brothers,” he chuckled at Airaxen’s twitching face.

“That’s impossible!” He shouted.

“Well why not? Come over here for a moment.” He walked over to the center of the room, a pedestal raising out from where the capsule used to be. Sonaris pressed a few buttons on the pedestal then turned to look at Airaxen and Tikai, before motioning them to come over. They shared uneasy glances but went over none the less.

“Tell me miss, do you remember the terrorist bombings 7 years ago?”

“Of course I do,” she responded quickly.

“Good, Airaxen pay close attention now, I know that’s hard but you should have the mental capacity to handle that,” Airaxen growled slightly at that, Sonaris just chuckled again. He pressed a few buttons causing a flat hologram to appear.

“Are you two aware of the legend behind the crystals?” They nodded and he continued.

“Then you know about the Myreisons I would assume,” another few nods.

“Well they’re still around to this day, in fact the one which had bombed those buildings and recreated us was a Myreison. He was sent to terraform the surface of the Earth so they could return to their previous lives, thus Dimitri was sent. Of course he was at a major disadvantage being forced into excessive amounts of light, and none of the technology he had could work in the light as well. With some thought he decided that the technology the humans had was sufficient, but he couldn’t create himself an army which could work in the light of the sun. So more thinking and he decided that he would select the very best human specimen he could find and use it’s genetic material to help create his army.”

“And the specimen was me, wasn’t it?” Airaxen asked very quietly.

“Very good, yes you were. But many of the first creations failed dismally, I was the first to function properly, but he thought that my abilities were unsatisfactory, I didn’t have the potential to grow like the other organics, so his search continued. Sooner or later he came across your design, which did work very well in fact, to the point where he modified me to be similar to your design. Now what he didn’t think of was that the organic half might actually develop a mind of it’s own and overcome the total sum of the programming. And you came along and did just that, your organic half overcame the programming that was installed in you, how is still a mystery to me.”

“In other words I was a failed experiment.”

“Yes that’s one way to put it. But it’s not what I want to discuss.”

“And what is it that you want to discuss?“ Airaxen asked.

“I’m getting to it right now. For the past little while you’ve been a rather intriguing rival, and I want to offer you a chance.”

“A chance for what?”

“Joining me, now don’t say no just yet. Think about it, the power, the glory from an ancient race of mighty people, doesn’t that sound entertaining? You see Airaxen, you and I are very similar, we’re both created from the same person, we both are very determined and strong willed, and we can work together rather well. And besides, I’d hate to have to destroy my own brother after all.”

“That’ll never happen Sonaris! Air would never join up with you, right Air?...Air?” He didn’t respond, he was in a trance like state lost in thought.

“Well...I can see your point Sonaris,” he said after 5 minutes of silence. Tikai was mortified at this, Sonaris grinned and offered him his hand to shake. Tikai moved in front of Airaxen then slapped him across the face as hard as she could, which nearly knocked him over.

“Don’t you dare go back on everything you’ve fought for!” She yelled. Airaxen regained his stability and looked back at Tikai and gave her a quick nod.

“Sorry about that, Sonaris's mind games nearly got the best of me,” he moved her to the side and walked up to Sonaris.

“Buddy, that’s never going to happen so don‘t hold your breath.”

“Tsk, sorry to hear that. I wanted to have you as my ally, well then I’ll just have to destroy you now,”

“You tried three times and you failed all of those times,” Airaxen back flipped away from him, drawing his sword.

“Tikai,” Airaxen peered at her.

“Yeah?”

“Find a way out of here, get to safety or something we only have 40 minutes left before the place explodes,” Airaxen pointed his sword at one of the doors, a beam firing out of it blasting apart the metal seal. Tikai dashed out of the room leaving Sonaris and Airaxen alone for their final confrontation. The two circled each other at a casual pace.

“You have the first move Airaxen,” the two stopped circling. Sonaris drew both his swords, Airaxen gripped his with both hands, moved it back then charged at Sonaris with a battle cry.

