Like alchemy, hate and spite transformed into a vicious bolt of concentrated mana that streaked invisibly through the dirty barrens air before slamming into the head of the bandana wearing ganger. The force behind the attack was so strong that it sent him flying back, red bandana fluttering in his wake.
The crack of the hunting rifle next to him firing barely registered to the young spellcaster, such was his concentration.
Before the mohawked ganger could react, Wilde sent a follow up strike of equal power to him. Through his borrowed binoculars Wilde saw the beads that had been laced through the ganger’s neon blue hair scatter as he fell back like a toy thrown by an angry giant.
Out of either a continued feeling of frustration or genuine curiosity, Pedro wasn’t sure which, he looked over to where the other two gangers had been standing. All that he could see from his position though was a fine pink mist that vanished in the wind as soon as he saw it.
He wasn’t sure if the gangers he’d just attacked were dead or not. He couldn’t see the floor of the roof from his angle, nor was he interested in astrally perceiving to check on them. They were down and that was all that mattered right now. Dead, alive, he didn’t care what happened to the gangers, all that he cared about was what happened to Kay.
Through the mental connection he shared with his spirit of air Wilde gave the command.
‘Attack now!’.
Immediately, there was a muffled “BOOM!” as if an explosion had happened somewhere inside of the mall. Perhaps it had. But he could sense that the spirit was still active so that meant the gangers hadn’t somehow eliminated it as soon as it manifested. He suspected that for the next few minutes in there it would be utter chaos. The golden time to strike.
Without a word between them, the human spellcaster and the cybered-up troll broke into a sprint towards the mall before them, charging through a landscape of pollution bleached urban decay and charred husks of vehicles as they ran. The sound of gunshots, yells and screaming came from their destination, but none of it appeared directed at them. There were no bullets fired towards them, nor did any gangers charge out to meet them. The plan was working.
As they ran Pedro took the opportunity to re-cast the agility enhancing spell and the reflex enhancing spell upon himself. He’d allowed the spells to fade away in his initial breakdown after learning of Kay’s kidnapping and hadn’t seen any reason to reapply them at the time. Now he was going to need every edge he could get in the upcoming fight though. He hadn’t cast them prior to his opening barrage out of concern maintain concentration on them might have lessened the power of his attack. But the advantage of being quicker than the other person was too valuable an advantage to overlook now that the fight would be transitioning from ambush to assault.
Magic flowed through his body, enhancing his muscles and nerves to an extent that it felt that before when he’d been moving it had been through water. Pedro was faster now, swifter, and keeping pace with Kenda who had been beginning to break ahead of him moments before. Had it been in under other circumstances he would have likely boasted about the inherent superiority of magic over crude cybernetics. But he had no stomach for bragging for the time being. Only for getting to Kay as fast as possible.
They reached the entrance of the decrepit former mall without incident, though the sounds of violence had only grown louder. As Pedro could still feel that the spirit of air was present on this plane for the time being, so he could only assume that the fight against it raged on. The bond between them wasn’t strong enough for him to be aware of its status beyond its presence however, so he wasn’t sure how well said fight was going. If they were lucky the spirit would either kill all the gangers for them, or otherwise keep them all occupied for the duration of the rescue.
Looking about the interior to get his bearings it became apparent why the front entrance had been turned into such a gaping hole. There were several cars in some state of disassembly in the middle of the main pavilion of the building. The gangers had left enough of a passageway for cars to come and go from the entrance but there was no order to anything; once white mock marble tiles had cracked under the weight of all the vehicles and were now stained with a mix of engine oil, break fluids and other unknowable substances. What once were kitsch shops had been ripped out, everything of value looted long ago. With the main space of the mall being devoid of any features save for the ganger’s cars, and the rest of the shops on the other two levels all being gutted the building reminded Pedro of an arena of old. It would have probably served as a good Urban Brawl arena, that fact made the whole experience somewhat surreal for him, as if this was just another match in a way.
Wilde refused to let his guard down though. Just because he had fought in similar environments didn’t count for much when it was his opponent’s home ground. That was why when he spotted a hint of movement coming from one of the upper floors Wilde leapt to the side with an alacrity that would have been impossible for him without his magically enhanced reflexes.
BANG! BANG! BANG!
Shots rang out from above as one of the Nitro Mizuchi ganers had noticed their presence. Wilde had been hoping that they’d be further in before they were spotted but he didn’t have time to regret that.
‘Frag! We’re under attack! They’re some here too! The frags goin’ on man?!’.
Panicked hysteria was clear in his voice. The plan of inciting fear into the gangers seemed to have been effective, though while the man firing down from the second story sounded scared, he still wasn’t breaking away.
‘Just walk away chummer! We’re not here for you!’.
