“On a scale on one to ten how badly is this about to go” asked Myles.
“About thirteen.” said john Barrington.
The two men, fully suited up were peering out of the window behind the cover of a thick paisley curtain with the lights off, looking to see what was coming. So far they had counted six shapes dart past, but they were certain of more.
“It will be fine, just don’t invite them inside.: Said John Marquis
“Thats vampires and vampires are not real.”Said Myles, who stopped and thought a moment. “John are Vampires real?”
“There are monsters that do vampire things but nothing Hammer Horror.” Said John Barrington, the reassuring tone completely at odds with the information conveyed.
Shapes in the dark wizzed past, the poorly illumination obfuscating the appearance of whatever they were. The house was surrounded by whatever the things were. they were keeping their distance but for how much longer remained to be seen.
“Can we not use our fancy super phones to call for some kind of back up?” asked Myles
“Maybe if someone had bothered to set up their fancy super phone they could have already been putting out a call.” snarked John Barrington. He rooted around in one of the bags he brought in and started punching keys on the screen as soon as it was in hand.
The back door banged and the windows rattled. Unknown enemy hand encircled the house and knew enough about the location of the people inside to strike from blindspots.
“We need to go out before they come in here, we have barely enough room to swing a cat inside this house.” Suggested Myles “But it is going to be a cluster fuck, in this street in that lighting. Do we have anything that can light the place up”
“Yes.” said John Barrington with gritted teeth. “Leave it to me”
“Mum! Lock the bedroom door.” Myles shouted up the stairs. “I’ll take the front, Marquis, you take the rear, Barrington, do what it is you are going to do to light us up and shoot anything that moves.”
“When did you take charge?” Jokes John Marquis
“When whatever bastards these are decided to attack my Mums house, thats when. These things have played a very stupid game and they are about to win a very stupid prize.” Deadpanned Myles.
The three strode out of the front door, taking up their positions. John Barrington made a small neon yellow mouse appear in his hand. He connected it up to his Trigger. Light bloomed around John Barrington, coalescing into a bright neon jacket… it was so bright, like a glow stick but more intense. In his hand was an oversized sword. The blade was the same colour as the jacket and emitting maybe even more light.
“Now you know my darkest secret.” said John Barrington “My Augments all clash horribly, my superior style a carefully crafted lie I..Where are you going?”
John Marquis and Myles were reading themselves. John summoning his Scythe and Myles wishing he still had his stick. John Barrington hurried up behind them and willed the light emitted from his jacked and sword even brighter.
“I called in the Neonblader, it is a giant magic laser sword, got terribly with everything else I own, looks hellishly tacky, but it cuts through damn near anything.”
“So this whole time we have been fighting together, you had the Acid house vorpal sword in your back pocket.”
“You don’t understand Myles. Look at how tacky it is!” John Barrington waved the Neonblader around to demonstrate, accidentally chopping a few rosebushes.
Banter was short lived as the entity that had Triggered them stalked out of the darkness and into the light of the Neonblader.
“Whoooooooooee-uueet”
“Whooee-uueet”
“Whooooooee-uueet”
Whistlers walked towards Betty Endeavours house. Pack after pack of the creepy things came forward, surrounding the small house. Myles and the other could not have escaped if they wanted. Myles counted ltirtyfive that he could see, and guessed more would be hidden or around the back of the house. The fae seemed strangely calm given the strange creatures apparent vendetta against Myles. He assumed the posturing was some form of intimidation, get him scared and off his game. Or maybe even possibly stall for time for some other heinous act to take place. Myles denied them the time and denied them the opportunity. He launched forward right at the biggest whistler he could see.
The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Pandemonium broke out the moment everyone realised Myles was moving. The large Whistler who Myles had aimed his person at however barely had time to register anything before all it knew was brief pain and eternal darkness. Myles Endeavour pulled his fist from the big whistlers skull and with another burst of power leaped towards the next of the larger whistlers. John Barrington used practiced sweeps, slashes and lunges. gangly pink limbs flew off splattering pale insipid blood as he applied calculated violence with the Neonblader to the problem. One of the perks in being outnumbers and or surrounded was you could hit in any direction and make it count. What had Myles called it?… an Acid house vorpal sword, John Barrington did not care for Acid house, but vorpal sword was not far wrong. Whee john Barrington was making his incisions above the waste, John Marquis was harvesting the shins knees and thighs of the whistlers. Using the long reach of the weapon, anything that got in range swiftly had its mobility greatly reduced. All the while john Marquis was using the suit to keep him away from any of the acidic pot shots the whistlers were taking.
Onto his forth of the big whistlers Myles was hoping if he killed enough of the command structure they could rout the sea. While an outright victory would be nice, forcing a retreat and living to see another day was a good outcome. His fist penetrated another skull. He wished he was elegant like John Barrington, or even had the charismatic bullshit of John Marquis. What Myles had as super powers and pragmatism, no flash, no style, just applying force to vulnerable places. Fist goes it, brain come out. Maybe he really was turning into a zombie, he would take extra care not to eat any fae brains once this was all over.
Unfortunately the three had been right in their speculation, there were more creatures hidden and they entered the fray with great murderous enthusiasm. Minutes wore on, fae corpses littered the street and the carnage was showing no signs of ending. towards the melee there strode another big whistler, wearing a black apron and holding a large wooden staff.
“We have a problem heading this way, big one in black is a named fae. That one is Granny whistler, it is old and can channel some kind of fae magic through that huge staff.” Warned John Barrington
No sooner had the heads up been given bolts of fee lightning were being shot at the three. The only upside was Granny care not for her inferiors as several of the lower ranking whistlers were burned to ash. Bolt after bolt rains down on them. Neonblader blocked as many as it could handle.