* * *

Tikai ran down the hallway as fast as she could, looking for something to help them escape, then she noticed an open door. She ran in and looked around the room, not too much was there a large computer console and a few tools, but upon walking into the room she noticed a panel next to the door which she entered in. Tikai walked over and took the object off it’s holder and smirked to herself.

“Oh this is going to be real fun...” She said in a devilish voice.

* * *

Sonaris shifted to the side easily avoiding Airaxen’s slash, then continued to spin around swinging one of his swords at his side. Airaxen leapt back barely avoiding the attack, Sonaris lunged forward and slashed at him with his other sword while he was distracted. He leapt back again, and again as Sonaris swung another sword at him, then with the other one. Airaxen jumped back, starting to show signs of fatigue; he was barely able to stand upright, his sword arm lower then his other weighed down by his weapon..

“You can’t defeat me, just give up!” Sonaris sneered at him.

“I destroyed all of your little servants, I can take care of you,” Airaxen breathed in a hoarse voice. Sonaris laughed at him cruelly, once he calmed himself down he looked over at Airaxen.

“You moron, none of my robots were meant to stop you, only to weaken you for this, and if they did destroy you then that would just be an added bonus. Enough of this idol chit chat!” He then lunged forward, Airaxen tried to raise his sword to parry the attack but was unable to do so in time and slashed into his shoulder joint sending out jolts of electricity. Airaxen let out a cry of pain, then Sonaris lunged once more and struck him in the side causing him to fall to his knee. Sonaris grinned, then put away his swords and pointed the cannon mounted on his arm at Airaxen’s head, charging it at a painfully slow speed to draw out the moment. A small blue orb formed at the nozzle of the weapon, basking the two in a soft blue light.

“Game over boy,” he chuckled slightly as the orb grew larger, but then a sharp ringing diverted his attention away, just in time to see a thin blue green come strike him in the arm and blast apart the armor covering it. The force of the attack knocked him to the side. Airaxen peered to the side, standing there in the doorway was Tikai in a suit of armor of some sort. The suit only consisted of the upper half of a suit of armor, the chest plate having a number of cords leading to two gauntlets on each arm. These gauntlets were colored a dark blue, with a long gun barrel sticking out of the top of the gauntlet. Tikai ran over to Airaxen and helped him back up to his feet. He looked wearily over at Sonaris and lifted up his sword a slight bit, but it fell back down to the ground letting out a quiet grunt.

“You take it easy for awhile Air, I’ll take over for ya,” Tikai stood in front of him and pointed her gauntlets at Sonaris who was standing up, now short one of his swords being unable to use it. He walked towards her menacingly.

“I didn’t think a simpleton like you would find and work my exoskeleton armor. Doesn’t matter thou, I’ll need a few moments to dispatch of you.”

“And I thought Airaxen was full of hot air, you’re even worse then he is!” Sonaris chuckled for a moment then dashed straight at Tikai, sword behind him as he charged. Tikai pointed both gauntlets at Sonaris’s lower body and fired off two beams which both struck him in the right leg destroying a small portion of his leg, causing him to cripple over and fall to the ground. He growled angrily while standing back up on his good leg. Sonaris threw his sword to the side pointing his right arm at her, which still had it’s cannon fully intact. A red laser fired out at Tikai, she wasn’t fast enough to react and was hit in the chest by the laser, cracking apart the chest plate as well as winding her. Sonaris lowered his weapon, then noticed Airaxen who was pointing his sword at him. He didn’t know why but understood when a multicolored blast of energy fired out at him, sending him flying to the opposite side of the room. Airaxen stood up slowly using his sword to help him back up.

“Alright, I’m feeling rested up, time for round two,” Airaxen assumed a fighting stance but Tikai grabbed him by the shoulder and stopped him.

