MIA’S PERSPECTIVE
Fuck fuck fuck what the fuck did I get myself into? This whole mess started with me trying to take out the goddamn trash!. Now I just escaped the police not even five minutes and I’m gonna have to fight some monster that belongs to a gang that wants both me and my family dead. Another shitty thing about the situation is that the actually competent person with us just disappeared as something huge is about to probably rip us into little bitty pieces.
“So did he just disappear or am I going insane” I turn Leo “nope he’s gone” I replied “were screwed” I nodded “maybe we should start ru” before Leo could finish something crashed in front of us knocking both of us on our asses as dust was sent everywhere. I felt the wind get knocked out of me as I flew back several feet and slammed into the concrete ground. I wheeze and gasp as I struggle to force air back into my lungs. As soon as I felt air fill my lungs I immediately started to frantically check my suit.
I signed in relief as there were no tears in my suit “thank god” I muttered to myself. “Hey, I think we have bigger problems than your outfit getting dirty,” Leo said as slowly lifted himself off the ground. I wanted to give him a piece of my mind since if this suit rips everything gets so much worse but I was quickly interrupted “excuse me”. The voice was extremely deep sounding like it came from some sort of viscous creature hidden in a dungeon or a powerful dragon in a castle. “Would you two mind having a quick chat with me?” as the dust was cleared what was left was a gorilla in a suit?
Well he didn’t exactly look like a gorilla there were a few differences such as he stood completely right up making him around eight feet tall and had more human looking brown eyes along with that his hands had sharp claws. “Is that bigfoot wearing a suit?” I turned to Leo who looked more confused than scared “I think so? “Excuse me sir, I find that very offensive. You compare me to some folk tale creature just because of my appearances now I find that very absurd”.
“Oh uhm I’m sorry?” Leo looked even more puzzled as I felt a small glimmer of hope as maybe we could reason with this guy. “Thank you now I’m not one for violence so can you please come with me to my dear leader so we can figure out this situation” ok that hope is flickering but maybe we can still convince him.
“Hey you seem like a calm and reasonable person and you probably know that it’s not in your best interest to go with your boss so maybe we can work out a deal” I would try to give my best smile but you know the mask. He closed his eyes and sighed “sadly I can’t do that I do sympathize with you. I really do but I have a job to do and well my boss doesn't like it when I don't do my job so please just come with me”.
“Sorry uhm not bigfoot we really can’t go with you” I could see Leo was already tensing up as The gorilla man sighed. “I guess we have to go with option B sorry for what's going to happen” the gorilla man ripped off his shirt. I quickly realized that this guy seemed nice but he was still a criminal and deadly one two. His body bulged with muscle once hidden under his well made suit, his limbs were thicker than longs and both of his pairs of hands look like they could easily crush a watermelon. His eyes became a darker yellow and his claws extended as he snarled a revealing set of bone crushing teeth as his gentleman person disappeared, replaced with that enraged beast.
“Are you sure you're not bigfoot?” he immediately started charging at us, breaking the ground with each step, god dammit Leo. The gorilla-lunge towards Leo at speed something that big shouldn’t be moving at. “Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck!” Leo launched a barrage of energy blasts but all it seemed to do was sing the big guy. I winced a bit as I felt the black sludge drench my hand as I pulled back my arm but in a flash the Gorilla-man grabbed Leo and quickly made him into a human shield.
Leo tried to fire several blasts into the gorilla-man as if that would make his grip listen. “Hey uh big guy before we get you beating the shit out of us can I know your name so I don’t just call you gorilla man?”. “Oh uhm it’s Roger” Roger said with a surprisingly apologetic tone. Leo decided to take this time to fire several blasts in well uhm rogers private area.
Roger didn’t even flinch as he slowly turned to Leo “jeez man I bad for your future or current wife”. Roger started to frown “or husband I don’t judgAHHHHHH!” I ducked as Leo flew into the wall behind with a thud. He groaned slowly as I just shook my head “you are horrible at reading the room” he gave me the bird as I spun around and hurled the glob of acid at Roger.
