[https://i.imgur.com/wBHgiOt.jpg]

Half Submerged Hideout

September 17th X288

Both Sticks Caldwell and Florian Lilly Cobblestone stood in the warpath of Juke Lucas. The angler frog’s fangs clamped through Ronaldo, gnawing him as Juke mauled him with relentless punches filled with crimson anger.

“What the hell did that therapist do to Juke? If this keeps up, Juke’ll kill him!” Sticks said in a cold sweat.

“We have to save Ronaldo. Help me stop him!” Florian ordered Sticks with sincerity in her eyes.

“What? Are you insane? Juke wrecked my crew with a flick of his wrist! There’s no way I’m fighting him again!” His snake mouse hid under his hood.

“Fine! I’ll do it myself.” Florian rolled up her sleeves.

“Are you trying to get yourself killed!?”

“I don’t care what happens to me! I’ll get Ronaldo out of here!”

“Damn it! Fine! Don’t blame me if you get hurt!”

Sticks and Cobblestone stood side by side.

“Follow my lead and get your therapist out of Juke’s line of sight!” he yelled.

The snake mouse soul shot out, catching the gorilla arm in place.

Florian circled and slid behind Juke. She grabbed Ronaldo’s hand, trying to pull him out of the storm of punches.

Juke’s head turned to Florian. He swung his arm as if swatting a fly. His spirit’s giant fist phased through Florian.

Sticks caught Juke’s arm with his whole body. “What’s wrong with you?! I said to follow my lead! Damn it!”

“I did,” she said. Your soul already showed me.

Florian pulled Ronaldo’s arm over her shoulder. She felt the arm was bending in the wrong direction. Ronaldo’s face was bloodied and swollen. His usually clean button shirt was stained red, his vest torn, and his glasses rendered useless.

Sticks’s grip tightened around Juke’s arm. “Juke! It’s me! Snap out of it!” Sticks was a mouse compared to the six-foot-three giant.

Florian didn’t waste a moment; she faced the door and dragged Ronaldo over her shoulder. The gorilla arm of the angler frog whaled through Sticks’s body and past Florian’s head.

“Get down!” Florian said, and without turning around, she ducked.

Sticks shrugged. “Don’t tell me what to do. You’re not even facing—”

Juke’s fist collided with Sticks’s head, knocking him back and forth. Blow after blow, Sticks didn’t let go of Juke’s arm, not allowing Juke to have another arm to beat him with.

“Yoooooou idiooooooooot! I ordered you to not let them escape!” Juke bombarded Sticks with his fists.

Sticks released his grip.

Florian made it to the door and reached out for it.

“Get back here!” Juke lifted Sticks by his hood and tossed him through the door, smashing it to pieces.

Florian and Ronaldo were knocked back from the shockwave, bumping into the couch. Florian squirmed. When she situated herself, she stiffened. She hadn’t noticed until now. A pile of threads lay below the sleeping woman’s head.

“What’s with all the noise? Is it time for my shift yet?” Sophie Squalid and her soul reemerged from her slumber with a yawn.

Florian had yet to identify the soul of the crazy woman who wielded a scalpel.

Hundreds of thin legs and hands sprouted from the back of the woman. Countless antennae and feelers brushed through the air as she yawned. She stretched her long slim arms upward, and her giant white eyes beamed through her long messy black hair.

“Hie hehe! That’s weird? Why do I feel so hungry?” Sophie said, licking her lips.

The angler frog spirit stomped Ronaldo’s head.

He’s going to smash his head open!

“No!” Florian jumped through the frog’s legs and shielded Ronaldo.

“Arah? Who’re you two?” Sophie said.

Juke raised his foot over the two on the floor, about to crush them in front of Sophie.

Sophie elegantly leaped with a twirl over Juke, landing on his back. She wrapped her thin arms around Juke’s neck, embracing him.

“Hie hehe. Did you forget? We were told not to hurt civilians. Why do you get to have all the fun?”

Juke, in a fit, tried to shake Sophie off.

Florian looked up at the giant angler frog getting strangled by an endless pink and black centipede. Its thick body pinched its legs all over the frog’s body.