Pedro knew he should have just attacked. It was a dumb move, a vain hope, a childish delusion, but he still wanted to try and at least give some of the gangers a chance of walking away.
‘THERE HERE! I GOTTEM CORNERED! LET’S WASTE ‘EM!’.
‘You don’t got dreck’.
Was Wilde’s muttered response as a manabolt sped through the air unseen by the ganger and hit him in his chest. The act of being hurt by the invisible projectile came as a big enough shock to the loud ganger that he lost balance and fell over the un-banistered edge of the second floor of the mall. He hit the ground with a sickening wet thud. Pedro didn’t go over to see if he was still alive. The rapidly growing pool of blood where he landed made his fate clear.
From behind the noise of automatic gunfire from the eastern part of the mall where Pedro knew his spirit was fighting against the rest of the gangers, he could made out the sound of hurried footsteps, along with yells and whoops as more gangers rushed in response to their comrades warning.
‘Frag. This place is a killbox with us at the bottom’ve it. Their just gonna fire at us non-stop ‘til y’r spirit things toast. Then their all comin’ here. We need ‘t make a break for Kay now’.
‘No!’.
‘What’d’y-‘.
‘Listen to me! You run up and I’ll cover you. Then you get to a good spot and cover me as I come up. So long as one’ve us is laying down suppressive fire they won’t be able to go all out on us. And once we’re up on the second level they lose a bit of their advantage’.
Wilde had a reputation for running in headfirst into a fight in Urban Brawl matches. A well-earned reputation in fact. But as he’d continued participating in matches Wilde had seen how quickly things could turn against him, how guts, aggression and talent could only take a person so far before the odds overwhelmed him. The manager of the rundown arena he practiced in, Vega, had warned him that he’d need to improve, to work better in a team, or he was going to plateau. So, he did.
Thinking tactically didn’t come naturally to Pedro, he much preferred to rely on instinct to see him through. But he wasn’t pig headed enough to ignore the necessity of it so he had done what he could to learn how to improve his understanding of tactics. He wasn’t an expert my any stretch of the imagination, but Wilde knew the basics and judging from the actions of the Nitro Mizuchi beginning to swarm into the second level, they didn’t.
As the gangers began to pour around the edge of the second level overlooking the central courtyard of the mall complex, they showed no sign of having any strategy guiding them. A few took cover behind aging trashcans and benches, but most stood out in the open firing blindly below them. Nobody was giving orders or attempting to organise their efforts, they were just half a dozen well-armed individuals; they weren’t a team. Neither were he and Kenda perhaps, but the two of them at least shared a common goal that was strong enough to force them to work together and give the fight their all, even if it meant acting against what they would rather do.
Kenda glanced up at the second level, staying beneath the outcropping of the second floor enough to stay out of fire from the gangers.
‘Y’ sure y’ can keep ‘em off me?’.
‘I’ll try. I can keep them distracted at least’.
A frown began to form on her face, but it faded almost as soon as it appeared. She then gave a grim sigh, steely with resolve.
‘Alright. I’ll rush up the busted lookin’ escalators an’ head int’ the store infront’ve them on the second level. Looks like there’s some rubble we can hide behind. On three?’.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
‘On three’.
‘One, two, three!’.
Like a charging rhino Kenda made her way through the maze of car parts and crumbling detritus scattered over the malls lower floor. She dodged and weaved where she could, but there were points where Wilde saw her rip off car doors in her passing. It was something he only barely noticed though. He was preoccupied with delivering on his promised covering fire.
Mana arched and warped around and through his body as he channelled it into his spell. Wilde picked out his targets, a group of three gangers standing close to the edge who were firing towards the charging Kenda. Only a couple of shots hit her, and they simply glanced off her armoured jacket. They seemed more interested in holding down the triggers to their guns than actually aiming them, one of them was even holding his rifle one-handedly and was barely keeping a grip of it. With the three as closely grouped together it was the perfect opportunity for him to use one of the combat spells that he knew that could hit multiple targets. The only downside to it was that this was a spell they would see coming.
Sparks began to form and jump on the palm of his right hand, before growing into a crackling sphere of electricity. He physically moved his arm as if to throw it, but it was more a gesture to help himself focus rather than being strictly necessary. It was his will that directed the spell, not his throwing ability. The ball of azure lightning flew through the air and exploded right in the centre of the trio in an eruption of light and thunder.
A whiff of bitter smoke and ozone crossed Pedro’s nose before vanishing. In the wake of the explosion a dark cloud of smoke formed, Wilde could make out two forms still standing, the third presumably lying down, hopefully incapacitated.
Silence rang through the battlefield; the sounds from further in seemed to become more muted as well. Then, just as he had anticipated the cries came out.