In what seemed to be instinct Roger leaped out of the wall as the sludge burned right through the red bricks. Roger switched to moving on all fours as I couldn’t land a single fucking on him he was just to quick as he kept leaping our of the way constantly trying to get close. I shot a much larger glob of acid towards him and once again he leapt out of the way but as soon as he left the air I fired another glob of acid.
It was going to hit him dead on but to my surprise and dismay he proceeded to spin mid air as my attack missed him by inch, Huh that was actually kinda impressOH SHIT!. Roger as soon as he landed leaped towards me like a furry cannibal. I closed my eyes in preparation to have every bone in my body crushed. Something did break but since I was still standing so I opened my eyes and saw Leo next to me, His fingers and eyes were glowing with that same bright blue light as I could see Roger was half way through a wall holding his smoking eyes.
“Thanks” Leo turned to me “your welcome but I really don’t think I did really anything to him”. “That was extremely rude! When I get my sight back I will give you a piece of my mind”. “You think?” He rolled his eyes as I quickly ran to the hole I made earlier, “hey maybe it’s not the best idea to go in there” Leo said as I felt his hand on my shoulder.
“And what try to run away from the obviously faster and more agile eight foot tall six hundred pound monkey man no the only way out of this is with us beating this guy”. Leo opened his mouth to protest but quickly shut as he followed me into the building. As soon as we entered the building I focused as I felt my home ache in paint as I blocked our makeshift exit with an acidic web.
“You know he can just bust through another wall right?” This time I opened my mouth in protest but quickly shut it as he was right, still think it was a good idea. The room we were in was pretty barren and extremely dusty as if no one was here for at least a decade, “So what's the plan?”. “that’s stupid it’s obviously uhm well huh let’s just make it up on the fly” this was a factory there had to be something useful around.
There was a door on the other side of the room as we both quickly hurried through it. We entered a much larger room filled with boxes of metal pipes. Leo went to grab one but I stopped him. “If your energy blast did nothing, what do you think a metal pipe gonna do?” he sighed as we both kept searching around CRASH! Then we started running as the distinct sound of a wall being busted open ran throughout the air. Leo blasted open a hole into a wall, the newly made doorway led into a stairway as without a second thought we hauled ass up the stairs.
Each stair creek as we ran up the stairs, I hoped maybe there was something on the next fl”aw there you are”. I turned to see Roger in all his hairy glory at the edge of the steps. The thing was he didn’t run up after us, he just slowly started walking up the steps. I couldn't tell if he was trying to be nice or just didn’t want to fall through the stairs, wait, idea!. With every step we took I made sure to leave a black footprint. We quickly got to the second floor as Leo kicked open the door crack! “God dammit” and there's Roger falling for my trick.
“What now and please tell me you have a plan” Leo nearly yelled as I looked around and saw several red canisters. “Hey, do you play video games?” I pointed at the canisters “what does that have to do oooooh I see” I grab several of the canisters “my acid has a special reaction when it comes in contact with gas so we just need to distract him for a bit so I can throw one of these at him and well you know the rest”.
“The main problem is how are we gonna distract him” I tried to brainstorm a couple ideas but that was interrupted by Leo clearing his throat “what?”. “I got something that can distract him for at least a couple seconds” I turned to him as I felt my eyes start to twitch “really? And why didn’t you use this until now?”. He held up his hands in defense “well I got in close and like you said that's not the best idea” I sighed “ok what is it?”.
Leo held up his hand as it glowed with a soft purple light “I can control gravity”. I stared at him “ok, essentially my powers are based on a star so I can control energy, heat and gravity well, not to the best extent but I can still do” I gave him a thumbs up. He rolled his eyes “what's important is that I can make things heavier, lighter and even denser but the problem is I’ll have to CRASH”. Well whatever Leo was saying wasn't as important as roger bursting through the floor in front of us “Sorry to interrupt” at least he’s respectful.
