They returned to flying over the sea, and as soon as they left Greek airspace, two jets zoomed past them.
“Ah, those must be from Turkey. Now the fun begins. Sorry, dear, but you may get a little wet.”
She teleported out of his arms, reappearing on a shipping buoy down below. Dampened with the foamy droplets of the sea around her, she looked up to see the two jets closing in on Xavier. From under the noses of the aircrafts, twin machine guns began firing off rounds so fast that the individual gunshots were barely audible. Laughing, Xavier swooped down towards the sea, dodging the streams of bullets. Reaching the water, he opened his wings and shot off across the surface with rounds splattering in the ocean around him. He soon pulled up and reversed himself in the air, closing in on the two jets. His hand raised, he sliced off the wing of one of the jets with his claws, sending it spiraling out of control. He turned around chased after the other jet, now desperately trying to escape him. He grabbed the tail end of the jet and ripped the craft apart.
About to go and retrieve Helena, he was blinded by smoke as a missile impacted against his chest. Grinning, he looked ahead at the six oncoming jets, firing their payloads at him. Xavier dodged all but one of the missiles, the last one he grabbed and held onto. Chasing after one of the jets with the rocket in hand, he slammed it against the underside of the aircraft and sent it hurtling down to the sea in a ball of fire. The other five jets were now flying around him, trying to confuse him while the pilots came up with a plan. Continuing to laugh, he slashed at the air and launched five blades of shadow fire from his claws, shooting across the sky like comets. The burning apparitions struck another jet, killing the pilot before he could eject.
The sensation of bullets bouncing off his back drew his attention to the jet shooting towards him from behind. Opening his jaws, he unleashed a linear inferno from his mouth, washing over the jet as it passed by and setting it ablaze. The fourth jet fired two more missiles at him, both of which he dodged. Holding his arm back, he materialized a black javelin in his grip. Focusing with one eye shut, he hurled it at the fleeing jet and struck it in the back of the rear thruster. The lance drilled through the aircraft like it was nothing and pierced the pilot through the heart.
Xavier turned to the last two jets, now being ordered to fall back. Refusing to let his prey escape, Xavier fired two lasers from his eyes and cut them in half. Down below, Helena watched the battle progress in utter shock. The idea of those pilots being killed was abhorrent to her, but she could not ignore her amazement at the sight of such one-sided destruction. To say it was impressive would be an understatement. His power was equaled only by his agility in the air, zooming back in forth in all directions and in tight turns with nothing but flaps of his wings. More and more jets showed up to shoot him out of the sky, but all met the same fate.
The next challenge came after they passed by Cyprus. The United States Sixth Fleet had been gathered, including two destroyers and an aircraft carrier, as well as at least twenty other ships. It was as large a force as could be gathered in so short a time. The armada had formed a blockade floating between Xavier and Helena and Israel, and neither of them could help but wonder if those soldiers had actually been told what they were up against. Once again, Xavier dropped her off at a safe location, this time on a nearby sandbar. The sky above the fleet was filled with jets, launched from the aircraft carrier and buzzing in circles like wasps.
Spreading his wings to their maximum length, Xavier gave a thunderous roar, and from the black membranes, a volley of black spheres were launched, like rounds of buckshot from a rack of automatic shotguns. Made of pure dark energy, the barrage rained down on the swarm of jets, knocking them out of the sky like they were nothing. Everyone in the fleet watched in horror as the sky was seemingly set ablaze from every jet simultaneously exploding and raining down in a hellish mess of steel and fire.
Reaching USS Carney destroyer, Xavier swooped up and then dove straight down, crashing into the middle of the vessel. The ship was ripped in half with ease, the bow and stern sent skyward from the force of the impact. From the observation port of the nearby aircraft carrier, the admiral watched with a cold sweat as Xavier crawled up the side of the now vertical destroyer.
Ignoring the lives of all the soldiers still onboard, he gave the order. “Fire everything!”
Every cannon and gun in the fleet was loaded and fired, this time in the direction of the sinking destroyer. Xavier took to the sky, maneuvering past every bomb hurled in his direction. With every flap of his wings, an invisible pulse of energy would be released and set off any rounds in the air around him. Having the time of his life, he flew up high over the clouds and then closed in for another dive. He struck a dock landing ship, crumpling it like an empty beer can and sending up a plume of water. Leaping through the air, he lunged towards another ship, this time with a charging sphere of dark energy between his hands. Cackling, he slammed it down onto the vessel and caused it to erupt into an explosion of black flames.
He did this three more times, leap-frogging from vessel to vessel with every ship he touched being obliterated either with a shadowy explosion or from pure kinetic energy. After the fifth ship, Xavier dove into the water to dodge the continuing barrage. Seconds later, a nearby cruiser was lifted into the air, skewered from below by a black laser with a diameter of over twenty feet. Another cruiser soon met the same fate, pierced by a beam of condensed darkness and sent skyward before crashing into the ocean.
Below the sea, Xavier swam over to a submarine and got under it. He placed his hands on the craft’s hull and dug his claws into the metal. Both his wings folded up into open cones on his back, and from them, two focused storms of shadow fire were released, his wings now acting like rocket thrusters. Using that propulsion, he rose out of the water with the submarine in his grip, sending shivers of fear up the spines of everyone in the fleet. He flew over to a nearby ship and then slammed the submarine down into it like a giant baseball bat, pulverizing them both and causing them to erupt in fiery explosions. He dove down again to get another submarine, repeating this process over and over again and decimating the fleet. Soon enough, there were only two ships remaining.
Swimming underneath the second destroyer, Xavier dug his claws into the metal. Giving a roar of joy and exertion, he increased the output of the two thrusters to their maximum, pushing up on the underside of the destroyer. Everyone on the deck watched as the water around the ship began to churn and vaporize while looking like oil. A loud groan was then heard, and slowly, the craft began to rise.