In the struggle, Sophie perched herself on Juke’s back.

“Hie hehe. Are you really letting me do this? Can I really have you all to myself? I do not hear a no. Hie hehe. Finally! I get to cut someone!” Sophie drooled.

Sophie reached behind her back and pulled out a dozen scalpels. She stabbed Juke’s back relentlessly. Juke didn’t react to the pain; he just tried to reach Sophie, who scurried around his back and arms.

“Hie hehe. Settle down, big guy. Don’t worry, I’ll sew you back together later. I won’t leave a single scar. Okay? Okay. Please, let me cut you up some more. Hie hehe.” Sophie squealed in pleasure.

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

Florian had to escape. She lifted Ronaldo and made her way to the door.

“Where do you think you’re going?” Sticks brushed off the rubble and blocked the doorway. “I can’t let you just walk out of here. I have to put in work to make my girlfriend happy, even if she did send you here to find me.”

“What’re you? Who? I didn’t come here for you! Move!”

“What? If Choco didn’t send you here to bring me home, then how did you identify us?” Sticks dropped his shoulders. “What?”

He dropped his guard and seemed to be processing his thoughts as Florian shuffled her way closer to the door.

“Don’t try to escape while I’m thinking!” Sticks reached his snake mouse soul toward Florian’s head.

Florian dropped Ronaldo and dodged the jab aimed at her head.

“I don’t know how you do it, but with this rematch, I’m going to break your arm,” Sticks said, taking a fighting position.

I don’t have time for this! No . . . If it’s just him, I can handle him. He’s around my age and was thrown through a door. He can’t take that much damage without feeling some pain. Besides, I can tell his weakness just by looking.

The snake mouse soul wrapped around both of his arms. Florian couldn’t tell which hand was going to grab her.

Sticks dove toward Florian, hands ready to apprehend her.

Which one? Florian’s eyes darted back and forth.

The snake clotheslined between Sticks’s arms. Florian guarded her throat with both arms, seeing through Sticks’s misdirection.

Sticks grabbed her wrists and pried them from her neck, one in each hand. He squeezed and twisted them.

“It’s over. It doesn’t matter, even if you protect your vitals. I’ll still clutch and snap whatever I touch.”

Sticks lost his balance, and his vision went fuzzy. Electricity hit his brain, and he released Florian as he fell to his knees in pain.

“What happened? Why am I on the ground?” Sticks said.

Florian grabbed Ronaldo and dragged him through the broken doorway.

Sticks recollected himself.

He didn’t notice her leg. She kicked him in the groin at full force. She let Sticks grab both her arms, risking them getting broken, to have a clear shot for his crotch. With his hands busy, he couldn’t block, even if he did see it coming.

“What’s wrong with her? No one would be stupid enough to try something like that. She had to have timed everything perfectly. She would have to know my actions before I even made them,” Sticks said, watching the two leave through the hole in the door. “Get back here!” he yelled.

At that moment, Sophie was thrown through the wall, landing in the room next door. Sticks’s jaw dropped.

“The stories were true. If Juke snaps, it takes the entire team to stop him. Travis was thrown out the window. That therapist was pounded into the floor. I was hurled through a door, and Sophie was tossed through a wall. What am I doing? How can I face her if I can’t achieve anything?” Sticks closed his eyes and covered his head as Juke sprinted past him, gunning for Florian.

Sophie had landed in the room next door, where they kept their supplies. She hurried to her medical bag.

“You twerp!” Juke stampeded through to the hallway and caught up to Florian.

Florian was reaching for the exit when Ronaldo’s unconscious body vanished from her shoulder. Juke flung him down the hallway where he crashed and rolled into the old tattered floor.

Florian couldn’t move her arm. When she looked down, she saw her mangled arm dangling from her shoulder. The pain caught up to her.

She screamed in pain, collapsing to the floor. Tears, saliva, and snot spewed from her face. She was used to getting hit and bruised learning martial arts, but not like this. Her arm had been pulled out of its socket when Juke chucked Ronaldo, twisting her muscles and nerves in tandem.