“Wait, let me take care of him I got a score to settle,” she said devilishly. Airaxen chuckled and nodded. She stepped forward and pointed one arm at Sonaris as he got up, and used the other to keep the other arm from shaking. Tikai fired off one last green beam at him, Sonaris turned his head to look at her just in time to be hit in the corner of his head by the attack. The beam shattered the upper left portion of Sonaris’s head and sent him to the ground as a heap. Airaxen smiled broadly, impressed at his companions aim.

“You’re good at that, can’t deny it.” Tikai smiled at the compliment.

“Yup, and don’t you forget it,” she said happily. They walked over to the motionless Sonaris and turned him over. His forehead was now half gone showing a mound of red vine like structures coiled together with many little blue lights running along them.

“Is he dead?” Tikai asked in a quiet voice. Suddenly a quiet moan came out of him, obviously he still had some fight left in him. Sonaris sat up slowly trying to clear up his vision from the attack. Airaxen pointed his sword right into his face, he looked up the duo which defeated him.

“You...you have defeated me. Well, finish me off once and for all,” he said in defeat.

“With pleasure,” Tikai said happily while pointing both of her weapons at Sonaris. But unexpectedly, Airaxen put his hand on her shoulder.

“Wait,” Tikai looked at him like he was insane.

“Wh-What’s the matter?! Don’t tell me you’re really with Sonaris!” She shouted.

“No, that’s not it I want some answers before Sonaris gets the axe.” He looked back over at Sonaris.

“Alright, I want you to tell me why are you going around causing all this destruction.”

“I-I must complete my programmed mission, it is my sole purpose.”

“Hm, well if we’re built the same we am I fighting for good while you’re trying to screw this place up?”

“I am unable to answer that.”

“I’ll tell you why, because I saw the natural beauties the planet had to offer and all the things the people of the Earth can do. So no, destroying everything on the face of the Earth is a bad idea. The difference between you and I is that I have a reason to fight, you don’t.” Tikai gave Airaxen a thumbs up, he nodded in return.

“Alright then, enough talk it’s time to finish this once and for all,” Sonaris closed his eyes and lowered his head waiting for his head to be slashed apart, but nothing happened. He opened his eyes slightly to see that Airaxen had offered his hand to him.

“Wh-What? I don’t understand, why are you-?”

“You’re a misguided person, someone that didn’t know any better from a little child who picks the wings off of flies. And since there haven’t been any casualties since your time as a villain, so you can be forgiven for the sins you’ve done,” Sonaris blinked a few times and looked at Airaxen and then at Tikai who was as shocked as he was.

“I still don’t-”

“It’s called mercy, it’s something that you should give out more often,” he took Airaxen’s hand and was lifted up back onto his feet.

“Not only are you a superior fighter, but you are a much better person then I could ever be.”

“Yup, that’s true. You just have to get over that blowing stuff up thing.”

“But-come now, a small office building!” Sonaris shouted.

“No.”

“A small house?”

“No.”

“Somebody’s car?”

“NO!” Airaxen shouted.

“So,” Tikai jumped in, “what about getting off the lunar base that’s about to explode?”

“Ah, yes that would be a good idea,” Sonaris said a tad sheepishly.

“What’s wrong?” Airaxen raised an eyebrow at him.

“Well, you see. The only way off the base is to use a small spacecraft,” Sonaris walked out the door, motioning them to follow.

“Small? How small is small?” Tikai asked.

“Small as in can fit about two people uncomfortably.”

“We can just cram in a third person,” she suggested.

“Ah, well you see then the problem is the weight of the craft is too much for the reentry system to handle which means we’d plummet into the Earth’s surface and die on contact.”

“Oh...That’s not very good.”

“No it’s not,” Airaxen muttered, “that means that one of us is going to bite the dust,” they all shared nervous glances.

“Yes, well I was trying to put it...a little bit less blunt,” Sonaris mumbled. They stopped in front of a circular hatch which obviously was meant to be the exit for the spacecraft.

“Marvelous, how do you want to do this? Pick straws or something?” Airaxen suggested trying to lighten the mood.

