Chapter 31: Cross Purposes

The moment the sun set we slipped out from under the pilfered tarp.

“We have two objectives,” I said. The damp air swallowed my voice as it tried to slip between the surrounding tomb stones. “Disrupt our enemies’ operations, and set them against each other in the process.”

“Okay, uh.” Electra pushed herself upright a beat after me. “I know this is important and all, but I’m pretty curious where you came up with this graveyard idea.”

I looked down at the tarp that Electra was busy shoving under the nearest bush. “Is it really so inventive? People don’t like to go into graveyards, ergo, they’re a great place to hide.”

“I mean, there are a lot of good places to hide, right? I just wanna know why you picked this one.”

I rolled my eyes. “We’re kind of on a clock here, Electra.”

She huffed, brushing the dirt off of her pants. “It’s just we’ve been learning so much about each other recently!”

I huffed. “My uncle slept in graveyards to hide when he was a kid. It’s how the coyote smuggled people up to the U.S. boarder. He told me about it when I was in high school.”

“Really?”

“Really.” I nodded. “It was for a report I was writing, or some stupid school project like that. I was much more interested in the idea of hiding in plain sight.

Electra laughed. “It’s a favorite of yours, I know.”

I smiled back. “Let’s just say I know where my ingenuity comes from. Now, any other questions?”

Electra shook her head as the two of us slipped out of the graveyard. Silverwall was quieter at night, and the streets were black as pitch. It formed a striking contrast with my own little town, where electric lights allowed people to be out until the small hours in the morning.

A small advantage, but one we sorely needed.

“I took some time to look over the city through my spy mirror.” I pointed upwards. “Our space whale is high enough up that you can’t get good detail, but fortunately, I already knew where to look.”

“Oh?” Electra asked.

“From the way Arlo acted, it’s pretty clear he doesn’t have complete control of the outer city. In fact, I’d hazard a guess his territory doesn’t extend very far south of the main thoroughfare that cuts the Silverwall in half.”

“So you were paying attention to the parts he does control.” Electra nodded in understanding.

“I knew I brought you along for a reason.”

“Hey, I got my start in RICO stuff, yanno, before I got picked up by Aegis Corp.” She hummed. “If the Tarnished only control the northern half of the city, why did we have to sleep in a graveyard though?”

“Better safe than sorry.” We took a turn away from a small group standing in the light of guttering torch. “And also, would you want to walk another three miles in the dark instead?”

“Point.” Electra grumbled to herself. “I can barely see the nose on my face.”

“You can always see you nose; your brain just ignores it most of the time.” I ignored her muted shout. “Anyway, I’m sure they have passwords and lookouts, but it’s pretty clear when one part of town gets a lot more foot traffic than it really should, especially in the bad part of town.”

“Yeah, satellite surveillance is kinda OP,” Electra replied. “So what are we hitting.”

“No idea.” I paused at an intersection, focusing on my mental map of the city as seen from above. It was not a simple task. “This way.”

“You don’t know?”

“They didn’t exactly put a sign on the roof. I told you what data I’m working with, El.”

She worked over that statement in her mind as we took a few more blind turns, before finally slowing as we crept down a dark street just a hundred meters or so from our destination.

“They’re kinda bold, ain’t they?” Electra nodded her head towards another group of men. There were quite a few of them, near a ring of torches in the middle of the street, and we could hear them cheering and shouting from here.

It was hard to tell from here, but if we got closer I was sure we’d see tarnished metal bands on their arms.

“Arlo was right about one thing, they own this part of town.”

“So what’s the plan? I don’t think we’re gonna have much time once they realize we’re here, Em.”

I nodded. “That’s why we go in hard, sow as much chaos as we can…”

“And ride the confusion of there before the guard shows up.”

I glanced over my shoulder. “Look at you, thinking like a proper villain now.”

Electra nodded, but even in the dark I could make out the conflicted expression on her face. “If we go back to Earth,” she said, “will we go back to playing these cat and mouse games with each other, Via?”

I paused, licking my suddenly dry lips. “If?”

“Oh don’t give me that.” Electra shook her head. “You have a lot going on here. Heck, so do I, and neither of us are the type to leave things half finished.”

“Too true,” I murmured. We edged closer to the light, voices turning into whispers. “What brought this on? Just because we’ve been ‘learning’ about each other?”

Electra shrugged, the fabric of her cloak rustling in the wind. “You said it best. We work well together, it’s just…”

I hummed in acknowledgement. “We’re also very good at working against each other.”

“Yeah. But we could do a lot together, not just on this world, you know?”

“Now you’re talking like a proper light novel protagonist.”

She sighed lightly. “I think we all know the main character of this story, Em.”

“Flattery will get you nowhere.” I paused, and closer and we were liable to be overheard. “I don’t think your friends at Aegis would be so keen on me joining up.”

“I wouldn’t ask you to join Aegis, jeez.” She shook her head. “Forget I said anything.”

“No, no, it’s too late for that now.” I turned to look at my erstwhile enemy turned ally. “I’m just surprised is all, what we’re doing here is pretty villainous as well, after all.”