The exit door opened by itself.

“Police! Hands on your head!” Officer Keen aimed his taser gun down the hallway.

“Officer Keen?” Florian panted on the floor, arm dead weight.

“You’re that kid? What’re you doing here?” His fox spirit groaned with a high-pitched gulp.

“Graaaaaaaahhhh!” Juke charged toward the police officer.

The fox spirit tracked its claws and fearlessly jumped toward Juke’s neck. Keen shot his taser, hitting him in the exact spot the fox landed. The jolt went through Juke’s entire body.

It didn’t even slow him down.

“Well, shit.” Officer Keen got tackled to the floor and lifted into the air by Juke.

The angler frog hugged Keen and hopped into the ceiling. Juke rammed Keen’s head through the hallway ceiling. Then he slammed Keen into the floor repeatedly. Over and over, the angler frog hopped on top of the officer’s body, blocking the exit.

Florian retreated down the hallway to Ronaldo. He lay there motionless.

She looked around; the only thing she could think of was to hide in one of the other rooms. She lifted Ronaldo with her good arm.

With her first step, Sophie Squalid slumped out of that very room.

The deranged woman was wide awake, holding several syringes. She lifted her tilted head, revealing a blood-curdling smile, partially shrouded by her long manic hair. Her soul behind her, a centipede’s body, peeled out from within her body. Its legs and feelers, in constant motion, wriggled behind her.

“Hie hehe! Hie hehe! Kya kya-ka!” She laughed, eyes staring through Florian. Laughing, she twirled down the hallway, waving multiple syringes in the air.

Surrounded, Florian couldn’t move. She couldn’t go on.

Sophie’s expression was complete excitement, ready to indulge herself.

Florian closed her eyes.

Sophie ran past Florian and leaped onto Juke, who was busy crushing Officer Keen into the floor. Laughing maniacally, she stabbed Juke in the back.

“Hie hehe! Kya kya-ka!” On and on, Sophie kept stabbing.

“These people are insane,” Florian said softly. It finally sunk in. Realizing what she had gotten herself into, she gave up. With the only escape route blocked by lunatics, their souls full of joy, Florian curled up in the corner of the hallway. Soulless.

“Why are they so happy?”

Juke collapsed on top of Keen. Sophie triumphantly placed her foot on Juke’s sedated body.

“Hie hehe! Hie hehe.”

Sophie Squalid had given up her temperance and revealed her true self. Her centipede spirit was embedded and overlapped with her physical body. Freedom to be herself, a true psychopath. “Kyakya-ka!”

“Ve’re back. Oh! Sophie, you’re awake.” Irina entered the apartment.

“Oh! Irina. Look what I did!” Sophie presented her achievement.

“Dat’s amazing, Sophie. You defeated Juke,” Irina said.

“Hie hehe. That makes me the strongest! Worship me!” Sophie flipped her hair.

Another person behind Irina entered the apartment. “I bet you’re hungry. I brought dinner.”

“Clarissa! Thank you. I can’t depend on these boys to get me anything. Thank you so much.” Sophie bounced with joy, ready to indulge herself.

“What happened here? I’m gone for one day, and all hell breaks loose?” Clarissa said. She carried a bag of groceries.

“Clarissa? There’s more of them?” Florian sank.

She was middle-aged and wore a white jogging jacket and sweatpants. She had brown hair and walked elegantly with confidence. Her voice was refined, and her words were motherly.

Florian didn’t recognize Clarissa’s face, but the soul was one she had met before.

“An octopus. . .” Florian whispered under her breath.

It was an octopus but in a different shape. It took the form of a lionfish. The tentacles sprang out and protruded sharp, mimicking quills. Fins grew from its sides, eyes glaring menacingly.

The mimic octopus spirit had hidden in her hair before. But now, with a different hairstyle, the octopus was floating in the air in its new form.

Clarissa approached Florian. When the two made eye contact, they both recognized each other. Clarissa was the mother of Florian’s childhood friends, the mother of the monkey boy and koi fish girl, who had divorced.

What’s she doing here? Florian thought.

“Do you know each oder?” Irina asked.