Sponsored Apocalypse, ch 13

The glass shattered and dark shadows rushed in.  A shard of ice flashed from Aldina's hand.  Whether through luck or skill, the monster she'd been aiming at managed to dodge.

I cursed and triggered [Stalwart Pan of the Lonely Mountain] before the monsters were halfway across the store.  The knowledge of how to use the ability was sitting in my mind like something I’d always known.

My body tingled and I felt a subtle difference all over.  There wasn’t any time to register more than that, though.  One of the display cases in the store slammed down, breaking, and a shower of clutter sprayed forward as a monster raced directly at me.  The vaguely canine looking thing had scales and some very, very big fangs.

“Iguana Hounds,” shouted Aldina.  She shot a shard of ice at the hound nearest to me.  It wasn’t a solid hit, just clipped its shoulder, but the monster lost its balance.  I barely dodged in time to avoid what looked like 500 lbs of slavering, pissed off, barking monster from knocking me over.

The second iguana hound was heading for Aldina.  She got another ice attack off but it glanced off the freakish thing’s thick skull.  Aldina moved backwards, doing something mystical-looking with her hands, but I couldn’t wait to see if she could save herself.

I hit the side of the monster attacking her with all my weight and all the momentum I could gather in three running steps.  All that power was transferred into the tip of my glaive, and my strike was good, too.  The blade slid between the creature’s ribs.

The iguana hound let out an ear splitting roar and snarled as it reflexively tried to bite me.  I narrowly avoided losing an arm, and braced my feet on the thing’s hide.  Then I pushed myself off, yanking my weapon out of the terrible wound.  My trajectory carried me right into a curio cabinet.

A sharp crack echoed through the store as the curio cabinet shattered.  A rain of tarnished old watches pelted me as I awkwardly tried to get to my feet, my backpack snagging on another display case.

I finally managed to get up just as the monster I’d bloodied had crawled its way back over to me.  It was almost literally on top of me.  I screamed and made a crude chop at the thing’s head right as another of Adlina’s magic icicles slammed into the side of its body.  My strike landed a second later.  The monster shuddered and grew still.

Great, shaking breaths were proof that I was still alive.  I was covered in blood, shaking from adrenaline, but luckily not hurt other than some scrapes and small cuts.  The curio cabinet I’d broken with my body and the subsequent lack of injuries was testament to how effective my new skill was.

A notification blue screen sprang up but I dismissed it.  Aldina shouted, “We need to go! Now!”

I glanced over and blinked when I saw that the other monster, the one that had skidded across the floor,  was already dead, too.  It had an ice spike through its chest and head, with a huge pool of blood spreading out all over the ruined antique store.  I panted and said, “They’re dead.  Are there more?”

“No!  They weren’t after us.  They were–”  She gasped.

I followed her line of sight and saw a huge shadow filling in the shattered windows at the front of the store.  “Oh shit.”  I turned and ran for the back door.  Aldina was already ahead of me.

We both made it outside.  I followed Aldina as she sprinted for the alley we’d hid in before, back the way we came from.  Her stealth circle was dim and flickered.  “Slow down!  Let me get in your circle,” I hissed.  Behind us, I could hear something big moving through the store.  I wondered if it could fit through the door.  Hopefully not.

“Maybe if we survive!  Right now we need to get the fuck out of here!  Didn’t you see that first iguana hound come through the glass sideways!?  It’s the big troll.  Had to be hunting the hounds but now it knows where we are!  We gotta fucking move!”

I didn’t say anything more, just ran after Aldina.  We’d almost made it to the alley when a premonition made me turn back to look.  I saw a huge grey shape chasing us down, running much faster than humanly possible.  It was going to catch up before we even made the alley.

“Aldina!” I shouted.  She turned and barely paused before extending a hand and unleashing magic.  Spikes of ice whipped through the air in front of my face, hitting the giant troll and making it bellow.

Great, now it’s murderous, and pissed off, I thought.

“Get to the alley!  It might be small  enough to stop it!  So we can get away!”

