Covered in Goo and Loving Every Minute of It

So, the whole assassin idea didn't work out. In terms of traditional fantasy classes, Alex's actual fighting style had turned into a mix of mage and brawler. Which he wasn't even sure was an established archetype.

There was battlemage but battlemage's usually used weapons. Who knows though, with the way his fighting style was evolving, he might end up using a weapon eventually.

Hephaestus had geared Alex and Sophia up with a mix of different equipment in a backpack. They didn't know what they were going to encounter or face on the other side of the portal, so they prepared for everything. They even had a limited set of climbing gear.

Not that Alex needed climbing gear with his newly acquired psionic flight, but nobody besides Alex knew that. He was trying to keep his abilities close to the chest, so Sophia couldn't anticipate his moves or use anything against him.

Athena herself was a master tactician, so with Sophia being one of her disciples, she must at least be a smart fighter. Alex didn't like that. He was shaping up to be pretty strong, but outsmarting your opponent or being outsmarted in a fight could mean the difference between life and death.

When they pressed the buttons on the extraction devices, they ended up in a vast desert. They weren't entirely sure where they were because no one had told them.

"Death Valley," Sophia said. "California."

Well, at least Alex hadn't known where they were.

"How do you know that?" Alex said.

"I recognize it," Sophia said.

"Ok," Alex said. "I'm going in. See you on the other side." Alex stepped through the portal.

He stepped pretty enthusiastically, even taking a few steps forward until he realized he was on the edge of a cliff. He stepped back, not wanting to be so close to the edge with someone who wanted to kill him nearby, even if he had the ability to fly.

Sophia stepped cautiously through the portal, noticing the cliff almost immediately. "Watch out for the-"

"I know, I know. The cliff. I almost dove right off of it. You know, just to see how long it would take to get to the bottom," Alex said.

"No. The giant alien behind you," Sophia said.

"Oh, shit," Alex said. He knew she might be telling the truth, but she also might just be trying to get him to turn around so she could stab him in the back.

So instead of turning around, Alex dove to the left and rolled back onto his feet. While doing his best to not turn his back on Sophia.

He kept running in that direction until, while still keeping his eyes on Sophia, he could see a giant mass of an alien monster similar to the one that killed him in his peripheral vision.

With Alex being so far away at this point, the alien started advancing on Sophia. She pulled out her shield and activated the orange forcefield. The alien lashed out at the forcefield with its razor sharp tentacles, but it couldn't get through.

Sophia pulled a spear off her backpack and stabbed at the alien, aiming for what little organs it had, but it was too big and the spear wasn't long enough.

"A little help?" Sophia said.

"Ah, shit. I actually have to do something, don't I?" Alex said to himself.

Alex ran back over to the two of them and activated 4 telekinetic spikes. Alex felt like he had more juice in the tank, so he made more spikes, ending up with 16 spikes.

Whoa! That was a major jump in power from before. This wasn't bad. It wasn't bad at all. Concentrating, Alex aimed for the monster's internal organs.

It only seemed to have a digestive tract that just stopped in the middle of its body and a brain. Alex aimed for both. He plunged the telekinetic spikes into the creature, but they got stuck halfway to their destinations.

The alien had given up slicing Sophia with its tentacles and decided to just lean over onto her shield, slowly crushing her under its formidable mass. If Alex didn't work fast, Sophia would be dead.

Alex focused on forcing the telekinetic spikes through the thick substance the monster's body was made of. While he was at it, Alex tried his electrokinesis on it, but it had no effect.

[New skill created: Kinetic lightning]

Sophia had disappeared out of view under the creature. Alex activated Psionic Surge to get an extra boost of strength. It worked. The spikes shot through the creature, impaling its digestive tract and its brain.

Almost instantly, it collapsed into a formless puddle of goo. Walking through the puddle, Alex could see that Sophia was trapped under her shield.

Activating his telekinetic body, Alex plunged his hands into the goo, got his fingers under the edge of the shield, and lifted as hard as he could.

At first, the suction prevented much movement, but with enough pulling, Alex was able to flip the shield out of the goo. Sophia came up gasping for air, covered in translucent goo.

"Thank you," Sophia said. "I almost thought you were going to abandon me there for a second."

"Me too," Alex said. "But I realized it would be fucked up for me to not at least give you the opportunity to stab me in the back one more time."

"Are you still sore about that?" Sophia said.

"You literally tried to kill me! Of course I'm still sore!" Alex said.

"I figured after a week or two, you would've gotten over it, but I guess I was wrong," Sophia said.

"What are you talking about? It's been ten minutes since our last mission," Alex said.

"It was ten minutes for me, but clearly not for you," Sophia said. "You look like a completely different person, almost. You have muscle tone you didn't have before, your hair is slightly longer, and you have a small scar forming on your ear that looks like it has been healing for one to two weeks. I don't know how you did it, but you lived two weeks in the three minutes before the alarm went off."

Damn, she was smart. Alex's hand went up to his ear, where the shrapnel from Jebediah's exploding guns had nicked it. "How did you notice all that?"

"I'm observant. You have to be to stay alive during combat," Sophia said.

"Clearly," Alex said. "You're right. I have lived nearly two weeks in the last ten minutes, and no, I'm still not over you trying to kill me. I can't trust you're not gonna wig out on me and try to kill me again."

"That was purely in the moment. I thought you were endangering our mission, and I tried to do what I thought I had to do to survive. And I will do it again if I think you're endangering my life. But no, I'm not going to 'wig out' on you. I don't hold grudges if that's what you're thinking," Sophia said.

Man, if only Alex still had liars insight like he had in the training game. Then he would be able to tell for certain if she was telling the truth. Right now, all he could do was guess.

Alex sighed and dramatically wiped his hand down his face, covering it in goo. "That was not the effect I was going for," Alex said, wiping the goo off with his shirt. He looked back up at Sophia. "I'm choosing to trust you again. Don't let me down, or you will regret it. I'm not as weak or forgiving as I was two weeks ago."

Alex looked around. "Now let's go check out that witchy looking house on the hill over there." Alex started walking towards a hut that was situated on the top of a hill, in the opposite direction of the cliff. Sophia followed close behind.