Psionics are a magic that is difficult to understand. It is not based on mana yet it is not inexhaustible like Reality Control. The mind generates power and psions have minds that produce many times the normal amount of this mental energy. They take this energy and use it to manipulate and create other forces. They are difficult to defend against but are also more specialized than most other spellcasters.
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Adrian
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I open my eyes and after a second bolt upright, sounds of breaking glass echo through the empty store.
“Get everyone up” I semi shout at Bryan, even if that strange dream was a lie that breaking glass was not.
I grab a loaded rifle as I move myself to the rails that bar those who are not paying attention from walking off the edge of this second floor. I look out through the scope, I can see movement but the darkness is too much for me to see much.
“Turn on the lights” I say hoping someone is already on their way to the breaker box.
The lights turn on in a blinding flash but where I am inconvenienced, the small creatures that were moving around the lower floor hissed and scream as they cover their eyes.
Goblins, or something very close. The skin color is a bit different, these midgets are all red instead of the green and red from the school. I take advantage of their momentary blindness and shoot the one closest to the stairs up into the food court.
“What is it?” I hear from Tomas, more an overly loud grumpy grumble than anything else.
“Goblins, grab a gun and take a position” I shout just loud enough for him to still hear over the sound of a second bullet leaving the barrel of my rifle.
Two for two but since they’ve started running around I won’t be able to keep that up.
“Tomas cover the stairs up to us. Abagail, get ready to take my spot, once enough of them reach the food court I’m going to move to block them” I shout out while Bryan begins to take out some of the goblins with me.
It is not long before I finish my first magazine of twenty-five rounds, a little over half that amount hitting one goblin or another as I cheat with my flawed version of Spatial Aim.
Several goblins have gotten past us, I set the rifle down as it isn’t going to be as useful in the closer quarters that I’ll be fighting in as I deal with the goblins that've slipped past us. I draw a pistol and nod to Abagail.
She abandons the hallway towards the food court as I enter that same hall. I screw in the suppressor for the pistol wondering if it’ll even help. It won’t be silent but with the gunfire in the building and the noise they themselves are making the goblins may not notice me right away.
The hall is empty, the only other thing they connect to are some offices for the employees. I don’t check any of those doors as they are closed and I assume that they are locked and contain nothing of value to the current situation.
I open the door slightly, several goblins are searching through the grill. They are sniffing around the currently cold grates of the stove and the door for the refrigerator. Talking to each other in their guttural tongue.
They’re occupied searching, what would they be looking for? Weapon? No, they are armed. Food? Must be, but I don’t understand why they would look for a meal right now.
Still, I’ll take the opportunity to get a surprise round or two. I aim for the head of the largest one as he goes through the dirty skillet and plates, just behind the counter.
A softer quieter boom is heard, barley noticeable with the background noise of Bryan and Abagail doing that they can to limit how many I’ll have to deal with here. The goblin gets a hole in his head and I would have been free to do this again if it weren’t for the clatter of the skillet hitting the tile floor and the shatter of a plate.
The goblins all begin to look around, they’ll notice me in a few seconds. I have to make the most out of this. I shoot again only making sure that I’ll hit one of the goblins.
The bullet goes through a shoulder. Not a kill but it’ll help me when he tries to get into melee. Judging by how the goblins shout and start running towards me, they found me.
I rush to hit as many as I can before they get to me. Three fall dead before the pistol is empty. I can only hope that it doesn’t damage the internal components of the firearm as I drop it to pull another in my left hand and a knife in my right.
I take a quick count, there are four more goblins. I got half of them before any reached the door. The closest goblin to me lunges with a crude spear, I manage to dodge and then slam closed the door with my shoulder, trapping the spear.
The door is still ajar, I quickly take aim at where I guess the goblin still is and fire.
The reward of a goblin’s scream tells me my ploy worked but I won’t know how well until I move from the door. They’ll get to me at that point but I’m not going to be able to do much of anything until I do so. I just don’t know where they are at this point. Only that the goblin I just shot is no longer holding the spear since it has pivoted with the weight of the spearhead pulling it down to an angle the goblin could not be maintaining.
I take a few quick steps backwards, always facing the door so I can get another free shot when it opens. The spear clatters to the ground and three goblins pour through the door. I don’t even aim and put two holes in the first one through. The other two hold another spear and a rusted knife.
They approach together, more cautious than their dead and dying kin. I am unsure which is more dangerous, the risk of being skewered by the spear or to taking a knife stab or two.
