A big bloody tree trunk smacked into his head knocking him flat on his arse. Myles knew he was not supposed to be engaging in any extra curricular activity just yet. John was acting as his training wheels to get him up to speed or in his actual words ‘so you probably won’t die’. But Myles was a planner. Spontaneity was something he always thought of as failing to get your ducks in a row and scrambling for a solution. Another part of him needed to get work done upfront, work harder and smarter now and reap the rewards. This had led him to ignore his previous doctrine on spontaneous activity in an effort to get stronger and increase his survivability. Myles was unsure if this had been the right decision. The tree trunk was brought down with inhuman force smacking him in his face. Myles had many ambitions in life. Getting beat to death in a garden centre was not one.
The offending log was being weaponised by some manner of ceramic construct. It either had some organic parts or was at least registered as fae enough to trigger his suit. The limbs on the thing were made from interlocking terracotta cylinders. this allowed its extremities to undulate. As if the damn thing wasn’t creepy enough.
“Flobalobalobaloba” The thing.. spoke?
Myles caught a third blow from the tree trunk in his hands and kicked out aiming for the golem things knee. A broken knee would have indeed been a great inconvenience to the earthenware construct if it actually had any knees to break. Myles had expended his energy to bend one of its legs backwards just a bit.
“Flob ob ob”
New tactics were needed, or at least an old one that worked.. Myles increased his grip on the constructs improvised club and was lifted into the air as powerful arms swung the trunk back. It was not quite the epic summersault Myles had imagined, but he did gain enough hight to belly flop down onto the creatures head. Scrabbling to get his arms around its neck, Myles gripped and pulled with all of his suit enhanced strength. First the pings and cracks were little, and quiet, but they rapidly increased as with on last tug the neck and lower head shattered. Falling back to the ground Myles still clutched the remains of the constructs head. Only to look up and see a still very active fae construct undulating and thrashing around.
“Note to self artificial fae, don’t needs heads”
The next logical target was the bulbous middle. Some kind of weapon or tool would make things go easier, but he was a long way off creating one of his own, breaking and entering into the garden centre hardware was one option, but that didn’t feel right to Myles. He felt guilty enough for knocking over a load of conifers earlier in the fight.
One of he constructs arms whipped down narrowly missing Myles.
“Fuck it, I’m a burglar now”
Myles jumped over the herbs in the kitchen garden section, narrowly missing the chives and made a dash towards the hardware department, the re-enforced glass doing little to stop the kick Myles unleashed on the closed door. Myles made his choice quickly. the suit made the large hammer feel much lighter. The construct was still thrashing around outside, while it clearly did not need a head, it must have been providing some sensory input judging by the seemingly random thrashing around.
“Okay Endeavour, keep it simple.” Myles said to himself as he cocked the hammer back resting it on his shoulder. In his free hand Myles picked up a pre-made display pot of bright flowers and lobbed over the thrashing earthenware monstrosity. The pot of flowers hit the ground with a loud crash attracting the attention of the fae construct.
Picking up as much speed as he could Myles ran. Striking it dead centre. The carapace shattered as the thing fell backwards. Inside was not the machinery or magic tomfoolery he expected. What myles saw was a large grotesque eye surrounded in green, vine like tendrils. It must have been operating that thing like a puppet but from the inside. The big disgusting eye Myles thought, made for a cracking bullseye. Calling on the suits powerful legs Myles leapt high into the air. Without the automatic functions of the suit his aim was still dodgy, but it was a big target. Myles landed driving the hammer down causing gore and raw green viscera to fountain up and splatter down over the plants and concrete. Myles heard clapping.
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“The improvised weapon was a nice touch” Said John Barrington who was providing the applause.
He stopped clapping.
“But this was too soon. You are adapting well Myles, but this was above your pay grade”
“I’m getting paid?”
“Sure, here’s your pay check” John Barrington gestured to the various shattered ceramic parts and miscellaneous fae gore.
The suits disengaged as the last twitching tendril weakly dropped to the floor. Myles made face at the mess, but started putting his hard earned bounty into his sub-space inventory.
“What exactly was this one” said Myles gesturing to the mess “I thought it was artificial at first… but well, look at all the gross squidgy bits flopping about”
“That young lad, is a Billunben, A plant like race of creatures that fashions exoskeletons to protect their soft very squish-able insides. Probably for the best as they have a bit of a thing for exterminating the lesser races.”
