“Because I was frustrated,” she said, her own helmet withdrawing. “I couldn’t land one punch on you.”
“But you knew that psionics wouldn’t change anything,” Adrian persisted. “Why try even?”
“You could’ve made a mistake,” she said.
“There is always a possibility of that. But you will not win, or even level the playing field, by hoping that I make mistakes,” Adrian said. “At our level of prowess, mistakes are rare. You need to guide me into doing something beneficial for you. Trick me into giving you an opening on purpose, then take advantage of it in a way that I haven’t predicted.”
“That’s easier said than done,” Aileen complained.
Adrian nodded. “It is. It is not about having a perfect technique. In fact, being perfect in your movements, attacks, and techniques is a bad thing. You need to be able to adapt to everything, invent moves that will accomplish what you want in an instant. Being perfect makes you predictable, easily maneuvered to exactly where your opponent wants you to be.” He tilted his head. “That is your problem; you think that if you fight perfectly, you will somehow reach me. But it has never been about that. On our level, fights are won in your mind. You need to manipulate me, trick me into doing what you want me to do.”
“I doubt that I could manipulate you into giving me an opening that I can exploit,” Aileen said.
“You can’t. I am too good at seeing those kinds of traps. What you need to do is let me attack you where you want me to, take the punch, and sacrifice in order to make an opening yourself,” he said.
Aileen nodded in understanding. At this point, she was willing to try anything to just land one punch on him.
“Let’s go again,” Adrian said as his helmet started covering his head.
Adrian walked into the control room of the Veritas with Sora following close behind a few minutes after the ship exited the trans-lane and dropped into normal space. Their location was an unimpressive system some one hundred light years spinward from Sol. And it was also the furthest point that the Empire had explored in their search for the Ra’a’zani. From this point on, they had no intel.
As he entered, one of the people standing in front of the holo table showing the system they were in turned to face him.
“Lord Sentinel,” said Gotu, formerly Hokra Gotu, one of the first Nel to have ever met a human, who was now a Warpath Master.
“Gotu, what do we have?” Adrian asked.
“Nothing much. There is no sign of life, but the system has two outgoing trans-stations. I’ve already sent two drones to the trans-stations; they should be arriving shortly and we will see what the scans say about them,” Gotu answered. Adrian nodded. From the sphere, they had gotten the scanning tech that allowed them to test trans-stations and find out the direction and travel time without actually going through them.
A few minutes later, they got the information from the first of the drones.
“Hm… three days’ travel time, going rimward…” Gotu started. “And here is the next one, going in the opposite direction—coreward, eleven days’ travel time.”
Adrian looked at the data on the holo. “Send both drones through, full stealth mode. Let’s see if there is something interesting on the other side.”
“Alright. Do you want us to explore the system some more? There are a couple of planets; we might find something useful for the future.”
Adrian glanced at the bleak system. He doubted that they would find anything that would warrant making a bigger colony here. But his people should at least have something to do as they waited for the word from the drones. “Yes, let’s start the survey. I’ll spend the time in the training rooms. Let me know the moment the first drone gets through.”
Adrian tried to lock his arms around his opponent, but he was too big for that. Instead, he found himself thrown off his opponent’s back to the floor, and a moment later big jaws started to come down on his neck. He rolled to the side and got to his knees, turning towards his opponent as he raised his front paw and swiped at Adrian’s head, only to be met with Adrian’s arm blocking it. The strength behind the attack pushed Adrian into another roll, and he used his arms to raise himself over his head and to his feet.
As he got his footing back, 700 kilograms of muscle crashed into him, with Adrian shifting his weight forward and grabbing the wolion. His legs slid across the floor a good meter and a half before he stopped. With a groan, Adrian twisted his upper body and dropped Akash to the ground, landing on top of him. Akash tried to bite his helmet, but Adrian jammed his forearm below the wolion’s throat, not letting him get close enough. He kept his weight on Akash, keeping him pinned; it was something that he never could have done before his body had been augmented. Akash struggled, trying to get a paw between them and trying to roll enough to get leverage on the ground.
Then Adrian’s hand slipped, and Akash turned enough to get his balance back and threw Adrian off again. Adrian stumbled a few steps back, and Akash followed by running at him, this time going low, with his head towards Adrian’s legs. He got a grip on Adrian’s leg with his jaws and pulled him to the floor. He then put his entire weight on him, pinning him to the ground in a similar manner that Adrian had done to him a moment ago.
With no way to get the giant wolion off, Adrian relaxed and conceded the win.
“Fine, you win,” Adrian said out loud over his Sentinel suit’s speakers.
Akash kept his weight on Adrian for a few more beats, making a point. Then he stood and sent Adrian a flash of his emotions—amusement, pride, and contentment.
“Yes, yes. But if I’d used my psionics, you would have had a lot more difficulties,” Adrian said.
Akash sent him another burst of emotions that Adrian took as him expressing doubt at that. The wolions—at least Akash and Sora—understood Adrian and spoken language perfectly. But their own language relied on their empathy, on being able to project and manipulate emotion. That made it much harder for Adrian to understand them. His telepathy could project emotions, but it was not the same.
“Fine, I’ll admit, you are a formidable opponent,” Adrian said as he reached Akash’s side and petted him on the head. His attention made Akash release a growl of contentment, and then he walked over to Sora, who was watching from the back of the room.
Adrian turned to one of the crates with equipment. With his telekinesis, he took out six rubber balls and sent them flying towards him. As each reached him, he put his hand out and fired a kinetic blast, sending it back as he released his telekinetic hold on it. Then when the ball reached close to the end of the room, he would grab it again and send it back towards himself. After a couple of minutes of that, he started moving around the room and sending the balls in all directions around himself. Pull then push, and repeat. Then, after a couple of minutes of that, he sent all the balls flying at his position at the same time. As the balls were flying, he bent and pulled his hands close. Using another one of his psionics, he built up an energy field around himself. As the balls closed the distance, he released the energy, letting loose a shockwave in every direction around him that sent the balls flying back.
He dropped to the floor, exhausted. That psionic was one of the more demanding, as far as the energy required was concerned. Up until now, he had mastered telekinesis, telepathy, kinetikinesis, and vitakinesis. Out of the other psionics that he possessed—and there were many—he knew how to use a great number, but he still hadn’t figured out how to use them efficiently. He had also realized that naming the psionics was foolish. Too many of them were interconnected, and relied on each other, that there was no distinction. So he had started to wonder if he should just start to refer to all of his abilities as the Sha, much like the People had.