I take a quick step forward, inside of the spears reach and press the pistol in my left hand to the face of the goblin. He tries to bite me but before he manages to I fire, twice since the first shot didn’t pass through the brain but rather the monster’s cheek. The knife wielding goblin I try to fend off with the combat knife in my right hand but unsurprisingly it is a better fighter than me. I miss in my poor attempt to parry and also miss the goblin.
Pain, more than I’ve ever felt at once before comes from my gut. I drop the knife and grab at the pain just in time to realize it’s a knife. The fucking monster got me.
The dagger moves slightly and I swear, my grip being the only thing that keeps the goblin from doing more. Press the gun in my left hand into the goblin’s side and fire.
I don’t stop firing. This bastard has to pay for hurting me.
*Click*
*Click*
*Click*
Out of ammo, I slowly move myself to the floor and lean against the wall. Wincing as I continue to breathe. I look down at my hand and the blade almost disemboweling me.
Shit, I’m dead if I don’t fix this. It isn’t something I can just burn closed either. I really didn’t want to have to test out what that strange dream showed me like this but I have nothing else to survive on.
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I close my eyes and focus. My will asserting itself over the tiny piece of the universe that is my body. I don’t know exactly how to fix what's wrong but the hole is wrong, the cut on my left arm is wrong and the light burns are wrong. I focus on my life force and how it is slipping away as blood flows outwards.
I grab onto it and bolster it, commanding it to cease diminishing but it only slows. I then push it, making it flow through my body faster as the dream showed me. A tingling feeling comes from my skin for a moment and the pain of the knife becomes sharper and I lose focus for a moment; my warping coming to an abrupt end.
I open my eyes to see the light burns disappearing, the trickle of blood slowing down around my injury. I stop, I can’t heal myself with the knife still in me.
Should I just yank it out? No, it’s harder to focus when I’m in pain. I hold my breath and grasp at nothing, pushing my will onto space. The blade vanishes from my gut but does not appear in my hand as I was trying to do but falls from a location in between the two on to the ground.
The trickle becomes a stream and I hold the gap closed with both hands, returning to my healing warp. The pain slowly recedes, I’m going to live through this.
My stomach growls just before I hear the door open and get slammed into the wall. My head bolts upwards, two goblins and a larger over six and a half foot version are looking right at me.
I abandon healing to arm myself. A revolver appearing in my arms just as the larger goblin's weapon reaches me, a spear; right into my shoulder. I pull the trigger in panic, not even remembering if it is loaded or not. The much larger caliber blowing a hole in the side of the creature while at the same time causing me to drop it due to my poor grip.
Just before it hits to floor I return it to my hand more a reflex to grab a weapon than actual planning. The shorter legs of the goblins causes them to only now arrive to melee range and the one on my right meets the same fate as its larger kin.
The remaining goblin screams in fear but I can barely hear it as my ears are ringing from the echoes in this confined space. It starts to flee towards the way from which it came but I shoot the third of six shots in this gun, missing anything vital but blowing a hole in its leg. The goblin collapses with blood pouring from the barely connected limb.
It shouldn’t live long like that, but I can’t have it interfering with my self healing. I shoot again, killing my now stationary target before setting the gun down.
I can feel the spearhead in my shoulder, I may not be pinned to the wall but it almost passed through me. My bones are holding it in place but there is no way I can pull this out on my own. My sense of pain isn’t doing anything which is a really bad sign. Fuck, I should never have let them get into melee.
I can’t teleport something this big, I don’t know how to exercise that much control over space. Something else, break the shaft and then teleport it out of me. I fumble through my pockets and pull out a small lighter. I need something to start with.
The small flame of this ninety-nine cent lighter appears and I grab it and force it to grow. Hotter and larger, and move it to consume the wood roughly six inches above my shoulder.
The wood quickly catches fire and within a minute there is a crack, the spear shifting slightly as the majority of the shaft breaks off under it’s own weight.
The wood stays burning even after I release the flames from my will. Once more I grasp the air warping space to remove an object from me and this time I succeed.
Blood begins to pour out once more even if it is from a different injury. I barely get started with the healing before an interruption appears. Another goblin, shouting at finding me injured and prone.
“I don’t have time for this” I mutter while gesturing with my hand as my will once more grabs ahold of the fire. The dwindling flame at the broken end of the spear flares up and grows into a small wave the encases much of the goblin's body. It does not live long.
I return to healing myself, each moment growing hungrier and quickly patch myself back together. A small barely noticeable scar on my left shoulder just above the collarbone and another where the goblin almost gutted me. I think I can erase them later but for now they are here.
I quickly pick up the three firearms and reload the pistols and send the revolver back to where I stashed it. After which I enter the food court. As there are only two restaurants, a burger grill and a small steakhouse, it does not take me long to glance and see if there are any goblins. Finding none I move to the stairs, the gunfire stops just before I look down at the main entrance.
