A cloaked woman had been waiting in the swamp of lost souls, she patiently waited for her accomplice to finish his task.
There were dead rotten trees everywhere, little frogs hopped around her, the mud reached all the way to the top of her boots. A small breeze gave her some shivers, her hood moved on the wind, a little of her green hair got revealed as her hood moved, It did indeed not take long until a portal opened up.
It was made by Nicholas, while he wanted to get Steve here, he had his own plans. Their plan to move the portal to the swamp had succeeded, The woman was glad that Nicholas made this portal, not only was he helping move their plan along, he also exposed himself.
After a few minutes, a woman fell through the portal, more like, she got launched through the portal, The mysterious woman walked towards Alice, she had face planted in the mud, and she slowly got up.
Alice looked at the woman who was walking towards her, She looked up, “I know you, you are the woman who should have been helping us. You need to get back and help Steve.”
The woman crossed her arms, “He will probably be fine. However, I have some other plans for you. You did a fantastic job, Alice, exactly as we had planned.”
Another man joined them, he was cloaked in a dark robe, and he hid his face behind his cloak.
“Take her,” the woman yelled at Alice, the man walked over to Alice, who had taken a defensive position.
Before Alice could react, the man threw dust over Alice, she fell over, down in the mud.
The woman looked at the man, “Now pick her up. You can use her for your sick ritual, just like we had agreed upon, oh and remember, don’t kill her.”
The man grunted, “Where is my portal?” Out of nowhere, someone landed, behind the cultist.
This man was cloaked as well, “No worries,” the new man stretched his hand and a portal opened up, the cultist nodded and walked through the portal with Alice hoisted on his shoulder.
The woman removed her hood, revealing a young face with green, shoulder-length hair, that moves in the wind, she has a strong, gloomy face. Hooded green eyes, set lightly within her sockets. “Well, where is my Steve?”
The man removed his hood as well, Blonde, well-groomed hair awkwardly hangs over a lean, lively face. Hooded dark eyes, set handsomely within his sockets, one of his arms could be seen as the wind moved his cloak, his right arm looks like a decaying robot arm. “Do not worry, he will arrive soon.”
They both crossed their arms and waited as the portal slowly started to flicker, The woman had been leaning against one of the dead trees. An ambulance came through the portal at full speed and headed right towards the tree where the woman was leaning.
She jumped aside with cat -like reflexes and landed on her feet. Both of them looked as the ambulance hit the tree, the tree cracked and fell on top of the ambulance, a lot of smoke came out of the ambulance. The woman walked over and looked over the smoking hood at the man, “I did not expect that.”
The man chuckled, “it is Steve, what else did you expect? Who is that woman, though?” The man walked over and put his hand on her shoulder, “her energy signature is frail, her name seems to be Abby.”
The woman sighed, “Of course, he took another woman with him, I will check if they are fine, why don’t you go check on the cultist? Make sure that our cultist friend, keeps his end of the bargain. I cannot believe we are executing this plan for real, you better behave.”
The man smiled, “When did I ever not behave?”
The woman shook her head, “How about, when you killed me?”
The man shrugged, “You are fine now, right?”
The woman looked at the man leave through a portal, ignoring his stupid remark. “What am I supposed to do now? Just, wait for Steve to wake up? How did he even get an ambulance here?”
A woman called out, “That sounds good, just don’t hurt him, Bella.”
Bella turned around and looked at a woman with large black wings, black, straight hair went down all the way to the end of her back, as she moved her hair aside, she revealed a craggy, tense face. Squinting rainbow-colored eyes, set delicately within her sockets. “You may call me O, for now.”
Bella walked over to O, “Just, who or what are you?”
O smiled, “Just someone that watches from the shadows, if you hurt Steve, then I am going to break you.”
Bella laughed, “Yeah, right!” Bella shot a green beam at O, she in response spawned a rainbow-colored claymore and just deflected the green energy beam with ease. O threw her claymore into the air, and it spun. O punched Bella, grabbed her hand, and broke it. Then she caught her rainbow claymore and let it rest on her shoulder.
Bella started to heal her hand, “Damn, that was nasty.”
O smiled at her, “Like I said, just execute your plan, but if I deem you to be handling Steve’s life with not enough dignity, then I am coming to rip off your head.”
Bella sighed, she raised her hands in surrender, “I will do my best to keep Steve safe. Now, I am going to execute the rest of my plan while they sleep off their crash.”
O nodded, and vanished.
Bella rushed across the land to Sector 07, as she made it, she smiled, “Record time.”
As she looked around, she saw the Insectines, they all ignored her as she exuded a powerful presence, when she saw whom she was looking for, she approached him. These Insectines are a type of invertebrate, they have two small wings that are usually tucked behind a shell on their back. Most of them have two arms, and two legs. Their legs look small and insignificant, however, Insectines are perfect at jumping and dodging.