Before either me or Leo could do anything in a flash Roger already had us in his grasp holding us up by our necks. “Now I’m gonna put a bit of pressure on your necks and sadly you will choke for a bit but it won’t hurt that much”. I immediately felt a large pressure on my neck as I felt the air quickly leave my lungs. I felt pressure get worse and worse as I felt the……everything….slowly….go..dar”g-get the f-fuck OFF!”. With a gasp I felt air feel my lungs as a blue pulse slammed into Roger knocking him to the other side of the room. I could see Leo gasping as he pointed at the canisters and mouthed shoot.
Without a second of hesitation I launched a ball of acid into one of the canisters “now that actually kinda hurts now BOOOOOM” Roger was cut off as the acid finally melted through the canister and when the gas and acid mix it made one hell of a boom. “Did we do it?” I dared to question out loud as I started into the burning half of the room. “I think it kinda sucks I didn’t get used to gravity manipulation” Leo said as he held his bruised neck.
“Wanna go find where other friend went off too?” I ask Leo.
“Sure but just give me a couple seconds to breathe” Leo laid back as his eyes glowed blue and quickly widened.
I turned to where he was staring as……you gotta be kidding me. “As I was saying, I think it’s time for us to end this little situation”. Roger was walking through the flames completely unharmed; actually it seemed like he got an upgrade. He was covered almost completely in thick plates seemingly made from some hardened bone. It even formed around his head like a helmet with a skull like appearance and his claws were much longer and blade like.
“You almost got me there but sadly I just had a little trick up my sleeve” I stepped back as all work was made null. He was definitely stronger, maybe he was slower. I tested that theory as I sent out a blast of acid but as if he knew what exactly he needed to do to shatter my last bits of hope he easily side stopped it. Roger launched towards me, grabbed me by the torso and slammed me into the ground. I felt a couple ribs crack as I grabbed onto his wrist and started burning it. He winced a bit as it was starting to get harder to concentrate as I Leo was firing several blasts into Roger in an attempt to get him off me but sadly it was useless.
“Just stop please, you're just making this worse for yourself's” Leo stopped for a couple seconds and I could see the dilemma in his eyes but quickly they were harder as he grabbed onto Roger. Roger raised an eyebrow not even trying to stop Leo from grabbing him and he became confused as Leo's hands glowed a light purple. That look of confusion quickly turned to shock as Leo easily lifted Roger into the air and then slammed into the ground over and over. Then his hands quickly turned to a darker purple as Roger fell like an anvil right through the floor.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
I slowly got up and looked through the hole to see Roger barely standing as it looked like he was about to sink right through the floor. Leo then pointed two fingers at Roger as they started to pulse and glow with energy. Nearly thirty seconds later Leo aimed fingers at Roger and fired as Blue bolt slammed into his head as he finally fell down.
“Jesus Leo, when did you become a badass?” I said in a playful tone. “Oh because of my dear friend adrenaline I’m sure you met them” That actually got a snort out of me.
“Hey Mia” I sat down “yeah?”
“Sorry about attacking you when we first met. I was just so excited to be a hero and I assumed and that was stup” I put a finger on his lips.
“It’s fine, seriously you saved my ass multiple times in the last ten minutes”.
“Thanks”.
“Your welcome”.
“So we friends?” He held up a fist to me.
“Sure” I pounded his fist with mine.
“So what do you think is happening with our fri” Before he could finish, a bony palm slammed into his chest. I could see the blood shoot out of his mouth as he shot backwards and crashed through several walls. I turned to see Roger back up like the villain of a slasher movie. His right eye was gushing blood as I simply just stared at him. “Sorry about your friend, he was probably a good person but I had a job to do so now please just come with me”. He killed Leo, someone who tried to help me is dead because of me, it's my fault again. Why do people keep dying because of me…….why?........why?........FUCKING WHY!?. I gently grabbed a steel bracelet on my wrist as I slowly started to twist it “what a surprise you got someone killed again because you were being selfish”. A small beep came from the bracelet as a black mist started to spray from it.