“Funny, but this is going to be a very difficult subject to figure out in little under 15 minutes,” Sonaris said. They all sat down and started to discuss plans on how to try to get all of them back in one piece, this failed dismally leaving them with 8 minutes to leave.

“I think,” Tikai started, “I should stay here, you two can do a lot of good for the world.”

“No, it’s a foolish idea to throw your life away, you should have a chance to enjoy life,” Sonaris said quietly. Airaxen stood up and opened the hatch to the spacecraft.

“Alright, I have an idea here, all of you get over here.” They walked over, then he grabbed Tikai and Sonaris and shoved them both into the ship, closed the hatch and banged on the launch button sending the capsule heading back to the Earth. Airaxen looked out a window at the craft heading towards the Earth, and let out a sigh.

<Well I have about 5 minutes of my life to live, what’s there to do now,> he thought to himself dismally. Airaxen sat against the closed hatch, placing his sword back into it’s hilt.

<Strange to think that it’s all over now. No more destruction to worry about, no more worries for that matter.> He looked out a window behind him into the dark abyss known as space. He smiled slightly admiring the view it provided, the thousands of tiny stars, the blue orb which he dedicated his life to protect. 4 minutes remaining, then Airaxen stood up for a moment and turned around, looking at his reflection in the window.

“If you must be doomed,” he said while dusting himself off and tidying himself up, “at least be beautiful.” He chuckled at the irony of the saying then sat back down on the ground.

<So, time to evaluate my situation. I’m stranded on the moon with about 4 minutes before I’m blown apart into tiny pieces floating around in space. I can just accept my fate and sit around and wait, or get out and drift in space once leaving the Moon’s gravitational pull only to deactivate a month later. Great choices I got here. Well, I might as well just delay the inevitable, I have been for years anyway.> Airaxen stood back up and turned to the circular hatch where the spacecraft used to be attached too. Suddenly, a shadow moved across the ground toward Airaxen from behind, but he sensed the shadow’s presence and turned around.

“Eh? It’s you again,” the shadow rose up from the ground and into it’s blackened demonic-like body.

“Yes, it is me.”

“Well, what do you want with me this time?” Airaxen asked.

“I want to give you a few disks of data I’ve compiled for you while you were battling.”

“Eh? You were on the base the entire time?” Airaxen blinked a few times surprised.

“Yes, I was following you this entire time.”

“Well that’s interesting. But what did you say about disks?” The shadow moved it’s claw-like hand towards Airaxen who opened his hand where two disks fell into it, one red another black.

“I would recommend that when you escape you take a look at the red disk if you want to have some of your questions answered. Oh yes, you have less then a minute left before this base explodes,” before Airaxen could ask anymore to the shadow it had already sunk into the ground and left. At that instant sirens began to scream in shrill voices and sending red light in all directions. Airaxen drew his sword and slashed open the hatch and dashing out through the hatch. He summoned all of his remaining energy and leapt straight up and flew up as fast as he could. As expected the lunar base exploded with an incredible force that sent Airaxen--who was hundreds of feet above the base hurtling out of the Moon’s gravitational pull, as well as blasting a massive crater into the surface of the Moon. Airaxen was spinning around rapidly in space, but soon regained his composure and stopped his spinning. He shook his head briskly and looked around at his surroundings, the moon now with a massive crater in it, the Earth off in the distance to the right of him. Airaxen looked at the disks he was given, they were ordinary in size and shape, round and with a hole in the center just colored different from each other, one with one side colored red the other black.

“What’s on this red disk that could tell me about myself...What did he mean by that, wait...He must mean my past! Sonaris may have told me the general details but the rest of the data should be in here at least I hope so. Alright then, only way to know is to get back to Earth and take a look,” but he lowered his head in disappointment.

<But first I have to do the impossible and get back to the Earth somehow, life just doesn’t seem to like me.> For the minutes that followed he didn’t lift his head up or move, instead he floated through space slowly, until a faint buzzing from nearby caused him to look around. Then a very fuzzy voice started to speak out of his wrist communicator.

