The Ice Giant groaned and his immense form struggled against the turbulent air. He was going to fall if nothing was done, so his massive hands clawed at empty space to regain balance.
He slammed both feet onto the frozen ground and his head swiveled. The monster's red eyes were fixed on the Gun Hero, yet, to his surprise, the man met his gaze with a cocky smile.
From the Hawk Walker's control room, Alf observed the scene on the monitors. A digital chuckle escaped him.
"What a showoff," he murmured before cutting through Rod's earpiece, "You can't let him fall like he almost did. It could create a shockwave that would most likely damage all this fertile land and the nearby towns."
"Got it. Maybe I could make him fall on the mountains so that they absorb most of the impact? Then, knock him out somehow?"
Alf's focus snapped back to the Giant's red eyes.
"Rod, from what I see, he has been completely taken over by the parasite. There is most likely no way to stop him without people getting hurt or killed."
The Gun Hero's head drifted to the distant town. A sharp pang of dread pierced him. They still hadn't finished the evacuation… He could clearly see huddled figures still waiting for transport, and the cold was not making it any easier. Every detail was leading into the worst case scenario…
The Ice Giant saw this vulnerability and a realization dawned upon his parasitic mind: Outright beating Rod would be next to impossible, hurting him though… That would be no problem if he took advantage of the weaker beings.
Rod turned his view back to the monster and saw him move.
"Alf, is he-"
"Affirmative. He is heading towards the town. Rod, you need to stop him!"
"Already on it!" Rod growled.
He jumped from the Walker and moved towards his enemy at subsonic speeds.
The man slammed into the Giant's left side and a blast of kinetic force sent a sickening shudder through its huge body. The monster roared. It dug its hands into the frozen ground to stop itself from being pushed back.
This monumental struggle unleashed chaos… The earth that made contact with his limbs was ripping massive chunks of frozen dirt, jagged rocks, and other debris from the ground.
They were truly playing with cataclysmic amounts of power.
Everything could be felt from inside the Hawk Walker. The interior lights flickered and Catra and Lofo watched from behind the window in awe. When they saw Rod push the Giant back, Alf's voice boomed through the internal speakers.
"Rod is engaging in combat outside of the Walker. Personnel, please head to the safety bunker immediately."
The battle raged on and the Hero jumped through the air once more. He activated his interlink and generated Elena's pistol.
Catra immediately recognized its distinct design from the Walker thanks to her cheetah eyes. For some reason, dread twisted her gut.
The pistol attached itself to Rod's arm and transformed into a sleek, mana-absorbing gauntlet. It hummed with power and started charging with the Hero's mana.
"That's… that's my mom's gun… Is he gonna… kill him?" the cheetah girl murmured.
Her eyes snapped to Lofo. He didn't know how to respond at all… Thus, the only thing they managed to do was watch two titans clash in a deadly dance.
The Giant pushed itself up while Rod darted across the landscape. He noticed something unsettling: Rod was slower than usual…
It was the cold. No one else noticed it previously, but Alf could see it now.
"Remember Rod, your power is not an endgame. It is an extension of yourself. In a place like this, you will tire out faster. It will be harder to catch your breath and to regenerate mana."
"Are you done talking? I'm kind of in the middle of something," Rod responded, expertly dodging falling debris.
The Giant unleashed a scream and shot thousands of jagged ice spears from its body. They became an indiscriminate barrage aimed at Rod and the Walker.
Alf instantly loaded the Walker's multiple automatic turrets and pinpointed the trajectory of more than 500 incoming spears. He fired in retaliation and protected them without fail.
Meanwhile, Rod abandoned any thought of interception and weaved through the downpour with ease. Four missed, then six more. The attack wasn't working… Therefore, the Giant adapted and focused on the Hawk Walker.
One spear struck the vehicle's outer shell, then another, and another. These attacks caused the vehicle to shake violently.
"ROD!" Alf exclaimed through the earpiece.
"What?!"
"My turrets cannot keep up with so many projectiles. If this continues, the outer protective shell of the Walker will crack!"
The Hero turned around and saw Alf enduring a bombardment of damage.
"I'm coming!" Rod yelled.
He generated a heavy shotgun from his interlink.
The Giant took advantage of Rod's movement to the Walker. It buried its massive right fist into the frozen ground and created a fast ice root that passed beneath the earth, moving directly towards its enemy.
Rod's mind and Alf's processors were too consumed by the threat to the Walker. They noticed at the very last moment…
"WAIT!" the machine screamed.
It was too late.
Rod felt a crushing impact to his left side. The ice root re-emerged from the earth like a missile and struck him by surprise at the peak of his leap.
It was so powerful that he went flying through the air for a second before slamming into the top of a mountain across the field, behind the evacuating town.
The impact on the mountain's rock created a crater large enough to fit the entire Hawk Walker. Rod now lay in its center.
He struggled to get debris off his body and his blurred eyes focused on the enemy in the distance.
The Ice Giant mirrored him. To the monster, it felt like a sort of challenge, and seemed a good time to elevate it into a new level. Thus, its large body began running to the terrified town, approaching in continuous earth-shaking footsteps.