That was a good idea.  Now that Aldina said something about it, the alley really had been narrow.  I tried to put on another burst of speed.  My feet practically flew across the pavement as I ran, the antique pan tied to the back of my belt hitting my thigh and my butt.

I almost made it.

Right before button hooking into the alley, it felt like the entire world hit me in the back and shoulder.  My entire entire body rocketed forward so hard I hit the pavement rolling and didn’t stop until I slammed into a mailbox.  I saw stars.  Somewhere behind me, I could hear Aldina screaming something.

Mind groggy, I turned to see Aldina standing inside the alley, hurling magic ice at the troll.  The big bastard was blocking some of the attacks, protecting its body with the massive club.  I blinked owlishly at the club.  That giant hunk of…whatever, had presumably just given me a gentle poke that would have killed me if not for my new, modest tankiness.  Hitting the mailbox as hard as I had should have put me in the ICU.  Instead, I felt like I’d just fallen off my skateboard as a teen.  I was dazed, but functional.

That was going to change soon if the big bastard of a troll noticed me being still alive.  At the moment, Aldina was keeping its attention.  I could practically see the wheels turning in its tiny, evil brain, probably debating throwing its club at the annoying magical lady even if the club would be lost by doing so.

I pushed myself up, still seeing stars, and moved further in the direction of the troll’s blind spot.  Thinking at the moment was hard, but fear was always a great motivator.  It felt like my body was practically bursting with adrenaline.  As I rolled over and my pack got in the way, I realized that it had probably cushioned some of the blow I’d just taken, at least a little.  It could have been a lot worse.  Amazing.

Even though I’d apparently been knocked out for a short while, I probably still shouldn’t be conscious.  I could admit that.  My high Endurance had to be helping.

Aldina continued to scream at the troll.  She was likely saving my ass right now, keeping the thing distracted.  At least no other monsters were likely to come around, not right now with the big son of a bitch there.

My bell had seriously been rung pretty good.  I wobbled as I stood, but I still stood.  Aldina had to have seen me, but she just kept making a fuss and attacking the troll like she had been before.

I rubbed my head, then the bridge of my nose, willing my eyes to focus better.  A moment later, I decided I couldn’t wait any longer.  If the troll merely turned around, I was toast.  So I took a solid grip on my glaive as I backed up all the way across the street.  Then I did exactly as I had back in the antique shop, using my weapon as a lance. But this time I’d had enough room to accelerate to full speed, and I jumped before putting every ounce of strength and weight into the strike.

My weapon slammed into the troll’s back, right beside the spine.  It was deep, but I didn’t get a good look before crashing into the monster’s back.  I bounced off right as it bellowed, before a massive hand reached back to try touching what was hurting it.  The troll wasn’t flexible enough.  Its hand didn’t reach.

From the ground, as I rolled back, I could see how pretty much the entire blade of the glaive, so half the length of the weapon, was buried in the troll’s back.  It was starting to turn.  Now or never, I thought.  My plan wasn’t great, but it was all I had.  I unholstered my pistol and ran at the stumbling monster.  I didn’t shoot right away, though.

Instead, when I got close, I hit the ground rolling.  The move was in time to avoid being seen by the monster as it turned.  On the ground, I kept moving towards the alley beyond.  When I was directly under the giant monster, I looked up and my eyes widened.

Those are some big, ugly balls, I thought.  And without really thinking it through, I raised my pistol and unloaded almost the entire magazine.

Then I rolled like crazy, somehow making it into the alley and stumbling into Aldina, dizzy as hell.

“Right in the dick,” I chuckled.

“Fucking run!  Go!  Now!” screamed Aldina.  It took me a second to understand what she was saying, but when I did, it was like all the fear I should have been feeling a few seconds ago hit me like a cinderblock to the forehead.

We ran, Aldina pulling my hand at first.  My head was finally starting to clear when we’d almost reached the other side of the alley.  About the same time, even over the noise of the troll screaming, I heard a loud banging and clattering a few times before the massive club hit the backs of my legs.  I went down, barely avoiding taking Aldina with me.