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This Insectine also has a small tail, there are also Insectines with more arms or legs. They have two eyes which sit delicately in their sockets and can often make them appear to be nervous. Their eyesight is superb. Their narrow mouths and narrow noses frequently make these Insectines appear to be upset, but looks can be deceiving. Most of the Insectine ears are a bit small and their hearing can be a bit poor. Their skin is strong, but not very thick.
Their heads are covered in nothing but a few hairs, typically, their skin colors are mostly green and light green, which tend to become darker as they age. The males are usually more self-centered than their female counterparts, and their colors are less vibrant, the females, however, are typically more obnoxious.
The Insectine stared at the woman before speaking up, “Humans are not allowed here, you will be punished with death.”
Bella sighed, they are so stubborn, “Yes, I know, the biomancer attack. Do not worry, I am very far away from being a human. You are making your way to Poluma right?”
The Insectine only nodded.
Bella smiled, “then I have a solution for you, You are going to visit your girlfriend and become a warrior, isn't that correct?”
The Insectine crossed his arms, “How would you even know that?”
Bella waved his question away with her hand, “I am here to offer you advice, that way, you can be with Rachel earlier!”
Bella started talking much faster, “Look, if you follow that road, you will find a house, it is abandoned, If you go west from there, you will be in Poluma in no time.”
The Insectine looked at her carefully, “We do not cross the swamp until we have weapons, we lost most of them in the last war, and Rachel's weapons are off limit.”
Bella crossed her arms. “Do not worry, all is safe, I killed the monsters.”
“Now, go buddy before new ones come back.”
The Insectine looked at her, “What is your name?”
“You do not need to know my name, I already know yours, so you do not have to introduce yourself.” The Insectine sighed and walked towards the direction where Bella had pointed towards.
The woman quickly made her way to a bandit camp nearby, she had already scouted it a few times before Steve and Alice had arrived. As Bella approached the bandit camp, she pulled a sack of gold out of her inventory, It was more than enough to bribe one of the bandits. As she came closer, all the bandits got up and pointed at her with their swords. “Look fellows, I need your service to rob someone, perhaps kill him.”
One of the bandits stabbed Bella, at least he tried to, his bronze sword bent when he tried to stab Bella, she looked down at where the sword had bent, “Ouch, that almost hurt me.” Bella snapped the bandit's neck, the one who had attempted to attack her. There was a thump sound as the dead bandit fell over.
Bella dusted off her hands, “Well, I need you to kill someone, not die yourself.”
One of the bandits raised his hand, “I will do the job,” is all that he managed to get out.
Bella looked at him, “Fine, it all involves killing one person, his name is Steve. If you encounter an Insectine on the way, feed him to the snake I placed in the abandoned house.”
The bandit nodded, he took the gold and left.
Bella smirked as she spoke up and headed back to where Steve and Abby had crashed, “Well, this will be fun.”
Bella had been leaning against a tree for a while, still waiting for Steve and Abby to wake up, she was sure, O was watching from somewhere.
A portal opened near her and the man walked out, Bella nodded towards him as a greeting, “Hello, robot man.”
The man chuckled, “I am more human than a robot.”
Bella smiled, “I don’t believe that, you don’t even have parents.”
The man shrugged, “I do have brothers and sisters, are you certain that Alice’s rune will hold?”
Bella nodded, “It has too, if she starts remembering everything, we have a problem, she could play the void against us, However, I have made sure to have a back-up plan. But, I'd rather not use that plan.”
Bella walked away from the tree, “That is not even the biggest problem, we have many factors that are impossible to factor into our plan.”
The man crossed his arms, “Are you talking about Drew?”
Bella turned around and put her hand on her chin and started rubbing it, “For example, and the Agency or the Inner Circle. As long as we have the grand council on our side, we should be able to fool Steve and get what we want, well, at least, what I want. I don’t care what you want, you are just a boy toy to me.”
Bella pointed at Abby, “That is another unknown factor that could change our outcome, as is the mysterious woman that can kill us with a snap of her fingers, she is probably looking at us right now, but I cannot sense her energy properly.”
The man sighed, “I understand, we need to have a lot of luck, lets, try to stick to the plan, our first step, get them to Brickton.”
Bella separated herself from the man for a moment. She let out a very long and deep sigh. I cannot believe it came to this, How am I going to get what I want? While avoiding disaster by releasing Micheal from his hellhole? If Alice gets her memory back, then she is going to look for Micheal as well. She began to breathe deeply, and then exhaled. Calm down Bella, you have taken many steps to avoid any disaster, you got them here, and all is working out perfectly fine, when the time is right, you will join Steve's party.