Page 26 of Tears of Tungsten
On the screen, Scylla flailed like a creature possessed. Typhon narrowly managed to avoid getting hit by one of her tentacles, but it was a close call. The wolf heads furiously snapped at Cerberus, but he wisely kept his distance and didn’t fight back.
“What in Tartarus’s name is going on?” Selene asked, already on her feet.
Together, we rushed to the entrance of the hangar bay. As we ran outside, the first thing that struck us was the sweltering heat. It was even hotter than usual. Temperatures tended to be high most of the time on Tartarus Base, but the Tartarus shield protected us from the worst of the solar radiation. The tachyon output coming from Scylla was so intense it felt like the shield had fallen and we were left with no protection.
It reminded me an awful lot of those horrible moments I’d spent trapped inside the Charybdis, suffocating, being cooked alive. Oddly, the memory didn’t fill me with panic. “We have to calm her down, Selene,” I cried. “I think Typhon and Cerberus can’t approach her properly. If they stop and try to absorb the tachyons she’s emitting, she might attack.”
“And I take it you think the two of us can do it?”
I shook my head. “I’ll do it. You stand by and get ready. When she’s calmer, you can ground her. Gaia’s Gift might be more useful to you there.”
Some terrorists had used their powers like that, attempting to smother the Tartarus flame burning in the diamond cores of our chimeras. It had actually worked a few times, although as far as I knew, never on a Grand Chimeras. Harpies were more vulnerable to such attacks.
Either way, the situation was very dangerous. I wouldn’t have taken such a chance with Selene’s life, but I trusted her to be able to handle this. She’d survived the power of the mirror trial and had saved me in the final stage of the tournament. She could do this as well. I was sure of it.
I wasn’t so confident in my abilities, but I had to help regardless. I refused to allow Pollux to lose his chimera as well. We had to stop Scylla’s rampage before the rest of the staff noticed and tried to forcibly intervene.
Secure in my decision, I reached out to the fire again, this time seeking the alien blaze in the air, instead of my own. A heartbeat later, my world, heart, and soul exploded in a rush of magic and heat. I tasted blood in my mouth, but I didn’t let go.
Scylla and Charybdis had been inseparable. I hadn’t managed to save Charybdis. In this, at least, I wouldn’t fail.