Eating shit after being at a full run for the second time in minutes was not pleasant.  Luckily, my supernatural mojo allowed me to get up, curse, and move at a limping, shuffling run.  It was better than nothing.  Outside the alley, the next street over, Aldina hissed, “Get in the circle.  We gotta move.  Make some distance from that ugly motherfucker.”

That sounded good to me.  My gait slowly got smoother and I never felt so thankful for my decision to get stronger bones.  Even with my magical, antique-based armor, I was pretty sure I’d be busted up badly by now without having inhumanly tough bones.

As we ran, I noticed that I was bleeding.  Almost absently, I spat on my hand and slapped it onto my wounded arm and elbow.  Then I got the other arm, and my neck, then the back of my head.  I could tell all of it was healing right away.

“Nifty,” I said.  By this point I was fully conscious again, but my surroundings still felt a little like a dream to me.  Or maybe a nightmare.  Too much had happened at this point.  I was just a meat popsicle full of hormones and fight or flight instincts.

Adlina nodded to the right and I didn’t know what she was trying to tell me before she turned and pulled me toward a post office with shattered windows.  We ran into the room where people usually waited in line to mail out packages during business hours, then jumped over the counter, moving to the back of the building where only employees would usually go.  Carts and bins were in varying degrees of organization and disarray.  I didn’t know enough about post office work to tell whether this was what it always looked like or if something bad had happened.  The lack of any visible blood was a good sign, at least.

We came to a stop in a corner, not far from a back door that I assumed led to some loading docks or a mail truck yard.  This deep into the building, I could probably thank my eye enhancement for the fact I could even see.

Aldina was gasping.  “Let’s wait here.  Fuckin hell. Shit! So frustrating.  Gotta get stronger.”

I nodded dumbly.  My breathing was under control in seconds.  I would have been amazed if I didn’t feel so beat up, and dealing with the aftereffects of coming so close to death.

“Are we going to stay here for a while?” I asked.  Aldina let her head roll back, closed her yes, and nodded.  I sat on the floor without ceremony, just dumped myself there.  A click of steel on concrete from my right hand reminded me I was still holding my pistol.

Feeling somewhat bemused, I ejected the almost empty mag and loaded a new one, my last one.  After getting back to Tom’s, I needed to get more ammo.  Guns might not be ideal for dealing with this new world, at least according to Aldina, but they definitely weren’t useless.  At least not yet.

I holstered my pistol and scooched back to a wall, leaning my head against it.  My eyelids felt heavy, but I jerked myself to alertness.  Being complacent now would be super stupid.

As that thought ran through my mind, I felt a tremble in the ground, almost like a tiny earthquake.  Then it came again.  I realized that among the background noise of violence outside, I could hear horrible crashes at the same general time as the trembles.

“Do you hear that?  Or feel that?” I asked.

“Yes.  Something big is out there.  Really big.  Whatever the fuck it is, it’s having a good ol’ time.”

“The giant.”  My words came out part statement, part question.

“Maybe.  Either way, let’s wait for a while.  This place was already broken into, goblins were here, but nobody was hurt.  It’s not likely they’ll hit it again tonight.  And the troll might still be looking for us.  This is a good place to reset the stealth field.”

I nodded.  Made sense and I didn’t have the energy to argue anyway.  With nothing else to do for a while, I pulled up my menus, checking my status messages.  I’d leveled up again.  After skimming through the notifications I’d gotten, I didn’t notice anything else that stood out.  So with nothing else standing out, I started diving into my menus.  This was the first time I had more than just a minute to check them out.

We stayed in the post office for about half an hour, the entire time I kept feeling those thumps and hearing crashes from outside.  Gunshots, explosions, dull thuds, distant screams, and even the occasional siren echoed throughout town.

With this relatively small town feeling like the ground floor of hell, I wondered what a big city would be like right now.  The thought made me shudder.  I was so glad I had deliberately chosen to settle down somewhere off the beaten path.