“Air-*zzt*-axen are you-*zzt*-there?” It was Sonaris’s voice and the frequency was breaking up rapidly.

“Sonaris? How did you contact me up here?” He shouted at his communicator.

“No time to-*zzt*- answer that-*zzt*. Have to warn-*zzt*-you about-*zzt*-another machine trying-*zzt*-to-*zzt*-finish the job-*zzt*. The final robot I-*zzt*-built in my lab has-*zzt*-been activated-*zzt*-because of the lunar-*zzt*-base explosion, and with your genetic-*zzt*-signature still active, the robot is launching it-*zzt*-self into space to-*zzt*-destroy-*zzt*-you. Ack-*zzt*-the signal-*zzt*-is-*zzt*-breaking.” At that moment Sonaris was cut off and replaced by static, Airaxen closed his communicator and looked around for the robot he mentioned.

<Great, I’ve spent about 5 hours of my day fighting off Sonaris’s flunkies, and just when I think it’s over there’s one last big giant robot trying to kill me, marvelous.> Airaxen held his sword with both hands and waited for what he thought would be his final battle.

* * *

Back on the Earth inside Sonaris’s lab it was totally still, until a computer console began to beep quietly. The beeping console was located deep in the lab. In fact it was buried at least 10 miles underground within a massive subterranean bunker. A loud mechanical grinding soon drowned out the computer’s noise, then a humming intermingled with the grinding noise. The tons of earth and soil above the bunker slowly shifted apart revealing faint traces of moonlight from the night sky. The faint light slowly made the automation visible. It was a 50 foot tall bulky rocket. It was very simple in design, a standard cylinder body with a point. But the rocket was much thicker and shorter then most, reason being was that it was actually a large mecha that was able to compact itself into a rocket. Smoke started to engulf the bottom part of the room as the engines started to kick start to life. Then the rocket began to lift up off the ground rapidly, the craft shooting straight up into the air heading straight into space, a red eye glowing to life.

* * *

Airaxen stared at the Earth for what he thought were the longest few minutes of his life waiting for his final opponent, hoping he’d make it out of this encounter alive. Suddenly a small shimmer against the surface of the planet caught his eye and he focused all of his attention onto it. The little shimmer grew quickly turning into a large dot, then into a recognizable figure; a rocket. It was approaching him at an unconceivable speed, but its engines stopped suddenly. The rocket’s top half and lower half turned in opposite directions and pulled away from each other, then the top half of the craft started to split apart more. Two thick arms fired out of the rocket, the arms were cylinders with a blocky hand, they were not connected to the body in any sort of way they seemed to hover in place with the rocket. The bottom half folded out to form to sleek legs with rocket engines instead of feet. Finally the point of the rocket split down the middle and simply flew off revealing a rectangular head with a single large red eye and a set of mohawks on the side of its head. The momentum of the robot’s launch carried it the rest of the way to Airaxen. It straightened up towering over him blocking out any light that the sun provided before. Airaxen gripped his sword tightly and brought it closer to himself. The two combatants glared at each other waiting for the other to establish the first move. The robot moved one of its arms back, then threw a punch with one of its massive fists. Airaxen, being unable to move in this environment, raised his sword and tried to divert the attack with his weapon, his attempt did stop the fist from connecting with his head but sent him flying back as well as sending his sword flying away. The robot charged and sent his other fist at Airaxen and smashed him away. It then pointed both arms at him vents opening up on each arm a rack of rockets on each. The automation launched all of the rockets which all homed in on the vulnerable Airaxen and seemingly blasted him apart, in fact it did. Airaxen’s left arm was blown clear off, his right tattered with barely any armor remaining, his lower body was no more now it was nothing more then a tangle of blue vines.