Over three dozen corpses are lain out but I don’t see any living goblins. At least none within the building, outside there are still maybe a dozen fighting against another group. I glance over to Bryan and Abagail, they are alert and watching though Bryan is reloading a rifle magazine and may be stuck on that for a few minutes.
I slowly move down the stairs, worried about being ambushed. I don’t know if I’ll get away with healing myself in front of others. My worries are unfounded and I reach the front windows without issue and take a closer look at the conflict outside.
Four individuals, are fighting with the larger goblins. The tallest is holding a slightly curved sword, maybe a saber, covered in deep scarlet red flames parrying and cutting the nearest enemies. The other three are nowhere near the size of their ally who stands almost as tall as the larger goblinoids, but they move with more grace and occasionally colored lights will join their blades in striking their enemies. Magic of some sort, is it like that goblin mage's that could ignore at least one of the rules mine follows?
Two of the shorter three have an odd shape to their armor, the top being larger than the bottom. Females? Their tallest ally's armor is similarly shaped though less lithe. They seem to be struggling with the remains of the goblinoids even though many litter the ground of the parking lot. Should I help them? I want to know of their magic but there is risk in getting involved.
If I just watch some of them should still survive but they would not want to talk. They are attacking my attackers though, and these monsters wouldn’t have attacked us if they were already fighting someone else so these not goblinoids probably came to help, even if they are dressed in chainmail.
I take aim and target the nearest creature that doesn’t have one of the four humanoids directly behind it. I fire and confirm a hit but the brute doesn’t fall as the goblins do. It keeps fighting and I put to more bullets in the thing before it begins to slow.
One of the humanoids finally takes a heavy hit by one of his opponents and leaves an opening taken advantage of by another foe. The tallest human decapitates a goblinoid before releasing a wave of dark green fire over another. Even as she takes a hit from a third wielding a club.
The lithe females work together but are mostly defending as the tallest human is slowly taking the creatures down. I’m going to have to do more, they are clearly good fighters but they’re exhausted. Do I risk it all? I’ll have to, I want to know about their magic and maybe they can help my friends and me survive.
I stand and empty the rest of the pistol's magazine into the hairy brute that just killed one of their companions. That got the attention of a few and I quickly switch to the other pistol as they charge.
I unload at the faster of the three moving towards me. It seems to ignore the wounds as I inflict them, 9mm just doesn’t seem like enough to deal with this larger goblinoid. It reaches the broken window I was using as cover before it falls.
The other two are close behind but I don’t have a loaded gun left, at least not one on me or small enough for me to draw it via a teleport. I pull the lighter from my pocket, I can’t deal with these things in melee I’ll have to do more magic.
It sparks and lights up just in time for me to step away from an axe's arc. I blow into the flame and do something impossible in front of at least Bryan and Abagail. My breath catches fire and while not immediately lethal to my target’s they do catch fire as I will it. I rush backwards, hoping to keep away long enough for the fire or gunfire from Bryan and Abagail to kill them.
The two monsters scream in anger and rage rather than the pain of being burned alive and I run towards the stairs, only getting to the before Bryan and Abagail begin firing on the two. The lower caliber of these hunting rifles is a problem but the larger quantity of bullets offsets it and one of the two fall to the ground.
I pull the fire off him and add it to the flames consuming the other. A few more shots ring out from the balcony like second floor before Bryan and Abagail run out of ammo. The brute reaches me and swings with his club, a crunch sounds out from my right arm as I raised it to bock.
My throat feels sore and my concentration on the fire broke even though the creature remains burning. I fall back into the stairs, and try to do anything to lashing out against the creature but other than burning him I have nothing available.
Another gunshot rings out through the store and the large goblinoid falls forward. A shot through the head. I push myself up and look towards Bryan, more specifically the pistol at him side. I need it and I’ll not be able to reload my own with how my arm currently is.
It appears in my left hand as I once more repeat the stupid but necessary decision of moving to the broken window. Now there are only four enemies left. I don’t think they’ll be able to spare the men to go after me
I smile and take my time aiming, as soon as I have a clear shot I take it. Putting a hole through a lung. This causes him to flinch and the tallest human takes the opportunity to cut down her foe. That there are only three leaves me with few openings I can take advantage of at this distance.
I exit the building, and move to change the angle I am shooting from while closing the distance. My next shot kills by sending a bullet through a head. Another falls to the tallest human and the shorter two take down the remaining one in a few more seconds as it panics over the death of all its allies.