As he jumped to his side to dodge, he heard a loud gunshot unlike any he had heard so far. It was louder than normal guns, and the bang was sharper. Jack felt a sudden sharp pain in his left shoulder.
The bullet had pierced through his barrier and impaled right through his shoulder. Jack groaned in pain—the bullet had broken through his shoulder joint, and the left hand was now dangling lifelessly, a hole in his shoulder.
Without wasting time, Jack redeployed his body strengthening and jumped up several feet in the air. He deployed a vertical Kana slab and used it as a foothold to propel himself through the air as he corked toward a standing wall among the rubble and took cover behind it.
He slumped against the wall. He used his right hand's fingers and inserted them into the wound, clearing out any rubble that might've gotten in. He grunted in pain and then took out a healing potion and drank it all up. The wound slowly started healing.
"Of course this will happen, smartass. You aren't the only Kratian in the world they have killed. There must be thousands of others with the same Ikanami like you, and who are more adept at it than you. Yet, they still met their ends at their hands. Of course they will have a countermeasure to every Ikanami." Jack berated himself bitterly at his foolish act right now.
The attackers had the doctor in an automaton and four other officers. They were carrying Kana rifles—guns that would concentrate Kana energy and imbue it into the bullets. Kana barriers and slabs aren't invincible. They break as soon as something more densely concentrated in Kana energy attacks them.
"What did I say, boy? Don't. Move. That. Arm. Now look at it, dangling like a broken doll. You never learn." He smirked and turned to his men."Get him. And break the other one, just for fun."
The attackers started toward Jack. Jack could see it in the broken glass lying in front of him. He picked up a big block of rubble and threw it at them, breaking their formation as the other officers dispersed to dodge it. The doctor, however, just shot holes through it, cutting it in half. The projectile fell apart, each half lying on his side.
"Wow, that thing traces stuff too, huh? Exactly what I needed when I'm wounded, low on energy, and the opponent is armed with a Kana weapon." Jack thought bitterly.
He was not yet adept enough to absorb Kana energy while fighting. After all, one doesn't run out of energy in the stimulator, and if he were to try now and something went wrong, it would tear apart his Kana flow without anyone being there to help him with it.
Jack closed his eyelids as he began to absorb energy as fast as he could, but deep down he knew he wouldn't absorb enough.
He put as much effort into it as he could. It tore apart his aura nodes as he absorbed such an amount of energy at once. Pain spread all over his body, but he didn't care. He has someone to protect, and he definitely ain't leaving her be.
Just then there was a blinding flash and a loud shrill sound at the enemies. The light reflected from the glass and fell on Jack's eyelids. He jerked his eyes open to the sounds of gunshots and slashes and thuds behind him.
Diana was there, fighting—demonstrating her close-combat prowess. Both of the armor blades stretched out from under the arm guards, handguns clutched in each of her hands. She had deployed a flashbang and was killing away the officers standing around the doctor.
The battlesuit also worked as a miniature version of body strengthening and speedster Ikanami. Diana weaved through the stunned officers.
She grabbed the head of an officer and drove the blade right through his neck. She then turned and used the handgun in her other arm to shoot two officers. The last officer had his senses back. He shot at Diana—Diana dashed around him, circling him rapidly, weaving through the trajectory and avoiding the bullets.
Suddenly she dashed toward him, withdrew her blade, and drove an uppercut up his chin before firing the handgun that was in that hand. The bullet pierced all the way through, and the officer died.
The doctor was back to his senses too. He halted in his tracks as he was walking toward Jack and turned to Diana. Diana's heart raced at the big figure in front of her. She wiped away some sweat and redeployed her blades.
The doctor aimed at Diana, and as Diana got ready to dodge, Jack came from behind the doctor and punched the back of his head hard. It was still inside an automaton, so the doctor survived—but he staggered. Jack lifted Diana up in his arms and dashed back to his hiding spot.
"What are you doing here?" he hissed, his voice full of concern and exhaustion.
"Was getting bored, so decided to join in," she giggled a bit.
"This isn't a game, Diana. I told you to stay there. I can handle it perfectly well."
"Ugh, c'mon. Your shoulder says something else. Shut it," Diana said angrily as she pulled Jack's side closer to her and started healing his arm.
"You're saying this to someone who was the top third in close combat, right after Franklin and you. If you can fight, I can too. I'm tired of watching from the sidelines and watching you get hurt," Diana said, her voice low and concerned.
"But it's dangerous out here," Jack said as warm energy spread over his shoulder. The pain slowly subsided.
"And what are you then? Some sort of hero? Just a lil old Kratian prince. Let me help from now. We are in this together, after all."
Jack remained silent for a bit, then nodded.
"My Kana energy reserves are less than half. Transfer your energy into me, then I'll keep him busy while you refill yours. Then come."
