Episode-976
Chapter : 1951
"I knew you would come," she whispered. "You always come back."
Lloyd gave her a small, tired smile. It was the smile of Evan, the soldier.
"Always," he promised.
He turned back to the Collector, his face hardening. The battle was over, but the war against the people who had sent this man was just beginning. And Lloyd Ferrum was done playing defense.
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The shattered glass of the greenhouse roof lay scattered across the floor like broken ice. The heavy, grey feeling of the time-slowing magic was gone, replaced by the sharp, fresh air of the afternoon. The sunlight streamed in, making the dust motes dance in the air. But there was no peace in the room. There was only a terrifying standoff.
Lloyd stood in the center of the wreckage. The ghostly woman with the clock eye, Zafira, had faded back into the shadows of his mind. She had done her job; she had cut the time trap. Now, it was just Lloyd and his raw power.
His right arm was still transformed. The white and gold metal plates of the Nova Cannon hummed with a deep, vibrating sound. The barrel was glowing with a blinding white light, charging up a ball of plasma that was hot enough to melt through a castle wall. Lloyd’s eyes were locked on the enemy. He looked calm, but inside, his emotions were a storm. He had won the battle of time, and now he was ready to end the war.
Across the room, the Collector was shaking.
The man in the dark robes was huddled against a heavy wooden table. His grey skin was slick with sweat, and his black eyes darted around the room, looking for an exit that didn't exist. He had lost his monsters. He had lost his time machine. He had lost his arrogance.
Now, he realized he was just a man standing in front of a loaded gun.
"It’s over," Lloyd said. His voice was flat and hard. He didn't shout. He didn't need to. "Drop the shield. Step away from her."
The Collector looked at the massive cannon pointed at his chest. He could feel the heat radiating from it even from twenty feet away. He knew that if Lloyd pulled the trigger, there wouldn't be a body left to bury. The beam would vaporize him instantly.
But the Collector was a survivor. He was a rat who had lived in the shadows of the Fire Fly Corporation and the Seventh Circle for years. Rats didn't fight lions. Rats cheated.
His eyes flicked to the side. He looked at Airin.
She was standing just a few feet away from him, breathing hard. She looked exhausted. Her hands were bleeding from the glass shards, and her face was pale. She was recovering from the massive amount of energy she had used to create the laser grid earlier. She wasn't a threat right now. She was a target.
A nasty, desperate idea formed in the Collector’s mind.
"Over?" the Collector laughed. It was a high, shaky sound. "You think this is over because you have the bigger stick? You think physics is the only rule that matters?"
He moved.
He didn't move with speed or grace. He moved with the desperate, jerky motion of a cornered animal. He lunged to his right.
"No!" Lloyd shouted.
Lloyd tried to adjust his aim, but he couldn't fire. The Nova Cannon was a weapon of mass destruction. If he missed by even an inch, the splash damage would kill anyone standing nearby.
The Collector grabbed Airin.
His pale, claw-like hand wrapped around her arm, yanking her roughly toward him. Airin gasped, stumbling as she was pulled off balance. The Collector spun her around, slamming her back against his chest. He wrapped his arm around her neck, using her body to cover his own.
"Back off!" the Collector screamed.
He raised his free hand. Black smoke poured out of his palm, forming a dense, swirling wall of darkness. It was his Void Shield. But he didn't put the shield in front of himself. He curved it. He wrapped the black energy around Airin and himself, creating a semi-circle of absolute darkness.
From Lloyd’s perspective, the enemy had disappeared. All he could see was the black wall of the shield and Airin’s terrified face peeking out over the top of the Collector’s arm.
"You want to shoot?" the Collector yelled from behind Airin’s ear. "Go ahead! Pull the trigger!"
Chapter : 1952
Lloyd froze. The hum of the Nova Cannon seemed to get louder, an angry buzz demanding to be released. But his finger hovered over the firing mechanism.
"Let her go," Lloyd warned. His voice was shaking now. "If you hurt her..."
"If I hurt her?" the Collector mocked. He pressed a jagged shadow-dagger against Airin’s throat. "I’m not the one pointing a cannon at her! You are! Do you know the blast radius of that weapon, Lord Ferrum? I do. I’ve read the specs on Fire Fly tech. If that bolt hits my shield, it will explode. It will burn me, yes. But it will turn this girl into ash before I even feel the heat."
Lloyd’s heart hammered against his ribs. He knew the Collector was right.
The Nova Cannon fired plasma—superheated ionized gas. It didn't just punch a hole; it created a thermal explosion. At this range, inside a closed room, firing that weapon was suicide for Airin. Even if he aimed perfectly at the Collector’s exposed shoulder, the heat wave would kill her.
He was checkmated. He had the ultimate weapon, but he couldn't use it.
"Put the gun down," the Collector ordered. "Deactivate the arm. Do it now, or I open her throat right here."
Lloyd gritted his teeth. He looked at Airin. Her eyes were wide, but she wasn't screaming. She was looking at him. She was looking at the cannon.
"Don't do it, Lloyd," she whispered. Her voice was strained because of the arm crushing her windpipe.
"Shut up!" the Collector shook her. "Transform the arm back! Now!"
Lloyd hesitated. If he powered down, he would be vulnerable. The Collector would kill them both with shadow magic the moment the cannon was gone. But if he didn't power down, Airin might die by accident.
It was the classic dilemma. The hero’s weakness.
"I’m waiting!" the Collector shrieked. "I’ll count to three! One!"
Lloyd felt a bead of sweat roll down his forehead. He felt helpless. All his power, all his upgrades from the System, all his knowledge from two lifetimes... and he was beaten by a coward with a hostage.
He started to lower the cannon. The white light in the barrel began to dim slightly as he mentally prepared to disengage the spirit.
"Two!" the Collector shouted, sensing victory.
The black Void Shield shimmered. It was a perfect defense against energy. It absorbed everything. It was designed to eat magic. The Collector knew he was safe behind it. He knew Lloyd wouldn't risk firing.
But he made one mistake.
He assumed that Airin was just a battery. He assumed she was just a scared schoolgirl who got lucky with a light spell earlier. He assumed she was a victim.
He didn't know about the memories.
He didn't know that inside Airin’s head, there was another woman waking up. A woman who had lived through a war on a different planet. A woman who understood that when you are cornered, you don't wait for the hero to save you. You help him aim.
Airin wasn't looking at the knife at her throat. She wasn't looking at the scary black shield.
She was looking at the angle of Lloyd’s arm.
She was looking at the shiny, reflective surfaces of the broken glass on the floor.
She was doing math.
Time seemed to slow down for Airin again, but not because of magic this time. It was focus. Pure, cold focus.
She felt the Collector’s arm pressing against her windpipe. She felt the cold bite of the shadow-dagger against her skin. She smelled his fear-sweat and the rot of his magic.
But her mind was somewhere else.
She was remembering a dream. In the dream, she was sitting at a kitchen table with Evan—Lloyd. They were arguing about a mirror. He was trying to fix a laser sight on a rifle, and the beam kept drifting.
“It’s about the angle of incidence,” she had told him in the dream, tapping the paper with a wrench. “The light hits the surface and bounces off at the exact same angle. If you can’t shoot around the corner, Evan, you use a mirror. You shoot the reflection.”
“You can’t shoot a bullet at a mirror,” he had laughed.
“No,” she had smiled. “But you can shoot light.”
The memory faded, but the lesson remained.
Airin opened her eyes fully. She looked at Lloyd. He was lowering the cannon, his face twisted in agony. He was giving up. He was going to surrender to save her.
And then they would both die.