“So why did it go apeshit when I took its head off, it couldn’t tell where I was, but a fair bit of it seems to be made of eye?
“See the head over there, have a look inside”
Myles made his way over to the head he had pulled off, and examined the interior. Inside the ceramic headpiece was a series of crystals and mirrors.
“A Periscope?”
“Got it in one Kid” said John while giving Myles finger guns.
“I’m thirt… no never mind” Myles drew the Billunben helmet into his inventory.
It had been two weeks since Myles had been sucked into this mess of Fae, Triggers and stupid amounts of fighting. His armour was finished and stable, but he had yet to find or make any decent weapons and his control was still absolute bollocks. He was getting a lot of milage out of the suits physical enhancement using it to literally brute force the problems. Myles was just glad the Billunben’s eye had been so large.
“As I was saying, this was too early for you to be going solo. Not all of us get the luxury of a mentor, not least one as competent at monster slaying as I am. I respect your need to learn and grow, but for now stick to the mundane stuff, take a class, join a gym. When it comes to suiting up, stick with me up to the point we get you fully in control of your armour and better yet, we get you a weapon.”
“Speaking of weapons, I don’t suppose this clean up crew of yours deals with B&E’s do they?”
“Don’t worry, they normally have someone who can rewind time on a localised basis”
Myles stopped picking up fairy offal and stared into space as he digested that information.
“Sorry…Rewind localised time… Rewind. Localised. Time. How come I get a bunny rabbit and someone else gets to lord it over physics”
“Put the tape measure away Myles, they are not one of us and it’s far too early to tell where your power set is heading. Personally I’m hoping it involves easter eggs.”
Myles gave his self appointed mentor the two finger salute before resuming his acquisition of gross fae parts.
“Will this miscellaneous gunk effect what I can make, am I going to suddenly get some kind of eyeball whip or a ceramic shield?”
“That my young apprentice is a good question. The short answer is no. The longer answer is sometimes a monster powerful enough will effect or pass on attributes to the object made from it. But the suit filters all those materials out when it makes repairs so you are not suddenly going to develop a codpiece that winks at people. Look at it this way, if my suit had tried to dictate my fashion choices I’d have thrown it in the trash years ago. Probably the most important part of the creation function is you. But everyones is a little different so you will have to experiment in your own time to figure yours… Hold up, they are here”
Green and Orange flashing lights pulled up outside the perimeter fence of the garden centre. Myles recognised the vehicle as ‘truck shaped’ but could not discern a make or model. A tall brunette woman exited from the driver side and a stocky red hair’d man from the passenger side. with a nod to each other they both vaulted over the chain link fence and landed in-front of Myles and John.
“I see you picked up another apprentice Mr. Barrington” Said stocky red head in a thick welsh accent.
“Look at the mess, it’s clearly one of his… HQ still talks about what his daughter did too that Bogglebear. At least Fairy Trigger incidents don’t require memory wipes.
Myles noted the venom the tall woman employed to say ’Fairy Trigger’ and tried to make himself more unobtrusive.
“From the look of it, a Billunben, handily smashed up with most of it gobbled up by one of your suits because thats fucking normal” Said the tall woman as she made her assessments. “Some property damage, distressed begonias and what looks like a hammer sunk into concrete. Entirely fixable and why are you two still here. Fuck off.”
“One second whitey” Said the red head, he tossed Myles a box “That is your new special work phone, everything you need is on there, all the normal community bollocks and the big special button that you press to call in the clean up crew.”
“Thank you said Myles” He looked at the box, it was black with big friendly pink writing on it, it was oddly reassuring.
“Just doing our job. Now as the lady said clear off.”
Apprentice and fashion conscience mentor left the clean up crew to do their job. Myles was not going to admit that the stern grumpy brunette made him feel things. Strange lights and noises were emitted from the garden centre as they walked away. Tonight had made Myles realise something, he had not been himself, he was trying to put out fires instead of doing what he did best, planning and working smarter. He needed a set plan to reduce the amount he was smacked about up tree trunks. He would get home, shower and put together something before bed. His phone… his old non special phone rudely beeped at him
John from Work
Myles, I just hooked a big new client, meeting tomorrow, I need some fuck off charts to sell the presentation. I know I can count on you.
Myles kicked a lamp post and swore to himself.