Olympus

Chapter 5

"Five... Four... Three... Two... One."

The moment the countdown elapsed, the four ballista guns launched their missiles into the air; the projectiles flying with a grace and accuracy that could only have been AI-guided. They soared through the air for some seconds before beginning their descent right towards Adolf.

"You may want to take cover for this one," Dennis said to Megan who immediately huddled closer as he pressed the screen of his wristwatch and commanded, "Blast protection," and immediately, what looked like a force field covered the both of them.

With bated breaths, Megan watched Adolf stare down the missiles coming towards him, like he could just will them away with his mind if he wanted. But just as they were a few metres from him, he wrapped his wings around himself in such a manner that no part of his body was left on the outside.

The first missile collided explosively into the wings, then the second, the third, and the fourth; all of them generating enough force to create a crack in the solid ground; and even in the safety of the force field, Megan and Dennis felt the aftershocks of the explosions when they passed through.

The shocks were the only things that would result from the missiles strikes though, as Megan herself soon discovered to her utmost surprise when she looked up to see Adolf unfurl his wings after the attack and he was totally unhurt. Natural wings definitely can't do that, she thought.

Meanwhile, Adolf was smiling unabashedly where he floated. He looked towards where Megan and Dennis stood and winked at them like they could see it- they didn't, by the way- before charging forward to meet the guns with a smirk that seemed to say, "My turn."

"Drones, activate attack sequences," the AI commanded when it sensed Adolf move and the drones immediately swarmed around him in a such a way that it would be difficult for him to move in any direction without coming against more than two of them at a time.

"Open fire," it commanded and they did.

Adolf held a wing in front of himself as a shield to deflect the bullet and used the other to guide himself towards the ground in a glide.

Watching the attack, Megan observed that whenever Adolf's wings were hit, the contact spark would morph into a rainbow wave that travelled through the length of the wings to lodge at their edges. Okay, there's definitely nothing natural about those wings, she concluded without a doubt.

"What exactly are Adolf's wings?" she asked Dennis.

"Bionics," he replied. "Heavy titanium plates infused with a defensive-offensive technology that even the Army hasn't begun to conceive of its existence yet. They're trillions of dollars in worth and thousands of tons in weight."

And somehow, a shadowy division of an even more shadowy covert department of the UN decided to give them to a teenager to play with, Megan added in her head, the thought perplexing her.

But speaking of which, she asked, "How in the world is he able to carry the wings then if they weigh as much as you said?"

"His real power, of course." He pointed up for her to watch.

Megan looked just then and saw that after a while of the drone assault, Adolf's wings had begun to glow very bright as the rainbow waves weren't just at the edges now but running erratic throughout the surfaces.

And then, he released them.

The release had actually started in his muscles. Adolf had tensed them in such a way that they somehow created a visible strain on the wings themselves, causing all the waves to congregate at one point; and then, he relaxed, and with an explosion, the waves shot out of the wings into the drones; visibly frying them on the spot.