Space Odyssey: Spectre-Chapter 434: The Sins

Chapter 434: The Sins
"We are all in position." Sergeant K confirmed.
Jace nodded his head and then revved his dirtbike’s engine. It quietly hummed as he responded. "I am going in."
He then shot forward on his dirtbike, kicking up sand as he went down a hill and toward the entrance they had picked. He could feel the wind whipping through his hair and the sand stinging his eyes as he went forward. He felt his hat fly off since it was not secure enough to his head as he zipped right past the demon guards that were at the passage.
He could hear the distinct sound of quiet laser fire as Sergeant K and Corporal Quest took down the guards. But the patrols, snipers, and gun emplacements were more focused on him as he went straight toward the canon on his dirtbike. He was an excessively good distraction.
After a few seconds the first of them realized they should be shooting at him and began firing. He only had to alter his course slightly as a red laser bolt turned some of the sand into glass. Then the onslaught came and he tensed his body as he prepared to jump off his dirtbike.
He felt a stinging in his shoulder and jumped up and kicked the dirtbike the rest of the way to the cannon. As he fell to the ground and slid across the sand the dirtbike exploded upon impact with the cannon. Throwing up smoke into the air.
Jace had only just climbed up to his feet when he saw a figure coming towards him. He just barely got his arms up in time when he was thrown backwards out of the smoke. His back slammed into the sandy ground and he looked past his arms that were throbbing in pain towards the figure that walked out of the smoke.
It was a massive demon with a black mask. He had tusks coming out of his mask but the more distinctive features of the demon was that he was not wearing any armor and only had two armored gauntlets on his hands. He spoke with a cackle and it sounded like a machine translated for him. "Ha! Ha! Sloth and Envy said you were a strong opponent. As the strongest sin I will be the one to slay you! You may call me Pride!" The black mask announced as he took up a fighting stance and slammed his fists together, Jace could see heat build up on the two fists.
"Major Jace, we are in position." He heard in his ear.
"Good, I will take the masks. You take the rest." Jace ordered as he pulled himself up and dusted himself off. The bruises that had started to appear on his arms had begun disappearing already.
"What was that humie?" Pride asked as he leaned his head forward. "I did not quite hear you."
Jace scoffed and looked at the demon before nodding his head and speaking louder. "I was saying you so called sins must be incredibly ugly if you all have to wear masks like that. I mean from the various grotesque muscles on your body it only makes sense that your face matches."
Pride looked down at his body then up at Jace and growled. "Humie... I am going to turn your skull into a piss pot." He then leaped forward and Jace raised an eyebrow in surprise. This guy was really easy to provoke. He had like five more insults lined up that he had not gotten to use.
Jace watched Pride’s movements and could already tell that he was going to slam his fists into the ground. Jace stepped to the side as he materialized his longsword. He went to stab the demon through the side.
But Pride swiveled on his feet and hit Jace. Or attempted to. But Jace twisted his sword and body to block the back handed strike with the flat of his blade. It rang loudly upon impact and Pride’s manners completely changed upon seeing the sword. He jumped back and got in another stance.
Jace took a glance at the surroundings and could see that several of the demons were going down as Sergeant K and Corporal Quest pressed forward, going along one of the walls to get to the cannon. While they were moving forward the other two should be doing their parts.
"Why do you have the skin of my kind’s hated enemy?" Pride demanded, pulling Jace’s attention from his thoughts. "Even the Dukes are unable to change the form of those metals. So how have you managed it?" Pride demanded.
Jace smirked as he took a stance and jumped forward. But he suddenly stopped and pushed back against the grounds as a curved blade cut through the air in front of where he was going. He looked to the side and saw the green masked creature from before. Envy if he recalls correctly.
Jace set his feet and swung his sword at Envy. There was a clash of metal as Envy was thrown backwards. But then he brought the sword around and blocked a strike from a giant ax wielded by a hunched over figure with a red mask. He was forced forward slightly, placing him in between the three masked demons.
He slammed his foot on the ground and dematerialized his sword as he threw himself up into the air. As he was up in the air he materialized the Spectre knife only to immediately have to use it to block several golden bolts of light coming toward him. They shattered upon impact with his knife but he could feel the scorching heat from them.
Before he even started coming down to the ground he felt something change behind him and twisted his body just in time to deflect a giant bone scythe that was slicing at him. But the force of the strike sent him crashing into the ground and sliding across the ground until he slammed into a wall of the canyon. Jace pulled himself up only for something to wrap around his feet. He looked down to see sand had hardened around his feet after he stood up.
"Sloth was wrong. This human was not that difficult to take down." Pride told the others with pride as they formed a semi circle around him. Jace looked up the wall to see a yellow masked demon standing on top of the wall above him looking down at him. It looked like as Jace was straining against the sand, it was forcing the yellow mask to focus on keeping the sand together.
"I would not be so confident, Pride." The red mask pressed a hand against Pride’s side and it came back covered in a black ooze. "He managed to break your skin. If I had not stepped in when I did, then both you and Envy would have died."
"That is why I said all six of you had to strategize to take him down. If it was not for Wrath, Pride would have fallen to the Spectre’s blade." Jace looked over to see Belphe tossing an unconscious and disarmed Sergeant K and a disarmed Corporal Quest.
"Sorry sir." Corporal Quest apologized as he held a hand to some blood that was leaking from the midsection of his armor. "We failed to disable the weapon."
Jace looked around at the masked demons. "That is alright Corporal." She then zeroed in on an annoyed Pride. An idea forming in his mind. "We came in here with limited information and still managed to kill a number of them. Not to mention I almost killed their weakest Sin member."
"Hahahaha!" Pride began laughing and pointed at the green masked one called Envy. "I think he is talking about you, Envy!"
"Actually, no. I was talking about you, you massive moron." Jace pointed out with a grin that exuded confidence. He saw Sloth flinch out of the corner of his eye.
But Pride was already moving. He was getting ready to punch Jace in the face. But Jace swayed slightly and sliced upwards with his knife. The punch which exploded with air pressure passed right by his face.
But Jace’s knife was cutting right through his arm. The detached portion slammed into the wall behind Jace. But Pride was pulling back the rest of his arm already while roaring in pain. Jace’s knife curved and sliced through the bottom portion of Pride’s Black mask. Mangling the demon’s jaw and chin.
Jace grabbed Pride by an arm and pulled him closer intending to slam his knife into Pride’s neck. But he heard a loud whistling and looked over to see Belphe holding the blade of the halberd against Corporal Quest’s neck. "Please let go of my comrade. He may be a moron, but he is a moron that is a member of my team."
Jace rolled his eyes. "You first."
"You know I will keep my word. I do not know if you will keep yours." Belphe growled out and Jace thought about it for a moment before he pushed Pride forward into the semi-circle away from him. A demon with a seductive form and gold mask moved forward and pulled him away while a gold light exuded from her hand.
Jace looked at the other masked demons as well while Corporal Quest walked over with an unconscious Sergeant K. As he did he could suddenly feel an increase in gravity on him.
There was the hunched over red mask who had a giant axe that was not proportional to his body. There was a tall and lean blue masked demon who had bones growing out of his body with a bone scythe in his hand. There was Envy, the green mask who had a curved blade. Yellow mask who was crouching on the wall above him, he had a pair of knives in his hand. The gold mask was treating Pride, the black mask, she must have been the one to fire those golden bolts earlier.
"Are introductions in order? Or are we just going to stare at each other like a bunch of idiots?" Jace asked with a scoff.