All the small figures inside the town were supposed to be scrambling to get into the evacuation vehicles. Yet, the transport units roared to life and moved, leaving more than forty people stranded…
"Rod…" Alf's voice resonated through his earpiece.
"What are you doing?" the Hero asked.
He pushed himself up.
"The protection spell will save the people on those vehicles… Though, it won't be enough for the ones inside the village… The rest is up to you… you know what to do."
Even if the protection spell covered everyone, it wasn't designed to sustain damage from an ice giant that powerful.
Alf immediately loaded a completely different magical spell into the Walker's spell shooter, ready to work with Rod on what needed to be done.
In the town, some families hugged, others tried to escape. There was no use… The vibrations of the giant's footsteps caused fragile houses to crumble and trap everyone there.
Death seemed inevitable… but not today.
The Giant took another step and Rod's perception of time sped up. He closed his eyes, drew a ragged breath, and crackling electricity exploded all around him.
"1, 2, 3, Be Whoop Eh," he murmured.
Afterwards, his eyes opened.
He accelerated to a speed no human eye could possibly track, moving through trees and over rocks so precisely it seemed he anticipated every obstacle.
A running woman froze after a structure fell beside her. And at that precise moment, Rod entered the town in a streak of golden lightning. He saw her first.
The Hero slowed his speed, gently grabbed her, and pushed her into the sky with an upward surge of his power. When she opened her eyes, the woman was inexplicably flying.
She'd now become a target for Alf… The machine tracked her from the Walker's cameras and activated the spell shooter. A beam of pure white magic struck her at the apex of her jump. She instantly teleported to a specialized room inside the vehicle's safety bunker, where engineers were waiting.
"One down, everyone else to go," Rod thought.
In his slowed perception, he picked another person, then another: A young couple, an entire family, some children with their pets…
It wasn't just him; Alf was firing the teleportation beam with such processing that it barely kept up with Rod's actions. Only five seconds passed until they'd saved every single one of them…
The Hero stopped to catch his breath, only to hear a faint whimper. His focus turned upward and he saw an old, black dog trying to hide amidst some crumbling debris at the center of the town.
He'd completely missed the pet with everything else happening. Before he could act though, the Giant was right in front of the town. Its huge foot was already beginning its descent to obliterate it.
Rod activated his power one last time and moved at speeds even faster. He grabbed the trembling dog and jumped out of the way, making it out milliseconds prior to the destruction.
BRAM!
The Giant didn't stop there… He continued behind the town and towards the mountain. Due to his speed, his size, and his untamed strength, the ancient mountain cracked. Its stone groaned and split. The monster cleanly broke through its massive face and entered a flattened snowy expanse.
Rod exhaustedly released the dog and quickly tried to catch his breath in a moment of relative peace. A peace that was halted by his earpiece.
"ROD!" Alf screamed.
"Let me just… rest a little…"
"He is heading to Naya City!"
While their conversation took place, the Ice Giant glanced at the mountain it broke through and scoffed. Its red gaze then drifted to the distant lights of Naya City. There was only one place to go now… Without a moment's hesitation, it put one foot forward and left the battlefield behind.
Time was of the essence… Thus, Rod ran to the top of the shattered mountain. He saw the fresh cracks of the ancient stone and a silhouette heading towards Naya City.
There was no way he could let that thing inflict the same fate on the innocent people there… There was no other option.
From a distance, in the center of the white covered field, Alf lost sight of both Rod and the Giant. He needed to move quickly…
"I am engaging emergency flight mode," his voice echoed through the Walker's internal speakers.
Everyone inside—Catra and Lofo, Oliver, the engineers, and the rescued civilians—felt the powerful thrusters underneath the vehicle spring to life and push against gravity.
Back on the shattered mountain, Rod noticed the Walker soar into the sky. Catra was heading his way… He knew what that meant. The man activated his power and opened a private channel on his communication device.
"Catra, I need you to look away for a second," he urgently commanded.
The cheetah girl, however, didn't listen. She couldn't. It was right there, unfolding through the side window. She needed to see her father's final stand…
Rod's eyes fixed on the gun gauntlet strapped to his right hand. The power gauge flickered dangerously low and showed it only had 1/5th of its full power capacity.
"That's enough," he told himself.
His body turned and his eyes locked on the towering form of the Ice Giant… and he sprung to action. The sound he made when jumping was like a rocket: A roar that ripped through the air and captured the attention of the large monster.
It spun around with surprising agility and shot jagged ice spears in a desperate attempt to stop the Hero's advance. It did this thinking that maybe shooting again might work better than before… It didn't.
Rod moved with speeds only seen in folktales, weaving past every single projectile and becoming completely untouchable. No one could see him. To all of them, he just teleported in a flash of golden light and reappeared directly in front of the Giant's astonished face.
He extended his gauntlet without wait, opening his palm, and a blinding amount of raw energy concentrated there.
There was no time to react, no time to think… nothing that could save it now.
"I'm sorry," Rod murmured.
He unleashed a beam of energy from his gauntlet, engulfing most of the giant's massive head and obliterating it instantly.
It could only be described as a feat of the gods… an act Catra's eyes couldn't stop seeing from behind the window in the Walker.
Her father killed someone with brutal efficiency for the very first time. And all she could feel, deep in her young heart… was a soul-crushing horror.