We both more or less decided to leave at the same time.  Aldina led the way, I stayed in the circle, and I just put one foot in front of the other, heading toward Tom’s Guns.

The going got dicey a couple times.  Once with a large group of goblins in the street, once because one of the flying monsters was taking off from the top of a building.  Both times, we basically just went around.  We only killed two goblins on the way–Aldina with magic and me with my bayonet.  It never even knew I was there before I’d hacked into its neck.

Finally, our destination was coming up soon, only a few blocks away.  I could feel a knot of stress in my back slowly releasing.  After getting back to Tom’s I should be relatively safe again.

We slowed as we got closer, eventually both coming to a stop.  Even through the overall emotional numbness I had going on, I crumpled on the inside.  I could feel a tear running down my cheek, both eyes brimming.

“Fuck,” said Aldina.  Sorrow and rage echoed in her curse.  I didn’t reply.

Tom’s Guns was in ruins along with the business next to it and half the business on the other side.  Even more monster bodies were in the street now, but now some of them had been crushed, like from giant feet.  The people in the store had likely sold their lives dearly but it hadn’t been enough.  The store was smashed, looking like a sand castle punched by an angry child.  For the first time, I regretted having better night vision now. I could actually spot splashes of dark blood here and there among the wreckage.

When I looked down the street, I could see another building that had been smashed to bits.  Maybe that one had had obvious defenders, too.

“The fucking giant,” I whispered.  A burning, all-consuming hate rose, threatening to overwhelm me with its intensity.  I fought it down.  All that remained was a feeling of emptiness.

Aldina shook her head.  Her eyes glistened with emotion, but no tears actually fell.  Her face stony, she said, “We need to go.  There are bodies everywhere here.  Some of the smaller, weaker monsters are gonna come through soon, I’m sure of it.  That would be a bad situation, especially while we’re tired.”

“Alright,” I said and shrugged.  Part of me wanted to rage or just stand there dumbly, staring. Luckily, I was still rational.  I didn’t even entertain the thought of scavenging the destroyed building.  There was no telling if anything could even be recovered, at least not before some nasty monster wandered into Aldina’s stealth circle and took a bite out of my ass.  “What now?”  I was too tired to talk about everything that had just happened, and now wasn’t the time anyway.  I could tell that Aldina felt the same way.

“Depends.  What level are you right now?”

“Seven.”

She sighed, closed her eyes, and looked up at the night sky.  “Change of plans, I guess.  You need to at least hit level 10 tonight.  So we’re going to level.  Then we’re going to go somewhere safe to finally get some rest.”

I didn’t even ask why I needed to hit level 10.  Instead, I focused on the more immediately important part.  “So it’s, ‘We,’ now, huh?”

“Yeah,” she said.  “I just lost my only friend I’d made in this world.  It was a slip up.  There’s nothing left here.  Nothing but what I need to do.”  Her voice broke but she got herself under control.  “No time to deal with it right now.  Anyway, you’re a handy heal-bot if the skill is kind of fucking gross.  Rather be spit on than dead, though.  Unless you have something better to do, you can tag along for a while.”

“Yeah, no.  Screw that,” I said, eyes flat.  “I’m not tagging along like a baby duckling.  If I go with you, we’re equals in our little team, whatever that means.  That means no more holding information, and decisions are made as a team.  Otherwise, you can kick rocks, lady.  You saved my ass tonight, but I’ve saved yours, too.  We’re ven.  And I have the magic spit.  Literally.”

Her mouth worked like she was going to quickly retort, but she closed it.  She looked at me consideringly.  “So you want to have this conversation right now, in the middle of the street, a stone’s throw from the body of our friends?”

I looked her dead in the eye, remembering what happened earlier with the lady chained to the fence.  “Yup.”

“And you’re sure you want to know what I know?  Knowledge is a double edged sword.  If you know some of these things, your life might get even more dangerous.  Still want it?”

“Yes.  Damn straight.”

She smiled without humor.  “Alright, fine.  Let’s see where this goes.”

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Boom :)