<I tried my best...in retrospect taking on three golems, a hundred or so little laser wielding robots, another three robots, Sonaris, and another one of Sonaris’s robots probably wasn’t the best idea. I just wish I could’ve just gotten a chance to say good bye to Tikai....probably not Sonaris thou.> The remainder of his body fell limp as he prepared for his demise. The robot put it’s hands together forming a large orb of energy which grew rapidly in size. Airaxen’s sword was floating away from the scene of the battle, but suddenly spun around and pointed straight at Airaxen and flew at him. The sword stopped near him, straightened up to be perpendicular to his body The crystals flew out of the weapon and circled around Airaxen leaving trails of color around him. Soon they stopped this and the crystals then shot straight at Airaxen and fixed themselves onto his chest in a hexagonal design with one in the center. Airaxen then began to glow gold slowly, then small gold flames started to engulf him and soon he was covered in them. Miraculously the damage he had received from the robot’s attack was being repaired quickly and he was soon fully restored to his previous state. The robot had finally finished charging it’s attack, a massive white orb in its right hand which it threw at full force towards the gold speck in the distance. In a few seconds the orb smashed into Airaxen and exploded in a blinding flash of light and smoke. The robot turned around and began to hover towards the Earth. Suddenly a silver beam struck him in the back, blasting apart some of it’s armor. The robot spun around immediately and to it’s disgust a figure was still there, Airaxen had survived the attack unharmed. But now he looked radically different, unrecognizable now. Airaxen’s entire body underwent a massive transformation a large arched spike that seemed to be fused onto his back. His legs and arms were all one color, a mix between gold and silver, as well as his body. One his arms he now wore red metallic gauntlets with white gloves, his feet in metallic silver and red shoes with little openings on the soles of them. His head was changed totally, now he had six large spikes fused into the back of his head where his hair used to be, the two in the center arched slightly downward while the two on each side pointed upwards like horns. On each spike was a large red stripe running along the top of it with stripe running down to his eyes from the center spike. The normal human looking ears were gone and replaced with two pointy triangular ones higher up on his head. His head was mostly golden-silver except for the red stripes and a black area which used to be where his mouth was. The seven crystals were affixed to his chest in the same design, as well seven white orbs were circling around him. Finally, to finish his new appearance he was engulfed in a bright golden flame which could be seen miles away. The robot wound up and sent a flying punch at him. Airaxen narrowed his eyes, then moved his left arm across his body and swatted away the attack sending the arm spinning off aimlessly. The mechanical golem moved back slightly intrigued at the display of strength, its arm flew back into place by its right shoulder. Then it raised both hands above its head in an “X” then broke the formation forming two small orbs in each hand. The orbs circling Airaxen suddenly stopped in front of him forming a circle that closed in and out rapidly. Airaxen tilted down until he was horizontal and then flew straight at the robot, the orbs acting like a shield. The robot threw the two orbs in its hands, as they traveled they split apart into tiny little lasers until there were at least over 50 of them. The orbs positioned themselves to be in front of any laser that would strike Airaxen and absorbed them leaving him untouched. He reached behind his back opening his hand which caused his sword to fly straight into it so he could slash apart the behemoth. But it was ready this time and swatted Airaxen away causing him to fall towards the Earth, as well as dropping his sword having it fall back to the Earth. The robot turned around slowly then it’s lower body broke apart from the upper body and began to transform. The structure lengthened out and two large blades emerged out of the side. The legs straightened out at 90 degree angles which could be used as handle bars. The robot grabbed this strange weapon then pointed it at Airaxen. The blades started to generate jolts of electricity which arched from one blade to the other forming a ball of electricity. Airaxen looked at the robot as he was slowly being pulled back to the Earth by it’s gravitational pull. He narrowed his eyes again and put his hands together at the wrists, palms wide open. Tiny lights started to gather at his hands letting off a sparkling like sound. He closed his eyes for a moment then reopened them to see a massive ball of crackling blue electricity between the blades of the robot’s weapon.