You need to accept that you trying to be human is an endless cycle of you constantly getting people killed. I slowly pulled off the glove. “You're a plague that destroys everything around you, your friends, your grandparents, your father, even your dear Si”SHUT UP!!!” I ripped off the glove as I shove forward and let everything out. I felt my arm buckle and nearly snap as an ocean of blackish mist shot hitting Roger. I grit my teeth as I let everything out until it felt like my arm was about to get ripped off as I finally grabbed the glove and slammed it back on my hand and with a twist I felt everything return back to normal.
I fell to my knees as my breaths became haggard as I quickly looked in front of me. Everything was gone from Roger to that part of the building to the city block, even part of the highway. Once again I destroy everything around me, I felt the corners of my vision go blurry as I fell to the ground. “Monster”, “shut up” was The last thing I said as I felt myself drift away into unconsciousness.
RICHARDS PERSPECTIVE
I nearly stopped in my stride as I heard what seemed to be several bombs going off in the distance. That must be Mia hopes she's ok, If there’s an explosion and anyone near it is never fine”, “agreed”. Well I’ll focus on that later, what's important now is the person trying to kill. Let's hope this upgrade is as good as I think. Shadow Garden Sent a onslaught of spikes towards me as instead of dodging I ran towards them. I pulled back fist and shot outa jab. As soon as my fist made contact with the pillar it shattered into dust along with several pillars near it, now that's what I call a punch.
I could see the shift from anger to shock just for a couple seconds. I can't blame them even I'm a bit shocked. Five pillars rocketed towards me, two came from my left, two came from my right and one came from my front. I Wanted to leap out of the way but I was just too heavy so I just hit it.
I shot out a knee shattering the pillar in front of me as I stepped forward making the other pillars shatter on impact behind me. “Just fucking DIE!” Shadow Garden held up a hand as the ground below shifted and dozens of spears stabbed into me. They bent, they fucking bent against my skin my skin not even leaving a scratch.
I smirk as I continue my stride ripping through the metal like wet tissue paper. Several walls popped up around me as an armory's worth of guns popped out of the walls and immediately fired. I held my arms in front of me as the bullets did sting a bit but it just felt like a bunch of mosquito bites. I took a deep breath as I unleashed a blast of freezing air covering my surroundings in a thick layer of ice and with a stomp my surroundings were mostly gone.
“You are so bullshit!” I swear they would have steam shooting from their eyes like a cartoon right now. “Hey I thought you were going to beat me to a pulp. I don't think I’m a pulp right now” I smirk as they roared in rage as an ocean of buzzsaws rushed towards me. I started running forward as I smashed through dozens of buzzsaws with only a few jabs.
With every jab the force I unleashed was similar to that of a train and I just absolutely loved this feeling. The black metal easily bent and teared as I made contact with the incoming attacks. This was a blast but I needed to remember I couldn't drag this out so I took a much deeper breath as I unleashed a wave of frozen air as once again shadow Garden and well her Shadow Garden were frozen solid, seriously who names themselves after their power it's just dumb and confusing
I put my hands into my pocket as I walked over to my frozen opponent. “You good there?” They tried to say something but their mouth was frozen shut. I tap their face “Hey I can’t hear you? What are you trying to say?”. If looks could kill well I would be dust because they were giving me quite the glare. I held up my hand “it’s rude to stare” and I flicked them right in the chest sending them flying.
Shadow Garden barely caught themselves as a large solid black arm shot out of the ground and grabbed them mid air. They were coughing blood and when they stopped I could see veins starting to bulge on their forehead. “I am going to kill you and I’m going to make it HURT!” Dozens of massive black hands appeared around me. A solid black fist shot towards me, I quickly caught it and slid back a bit. With a push it shot backwards as I quickly backhanded another hand away destroying it.