Diana nodded excitedly, memories of their team drill combat sessions flooding her mind.
She sent her energy to Jack. Since Jack didn't have to concentrate on it, he could freely concentrate on keeping the doctor at bay. He kept throwing rubble at him to keep him from getting closer, warm energy sweeping all over him as his reserves refilled.
"Done. Now go. Let's go with Formation 1," Diana said, her voice enthusiastic.
"Before that, gimme your hand."
Jack took Diana's hand and passed some of his own energy into her suit.
"Now this will allow you to grip onto my Kana constructs, and you can see them with your visor."
Diana nodded and started to refill her reserves.
Jack redeployed his body-strengthening Ikanami, his body filled with more energy and more vigor, his body engulfed in colourless flames, occasionally sparks cracking through them.
He jumped up, several metres into the sky. He deployed a lot of Kana slabs vertically in a big circle over the doctor.
The doctor's automaton traced Jack, shooting at him. It was catching up. Jack distributed more power, flames roared violently around him, violent sparks crackling around him as he encircled the doctor. Fast like lightning, all that was visible was a circle of black that was enclosed in lightning.
He had surpassed the speed of the automaton!
As he circled, he deployed a Kana slab in front of a trajectory. Surely the bullet broke through. Then he deployed two at once; the bullet broke through the first, slowed down, and stopped at the second. Next time, he constructed a slab with energy equal to the previous two combined. The bullet halted.
He had managed to outgrow the danger!
Jack saw Diana get up. She gave him a meaningful nod and pulled out her blades.
He stopped circling and, with a huge jump, plunged at the doctor, smashing through his head protection. Then he retreated to avoid a counterstrike and constructed a Kana arm, lifted the doctor, and threw him at the hospital rubble.
The arm was still wrapped around him. Diana dashed and jumped onto the arm. She was able to stand on it like solid ground. She dashed toward the doctor. The doctor moved his neck and dodged the blade that was aimed at his forehead.
The blade hissed past his eye and claimed one of his ears before sliding into the back of his helmet, striking various wires there. The legs of the automaton stopped working; after all, Diana cut off the wires that read the neural signals and sent them to the feet.
Yet the surprises weren't over!
Jack could feel his grip around the doctor loosening.
The automaton was absorbing energy from his Kana hand, making the doctor free from the grip slowly and charging a bullet.
The doctor slipped from his arms, and as soon as he fell down, he aimed at Diana, ready to shoot.
Jack jumped up, made a slanting Kana slab in the air, turned around, used it as a foothold, pulled out Kazekiri, and jumped with as much force as he could toward the doctor. He shot forward faster than a bullet.
He put all his energy into Kazekiri and slashed, cutting away the barrel of the gun like a hot knife cuts butter. As soon as he landed, he turned around and beheaded the doctor. The doctor's head flew high and landed with a thud alongside the automaton that whirred as it powered down.
He had won, against the first Kratian eradication weapon he faced, without losing anyone, fulfilling his duty to protect his loved one.
Jack stumbled. He sheathed Kazekiri and looked at Diana, whose eyes were gleaming with pride at their teamwork.
"We make a pretty good team, huh?" she said, grinning.
"Of course we do. We used to be unstoppable at the training centre," Jack said with a weak laugh. He thrust sheathed Kazekiri into the ground and leaned onto it for support.
The fight was over, and now the pain from his aura nodes was killing him. Well, it was better too, because when they healed, they would expand and allow him to utilize more energy.
Diana walked over to him, noticing the irregularity in his Kana flow. She put a hand to his abdomen, right above the Dantain, and started healing him.
Jack's aura nodes relaxed as the warm energy spread through him. It relaxed him.
"There, all better," Diana said, a warm smile at him.
That intoxicating warm smile was lethal to Jack, who was already pretty tired from the fight. He wanted time to stop so he could sit down and etch that moment into his soul, but well, the crackling of fire in the rubble beside them brought him back to reality.
"Ahem, well, let's get going now. I am definitely not in a position to catch another stray enemy."
"Yeah, you are right. Let's go. But where? You said we weren't gonna go back home," Diana said as she walked back and looked at the demolished building near them.
"Pennsylvania is famous for hills and mountains. Those are the perfect hiding places. But as your punishment for getting out of the car, you will drive," Jack said playfully as he straightened up and slid his katana into the pouch.
"Yeah yeah, alright. Was going to anyway. Don't want you sleeping while driving. You look so tired," Diana said, staring deep into Jack's eyes.
"Yeah yeah, sure you were," he said sarcastically.
They both looked at each other for a moment and burst out laughing, an involuntary habit of theirs—and something they needed a lot after all the tension recently.
They started walking to the car, Diana wondering how they were gonna live in the wilderness. Will they build a small hut and live in it? or something else? The answer only time would tell.