“FINAL DESTINY!” He shouted in a deep and commanding voice. At the same instant a crackling blue beam was launched at Airaxen as a truly gigantic set of 7 spiraling multicolored beams were fired out at the robot. The robot’s attack was radiating massive amounts of energy, but it was no where near the amount that Airaxen’s was sending off. The attack was instantly engulfed in the other one as if it was nothing more then a small speck of dust. The massive 50 foot tall robot was even engulfed by the attack and instantly began disintegrating into dust. A minute later Airaxen’s attack had flown out of sight and the robot was now non-existent. He closed his eyes again, falling back to the Earth faster and faster with each passing second, the orbs surrounding him spinning around rapidly encasing him in a large white orb.

* * *

Sonaris and Tikai were slowly walking away from where their spacecraft had crashed in the dead of night, a solemn mood as they went. Tikai saddened from losing a friend, Sonaris unsure what to say to someone he had taken hostage for the better part of a day. He looked at the ground for a moment then started to speak.

“Um, I’d like to say that, um...”

“What?” Tikai said briskly.

“I’m sorry for dragging you into this situation I would assume is what I mean.”

“Well that’s nice, still wish you were the one that got blown into a million pieces thou,” she said with spite, Sonaris winced slightly at the comment.

“Ah, yes well I would think I deserved that.”

“You deserve a lot more then that,” again he winced. An uneasy silence followed this. Sonaris looked up at the night sky and began to admire the sights he never took the time to witness before. He was just about to point this out to Tikai in an attempt to break the silence, but just as he turned around to face her, she fell to her knees and started to cry quietly. Sonaris blinked rapidly, trying to think of something to do to comfort her.

“Err, there, there. What’s wrong?” he asked feebly.

“I’m sorry, I’m-*sniff*-just a bit shaken up-*sniff*-from you know-*sniff*.” Sonaris gingerly patted her on the shoulder.

“Yes well, he was a very good person I hope he’s finally resting at piece now,” this comment accidentally made things worse and Tikai cried a bit harder.

“Err, wait look up there!” Sonaris pointed up at a large shooting star which streaked across the night sky. Tikai looked up at it, then back at Sonaris.

“So?”

“Um, make a wish?” He suggested.

“You know that only works on little 5 year olds.” Then a loud crash from nearby caused them both to perk up. Tikai stood up suddenly and dashed off towards the crash site, Sonaris following closely behind. They arrived at a large crater, at least 10 meters in diameter and about 15 deep. In the center lay Airaxen, his body tattered and sparking violently.

“AIR!” Tikai ran down into the crater and start shaking Airaxen violently. “Come on, wake up, wake up!” He groaned weakly drained of all strength.

“Ow...Stop that...I can’t feel my body...” Tikai stopped and let out a cheer and then hugged Airaxen tightly.

“Ack! Tikai! Stop it! You’re crushing me!” Airaxen choked out. Tikai was in tears again, this time out of joy. Airaxen blinked slowly at her.

“Eh? What’s wrong?” Sonaris whistled sharply for a moment getting the attention of the two in the crater.

“If you don’t mind, I would recommend that we start heading back to the city it is rather late you know,” Airaxen nodded and stood up with great difficulty, mainly because Tikai wouldn’t let go. Sonaris went down into the crater and gave him a hand getting out of the crater. At that moment Tikai let go of Airaxen, took a few steps in front of him, spun around with her eyes covered by her hair. Airaxen raised an eyebrow, then Tikai raised her right hand and-*SLAP*-slapped him across the face with a lot of force still hearing the armor she found in the lunar lab. Airaxen lost his footing and nearly fell back into the crater, but Sonaris grabbed onto him before that happened.

“If you ever do something that stupid again Airaxen, I swear to god I’ll kill you with my own two hands!” Tikai screamed, then clung back on him again. Airaxen looked over at Sonaris dumbfounded, and he got back an equally dumbfounded look from him.

“So, now what happens?” Sonaris asked in an attempt to change the subject.

“I really have no idea,” Airaxen muttered in response.

“Well, I guess getting back to the city is a start.” They agreed and started walking east.

“Question, how far away is the city anyway?” Airaxen asked.

“You don’t want to know.” Sonaris muttered.