Several black hands came at once as I spun around shredded them to bits with my claws. I tried to move forward but I felt something stop me in place as I looked down and hundreds of pitch black arms grabbing at my legs. I went to kick them off but a truck sized fist slammed into me not really doing any damage but interrupting my focus.
Not even a second later another fist slammed into then another then another as what seemed like a barrage of endless punches started hitting me. If it wasn't for my newly enhanced durability I would probably be a bloody mess but instead I was only being shoved around even then it wasn't by that much.
I slowed my perception as everything quickly starting moving in slow motion as I pulled back my fist and went to destroy the on coming wave of giant fist but before I could I felt a wire wrap around my wrists. The wires weren’t that strong but it started to glow and quickly it started to spark. I felt electricity course through my body as I felt every muscle start to spasm.
“Gotcha! Hahahahhahaha finally not so fun now where did that smile go huh!” As they were talking I felt my muscles stop spasming as I looked down to see the electricity flowing into my steel claws as they started to glow brighter.
I yank my hands upwards, ripping away from the wires as I quickly ripped away from the hands. I then swiped out my claws as ten crescent waves of electricity tore through the arms. “You gotta to be fucking KIDDDING ME!” Shadow Garden tried to Form several more hands but with a swipe from my claws they quickly destroyed as soon as they formed. I sprinted towards them as they frantically started trying to stop me. Nothing worked as I quickly tore through a number of walls, pillars, guns and giant arms. Sadly not long after I got it my electrified claws riveted back to normal as the electricity faded away.
As I got closer to Shadow Garden I could see the mix of worry and anger in their eyes as they sent another wave of shadowy constructs, This is getting us nowhere, find a better way to get close to them. I quickly turned my feet to steel as I felt the ground beneath crack as I leap forward smashing through the constructs like a cannonball through paper.
I was only inches away from Shadow Garden as I tackled them right into the wall. Crack!, I felt something crack as I slammed Shadow Garden into the wall, I definitely broke them with how hard you hit them I'm surprised they didn’t splatter against the wall. I held up the broken body as the dust cleared to reveal a mannequin. Not this bullshit again BOOM! I felt something slam into my back nearly knocking me to my knees as it felt like my spine nearly snapped in two.
I turned to see several metallic shards stabbing into my back as I turned to see Shadow Garden with an all too familiar rifle poking out of a wall behind them. Fuck should have stored that earlier well guess I gotta deal with the consequences of my actions. “Wow I didn’t think you would fall for the same trick twice but here we are and I must thank you for the new addition to arsenal don’t worry I’ll make good use of it” They ended that last part with sinister grin as more railguns popped out of the wall behind them.
They snapped their fingers as The weapons quickly charged and fired as I held up my arms and realized something, this was gonna hurt. I tried to dodge, I really did but I was quickly slammed into the wall as I was bombarded with a hail of metal rods smashing into my body. Each impact the metal rods made with my body felt like one of my bones was turned to dust. The rods were strong enough to piece through me but dozens of metal shrapnel was left stuck in my bruised skin as blood slowly started to trickle down my body.
I grit my teeth as I tried to smack away at least one of the metal rods but each time went to knock away one five more knocked me back. Fuck I don’t know how Long I could last I may be so much more durable but with constant pressure I would eventually break. Damn it what’s the point of being stronger if your slow as fuck.
Maybe if I was faster I might have been able to get myself out of this situation but I’m just too slow, quick your whining and think. As I was going through a bout of self pity I felt something click in the back of my head. I felt like a switch was flipped as everything slowly started to slow down as I felt myself decompress. I felt my body become less dense as I felt my body return to normal but then it changed again.
I felt my body become lighter no weight less as it felt like I could walk on air hell I was even more lengthy. I felt more flexible and just quicker as the metal rods coming towards were moving at a snail pace. This was nothing special since I could use my perception and reaction time to have a similar effect but what was special was I was able to move as quick as my senses.