“So maybe I’ve changed some too, sue me,” she said. “I just wanted to know if you would change as well.”

I paused, looking up at the moonless sky. “We’ve had this discussion before, haven’t we?”

“Usually you trying to tempt me over to the dark side, figured I’d try the opposite this time.”

“Tell you what.” I chuckled. “After we fix everything here, after we create a foundation that won’t just collapse the moment we vanish, then you can ask me that question again.”

She grumbled. “Seems like a cop out to me.”

“Villain, remember?” I replied. “I’m good at running from the cops. Now…” I turned back towards the fire.

“It’s a deal.”

I paused. “Hmm?”

“After we fix whatever mess is wrong with Silverwall, with this whole island and whatever sick experiments they’re doing to Ishanti’s family or whatever it is, I’ll get your answer.”

“I guess heroes have to be ambitious.” I fought back against a smirk Electra wouldn’t even be able to see. “I don’t hate it.”

“Great.” She started forward again. “Now let’s break some heads.”

I laughed, no longer worried about stealth. “And here I thought you were trying to convince me to be a hero.” As I raised my hands, a wave of my favorite demons appeared before me. Now that I could level my skills again, it felt almost easy to assemble my favorite legion of hobblefiends, coupled with bigger gryphons and nimble blight bats for air superiority.”

“Whatever.” Electra raised a hand of her own, just as the men in front of our target started to turn and peer into the darkness. “Strike Twice!”

Twin bolts of lightning hit the ground, throwing the low level thugs to the ground with a massive boom.

“Let’s get to work, my pretties!” I cackled as I raced forward with a wave of demons, before breaking over the heads of stunned and .

If the Tarnished didn’t know we were here, they sure would now.

I hardly needed to contribute, but I could help but want to stretch my power armor. I caught a man’s fist, grunting as he actually pushed me back a step before I socked him across the face. A blow that would send a normal person to the hospital didn’t even knock him off his feet.

Then a gryphon swooped out of the sky, bearing him to the dirt with claws and a razor sharp beak.

I shook out my hand. Fortunately, it was designed to match superhuman strength, what a pity for me that any two-bit gangster could push a few levels and suddenly be as strong as your average C-list hero back home.

On Earth I wasn’t able to summon literal demons, so I’d call it a wash.

Electra came up to my side, fingers still sparking with lightning both magical and mundane. “That’s all of them.”

“Looks like it.” I turned towards the warehouse that was the target of our attack. “Did anyone get away?”

“One or two, I think I saw,” Electra said.

“We’re already short on time them. Just blast the front off the building.”

Electra tilted her head. “We’re not even gonna go inside?”

“I’d love to loot it down to the wall studs, but they don’t even have studs in the walls here.” I waved my hands. “Plus how would we carry our loot?”

She shrugged. “Suit yourself.” She lowered her center of gravity, before launching off another thunder bolt at the worn brick edifice. It blew a steaming hole in the wall, before the roof crashed in with a shuddering groan.

Water rushed out of the building, forcing Electra to take a few steps back. I glanced down as a brand new river washed past my boots, running first clear, then increasingly red.

Small wooden chits bumped against my heels¸ mixed with oddly decorated playing cards. “A gambling den…bath house?” I asked.

“I’ve seen weirder,” Electra replied. “So…”

I nodded. “Let’s get out of here.” I looked back at my small army of demons as we moved. “Give the guards a scare when they show up.”

Electra didn’t say anything, but I could feel the discomfort radiating from her. She still identified with the law. To be fair, the guards of Silverwall were surprisingly uncorrupt; they simply served a corrupt regime.

Too bad I didn’t accept, ‘I was just following orders’ as an excuse.

We jogged back into the night just as people were starting to stick their heads out of the windows. I lead the way, doing my best to keep track of our location from memory, but without even discussing it, we circled back around for another look at the scene of our attack. With practiced efficiency, we climbed up onto the roof of a nearby tenement house, wood creaking beneath me all the while, just in time to see the guard make it to the scene.

By the looks of it, the Tarnished had made it there first. I’d felt a few more of my demons vanishing while we’d moved, but the gang had called it quits. Maybe they wanted the guard to bleed instead of them.

A squad of ten men and women and silver armor came down the street, a large brass lantern floating above them.

At my side, I felt Electra tense as they formed up to confront what remained of my unholy horde. They’d…probably win?

I sighed. “For what it’s worth, Electra, I’ve changed as well.”

With a snap of my fingers, the demons dissolved back into aether, leaving a confused squad of guardsmen standing alone in the middle of the street.

Electra looked at me in askance. “Empress?”

“Let’s get moving.”

We made our way back to the street.

“I thought the plan was to set our enemies against each other.” She wasn’t asking a question.

“Yeah, well, it’s kinda well know that I work with demons at this point,” I replied. “It’ll probably make the Tarnished madder if they think we’re working with the city guard.”

“…I know we’re gonna have to fight them both,” Electra said.

I nodded. “But not today.”

“Not today,” she repeated. “Thanks, Em.”