“Cover me, I need to be the one who takes care of this” said John Barrington, as he gracefully moved between the attacking whistlers. He climbed onto of a car and ran and jumped from car to car towards Granny whistler, blocking shot after shot. With the distance closed, she had to employ the staff as a martial weapon. But the material was strong or at least magic enough to counter whatever properties allowed Neonblader to sever almost any matter. John Barrington earned his skills over many lifetimes, but the named fae, one known for its magic and long range threat was matching him in speed and power.
“Whoooooee-uueet” said Granny.
Myles and his companions were not holding out, bit by bit they were being overwhelmed by the tide of fae goons. Gore soaked and running on fumes Myles was simply not strong enough. The end was inevitable. But then hope flashed in orange and green.
The clean up crew truck crashed through the fighting whistlers, battering some aside and crunching the bones of others under heavy duty tyres.
When Zara stepped out Myles could have kissed her… if not for the faceplate and the strong probability she would literally shoot him down.
“Well this is horrible.” she said pulling her jacket sleeve back revealing some kind of wrist mounted device that Myles could not make out properly in the dark. Rusty who had followed her out of the truck made the same preparations. Both struck the wrist mounted device at the same time causing it to light up, they raised it high.
“GEAR UP ANIMALBION SENTRY SILVER BAT”
“GEAR UP ANIMALBION SENTRY GOLD SNAKE”
The transformation Myles could not help notice was smoother and less aggressive than the Trigger. It felt more like protection than the looming threat of violence. It was however still just as spectacular. The outfit was sleeker and more form fitting than his own armour, it didn’t even look like armor at all, more like a highly mobile combat suit, built more for mobility than a slugfest. Zara stood in silver and Rusty in gold. Their transformation had barely settled when Zara pulled from her own sub-space storage a large double bladed axe styled to look like wings. It was huge but she lifted it as if it was made from hollow plastic. Rusty had an even stranger weapon, it was a whip that looked like a snake, it even moved on it own.
The two Animalbion Sentries dove headlong into battle, from appearances they were not as physically powerful as a Trigger user, they had years of experience under their belt and this was clearly not their first dust up with the fae. Zara could not have split whistlers in twain faster if they had formed an orderly queue. Rusty was acting as crown control, using his whip to trip tear and pull them into position for the others to strike down.
John Barrington’s battle was not going well. Granny had managed to bash his helm enough times to send big cracks through the faceplate. What almost sealed his fate was the huge gob of acid she spat. Narrowly blocking with Neonblader he was forced the drop the corroded weapon. But John pulled put his regular sword and gun and switched back to a more evasive fighting style. Myles saw this and began to run over John was skilled, but without Neonblader to match the fae weapon one hit was all it would take to down John and that is just what happened, it was a momentary misstep and the crackling fae staff connected launching john Barrington into the side of a Nissan Micra. Gathering speed, Myles leapt at the large named Fae only to be bashed into the ground for his trouble by the staff. Clinging on with all his might, Myles had an idea. He tried drawing it into his storage, it was not fed, but had it spent enough time around Granny to pick up any of whatever had allowed him to draw in a genius loci earlier. Myles felt it resist, but he concentrated harder, Granny kicking him to try and remove him from her weapon. She begun charging the weapon. if she could not remove him by brute force, she could cook him and scrape him off later. But Myles pulled harder and with no pop, bang or fanfare what so ever, the fae weapon was stolen away into Myles’ storage system,
“Whoooooooooooooooee-uueeeeeeeet”
The noise was as close to a scream he had heard from the whistlers so far. The thing was pointing accusatorially at him. He supposed had just stolen an ancient treasure. But before Granny could make good on whatever three she was making John Barrington’s sword was burred hilt deep in her skull. Being ancient, powerful and wise was no protection from sharp metal being jabbed down hard into your meat computer.
Pushing himself back to his feet Myles found his suit disengaging. They were all dead. They had, with significant help, survived a whistler raiding party… that had shown up at his mothers house. That thought disturbed Myles no end. For now though he would help with the clean up and then have a nice cup of tea.
“I can’t believe you have finally brought a girl home” said Betty Endevour. “And such a pretty one”
“We are just work friends Mum”
“Did you tell her you used to poo in peoples gardens”
“That was not what happened and you know it Mum”
“It is lovely to meet you Ms. Endeavour, I have only known Myles a short while, but he seems to be taking to the job well” Said Zara the model of civility.
Everyone had cleaned up best they could and gone back to Betty Endeavours house for a cup of tea. The clean up crew, had explained that you don’t have to be ‘clean up’ for any fight you took part in, if you need to get involved in the s then someone else gets send. Rusty had said they dressed it up in fancy words like objective and neutral, but it is really about letting the knackered person have a rest. Myles had then asked why they made him pick up all of the bodies into his storage when another crew was on the way. Apparently it was because it was funny. It was late and everyone was now crashing at Myles’ Mothers house.
“Would anyone like some food?” Betty offered receiving a show of hands “Okay Mr. Barrington and Mr. Marquis, come and make a sandwich with me” Betty Endeavour headed into the kitchen.
The Johns gave a shrug and followed her into the kitchen to help prepare food. Zara and Rusty stifled giggles. Surprisingly it was Zara who struggled most.
They had survived. Myles had questions, but that could wait until the morning. That was when He fell off his chair s the worst migraine he ever felt flared up in his head.
LANGUAGE SYNCHRONISATION COMPLETE NEW OPTIONS AVAILABLE