‘MAGE! THEY GOTTA MAGE!’.
‘GEEK THE MAGE! FORGET THE TROLL!’.
‘ohfragohfragohfragohfrag!’.
Magic wasn’t the impossibility it was more than eighty years ago, but it was still unexpected to find, especially in the streets. Most people knew of magic only from what they saw on the matrix or the trid which was rarely accurate to reality. This left many uneducated people uncertain as to just what magic was capable of, only being sure that it had the potential to be extremely dangerous. And when people found themselves on the other side of it the first priority for many was to eliminate the source of it.
This was the real advantage of having Kenda go to the upper level first whilst he attacked. Even if he wasn’t effective in a fight the gangers would have diverted all their efforts into killing him first and leaving the troll for later. But unfortunately for the Nitro Mizuchi he was very effective in combat.
The gunshots stopped for a moment as the gangers began to run to positions to better take aim at him. Pedro crouched behind an acid-washed car on blocks for some cover while trying to keep track of where all the gangers were. He could see the two that were still standing after his ball lightning spell were both badly scorched by it, their once blue jackets blackened and still smoking in places. One of them threw his assault rifle to the ground and began to run in the opposite direction.
‘Koshinuke!’.
Cried out the other scorched ganger to his fleeing “brother”. One less ganger to worry about. Unless he was running to get reinforcements. Pedro checked his bond with his spirit of air. It was still active, so the fight was still ongoing. That was good. He needed as much time as the spirit could give him.
RATATATATATA!
RATATATATATA!
RATATATATATA!
RATATATATATA!
RATATATATATA!
Bullets rained down upon Wilde’s cover like rain from a vengeful god. There was no semblance of order to the ganger’s attacks, just an unending hail of fire at his general location. He lay as flush to the husk of a car as he could, grateful for the limited protection it offered him. What the gangers lacked in skill and tactics they made up for in sheer numbers. The knowledge that they were facing a magically active opponent also seemed to have inspired some concern in them as they all now appeared to be taking what little cover they could and were more spread out than they were before. He wouldn’t be able to repeat the success of his ball lightning spell on them now, it was powerful but inefficient against singular opponents.
Out of the corner of his eye Pedro spotted a ganger who seemed especially emboldened. From the man’s manic expression and literal froth coming from his mouth Wilde suspected he’d taken some form of combat drug.
He didn’t use them himself, the effect they took on the mind wasn’t worth the short-term benefits in his eyes, but Wilde had seen plenty of people who did take them during Urban Brawl matches. While the users almost always wound-up addicts after a few uses plenty were willing to pretend they would be the exception or just didn’t care. That was because while they weren’t as effective as either cybernetics or magic, combat drugs were significantly cheaper and easier to come across. They weren’t as effective, but they could still help a person shake off the shock of being shot in the stomach, grant them a greater than normal strength, or improve their reflexes to the peak of what a normal person was capable of. And sometimes that was all it took to win a fight in the barrens.
A bolt of mana jolted out to the ganger and struck him in the chest. The man didn’t appear to resister the attack, he just carried on firing down. He wasn’t even shooting near Wilde, or at any specific spot, simply lashing out at any shadow of imagined moment. Wilde sent a second blast to the man which finally put him down into a crumpled heap.
‘Kare wa Kenny koroshimashita! Ano hidoi yatsu!’.
‘E’s got mind bullets! Frag dis!’.
Another ganger turned and ran into one of the ruined storefronts on the second level to the jeers and spiteful yells of the others. That was another two dealt with now, but before Wilde could enjoy his success, he felt a sharp pain slam into his left shoulder. Looking apprehensively at it he saw that some of the Nitro Mizuchi’s bullets had managed to rip through the bodywork of the car he was hiding behind and had struck him. Fortunately, his armoured jacket had taken the brunt of the damage for him, all it had seemed to do was slightly dent the metal plating beneath it and scratch the paint. Pedro’s arm ached, but it wasn’t bleeding, and the wound wasn’t incapacitating.
BOOM!
Whipping his head up to see what the sound was Wilde just managed to catch the sight of another of the gangers falling off the edge of the second level. This one screamed as he fell, not just out of fear of the fall but due to his right arm having been severed and falling down with him as he struck the ground with a horrid SPLAT.
‘OH FRAG THE TROLL!!! RUU-’.
BOOM!
Kenda fired off another round from her shotgun, her hunting rifle now hanging over her shoulder. She’d managed to make her way up the immobile escalators not only quicker than he’d expected, but practically unnoticed thanks to the destructive distraction he’d provided. But the woman had been unwilling to hunker down and take cover. Instead, Kenda was charging through the second level blasting away with her shotgun at any ganger in her way. Now that she was free from all the obstacles littering the ground level had to admit he was impressed with the speed at which Kenda moved at.