I Had to duck my head to avoid a metal rod as I quickly walked over to Shadow Garden, Please draw a mustache or a dick on their face, it would be hilarious. I now kinda wish I had a marker with me well, whatever there's more important things to focus on as I pulled my fist back and hit Shadow Garden right in the jaw with a classic haymaker.
They shot back a couple feet as I looked at my hand. Huh that was full force guess this form stat whatever focuses more on speed and agility. Another guess I have is the switch in my head is related to this. I flick the switch as I returned to my normal self and then to strength mode as I quickly returned back to normal.
“I hate you I hate you I HATE YOU!” Shadow Garden looked to be having a mental break as a black blood started to pour from their eyes as hundreds of shadowy constructs started to form around them.
Jesus Christ how much stain does this person have it just seems like every time I knock them down they just get back up more pissed off then before. That wasn’t good since I needed to end this quickly and I could hear the police starting to enter the range of my hearing.
I sighed as I slowed my perception and gave myself time to think. I needed to hit them with a direct hit or this will keep dragging out but with there power they can be on both the offensive and defensive. What I needed was enough strength to get through their defense and enough speed to get past their offense. After a couple seconds I figured something out as I prayed for this to work.
I felt my body strengthen and become heavier as I entered strength mode and quickly stomped forward to the ocean of shadowy weapons. I focused all of Steel Drake's power into my left arm as The constructs got closer I pulled my arm back but instead of aiming in front of me I slammed my fist into the ground.
A shockwave shot out as most of the constructs were shattered but that's not what I wanted. As the shock wave from the punch traveled through chunks of the ground shot through the air as I quickly changed to dexterity mode. I jumped into the air as it nearly felt like I was flying as I quickly leaped from each piece of rock as I started to speed between them.
I could see Shadow Garden already forming another attack as I felt a yellow aura surround me as I quickly started to bounce around the room. My momentum kept rising as I built up more force as when I passed over Shadow Garden I fired a blast of flames towards them. In response Shadow Garden formed another black steel container around them blocking the blast, perfect. I then shot towards the end of the room as I sped towards the container and turned my feet to steel and switched to strength mode.
I felt the black metal crumble as I made contact with it as a shockwave quickly followed after I landed Launching the container outside of the building. As soon as I landed I switched to dexterity mode as I sprinted Shadow Garden who just started forming from the inky black ground.
As soon as they fully stood out I was already reeling back back my fiat right in front of them. I could see an ocean of emotions flood their eyes from shock to fear to anger. I stopped focusing on them as I switched to my normal state and with all my might slammed my fist right into their face.
I felt their jaw snap as I swear I left an indent on their face as they slammed into the wall getting embedded in it. I wanted to see they were finally done but the inky black ground slowly fading back to normal was definitely a sign. “FINALLY!!!” yelled in victory as I wanted to rest a bit after one hell of a fight but I knew that we didn’t have much time left as the sirens got louder.
I rushed over to the unconscious Leo, who luckily was not caught in the crossfire as I grabbed him and put him over my shoulder. Without wasting a second I already leaped out of the warehouse as I quickly used my X-ray vision to find Mia in the nearby Factory. When I got outside the whole area was just a mess covered in burn marks and melted stone. There was Large Leo shaped hole near the second floor as I quickly leaped through it to find Mia unconscious and a terrifying sight.
I didn't know how to describe it but it was just pure destruction as I could see that several blocks were just completely gone as if they never existed. I looked down at Mia as it wasn’t hard to figure out who caused this, maybe we should just leave her, no. I gently grabbed Mia as if I was grabbing a bomb as I gently placed her on my other shoulder.
I could hear the sirens coming down the non destroyed blocks. Fuck I need a way out of here and to get too these two to there families I can’t just run them so I needed another option. I looked around for a bit until I saw a couple cars on the highway, that will do.