She stood at just under nine feet tall and possessed a muscular build. To see someone that massive run like a flash of lightning, sidestepping automatic gunfire at moments, Pedro mused that it must have seemed to the gangers that they were in a waking nightmare. He certainly wouldn’t have wanted to go against someone like her in an Urban Brawl match, let alone a genuine life or death fight.
With Kenda now the main source of the defender’s attention Wilde made his way through the maze of cars and general detritus, always keeping to what cover he could as he heard the combat continuing above. He was moving slower than she had when she made her way through it, but he lacked the robust durability of a troll. Pedro was much more concerned about being injured now that he was so close to Kay. He couldn’t be a burden to her when she was so reliant on him saving her.
He paused before the frozen escalator and looked back up to the ongoing firefight above him. Kenda had either killed or incapacitated most of the Nitro Mizuchi on the level, only a couple more remained able to fight. Two had taken to hiding behind pillars and were laying down suppressive fire at her, the direness of their situation forcing them to become more capable fighters. One of them, due to the charred nature of his clothes, Pedro identified as one of the gangers he’d struck with his ball lightning spell. The man seemed to be wobbly on his feet, but leaned against the pillar he was behind for support whilst firing his rifle. For her part Kenda showed little concern for the gangers entrenched position, taking cover behind another pillar and returning fire at them. Though in her case the pillar she stood behind struggled to provide cover to even half of her frame.
Just as he was preparing to make a dash up to the second level though, Pedro spotted movement. It came from within one of the long-abandoned shopfronts, another ganger from what he could tell. They were behind Kenda’s position and from what he could tell she hadn’t noticed him. The ganger crept closer to her, slowly raising his rifle up to point towards her.
Heat radiated from the palm of Wilde’s right hand as he hurriedly channelled mana into a spell. Just as with the ball lightning spell sparks began to form in the centre of it, but this time they erupted into a small sphere of fire. As soon as it had blossomed into his hand Wilde threw the bolt of fire towards the sneaking ganger, hitting his head before he’d even noticed that it was heading towards him.
‘AAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!’.
The mans high pitched screams grabbed Kenda’s attention and seeing the ganger with the burning head pointing his gun towards her she swiftly dispatched him with a single shot to the chest. It came as a relief to Pedro not to hear the man’s screams anymore. The other gangers opened fire on Pedro, as if they could only focus on one target at a time, but when they leaned out to shoot at him Kenda took the opportunity given.
BOOM! BOOM!
Two shots rang out and two corpses fell to the floor.
Running up the escalator Pedro realised that they had managed to kill all the Nitro Mizuchi that were there with any others having fled. He took a moment to soak in the scene before him. Dead bodies littered this second floor and the smell of gunpowder, blood and a faint whiff of burnt meat hung in the air. Trudging towards him Kenda swiftly approached, reloading her shotgun all the while.
‘Thanks for gettin’ that one creepin’ up on me. Never saw the fragger comin’.
‘No problem. How are you? You hurt? Low on ammo?’.
‘Runnin’ a bit low for my shotgun. But none’ve these fraggers were packin’ any’ve their own so I’m stuck with what I got. ‘Less you can magic up some?’.
‘Yeah no, making magic bullets isn’t really a thing, at least… Never mind. What about taking one of their guns? Plenty of ammo about’.
He glanced around to see if there was any more of a response from the Nitro Mizuchi. Seeing that they appeared to be safe for the moment he and Kenda walked cautiously towards where he had seen Kay being held in the astral.
‘Not an option for me’.
As they walked by one dead ganger whose chest had been ripped open by a shotgun blast Kenda grabbed his Colt M23 in her massive hand. She demonstrated to him how with her giant fingers she couldn’t even properly put a finger over the trigger due to the guard, let alone comfortably hold it.
‘Oh, sorry. Forgot’.
‘Eh, its fine. Y’ can take it though. Might be handy for y’. Better range than either’ve y’r guns an’ plenty’ve ammo ‘bout for it. An’ it aint much use t’ anybody just lyin’ ‘bout here’.
She handed him the assault rifle without waiting for his response and tossed him a couple of magazines of ammunition that the Nitro Mizuchi just seemed to have lying around. Pedro put them in the pocket of his jacket and threw the gun over his shoulder. He didn’t quite know how he felt about taking the weapon of a dead man, a man that he’d helped kill just moments before, but he decided that Kenda was correct. Better he have another backup weapon than some ganger grab it and fire at him with it. The sling that the rifle was on was in the Nitro Mizuchi colours and had the Eastern style dragon embellishments on it that they were so fond of, but he didn’t have any other options of carrying it other than in his hands, so he put it on as they walked deeper into the heart of the gangs den.