Miriam let out a mirthless laugh. Her expressions clearly expressed disdain and a good amount of sarcasm. She stayed silent
though. Miriam was never one for talking.
"Well... That was certainly not a great victory.", haltingly announced Lyo, making the biggest understatement any of his
teammates had ever heard.
"Yup.", quietly agreed Canem, the humanoid wolf on Jillian's side.
They all were staring ahead at the remnants of their skimmers, blasted to the ground,profusing a vast quantity of
dark thick smoke in the air. The parts were dispersed, but after one quick glance, Canem could tell none of them could be re-used. Although he was a decent engineer, even he couldn't make something out of melted, burned, and useless junk. Their skimmers were gone. Forever.
Jillian looked like he was about to cry. His deep azure eyes could do nothing but stare ahead, and his childish features were distorted in the effort he was making not to shed a tear. His shaggy green hair, which hung over one of his eyes, limited his vision, but he felt too discouraged to swipe it away. His gloved hands seemed to be clutching some unknown object, and his shoulders were slumped. So much for their dreams. So much for their hopes.
"We should go. It's getting dark.", proposed Canem, his furry brown feet restless. He threw nervous glances at the burning scraps. "And that fire will get us seen."
The others didn't look like they wanted to go anywhere. Jillian was crouching, clutching his knees, his face hidden. Lyo, usually so smug and humorous, could find nothing to add and stalked around the swamp, his giant booted feet making a slurping sound as he extracted them from the mud. Miriam had a look on her face that worried the Welf. She would have normally exploded by now, her fury tainting her round-shaped face a reddish tinge. But instead,her violet eyes were lost in the fire, her mouth still shaped in her sardonic sneer.
"Come on guys, get up. We have to go. The sky knights...", tried Canem again, his persistance and animal instinct urging them on.
Jillian quietly got up, his face still bearing the red marks their ennemy had inflicted him. Lyo followed, his orange hair strangely messy and tangled, as if he had passed his hand in it a couple of times. Miriam threw a last dark look at the raging flames and joined them, blood oozing from her arm.
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"The ennemy has escaped! Spread out and find them!", shouted the old man from his skimmer.
"Yes commander!" came the immediate response. The group was used to such things. As a matter of fact, they had done it so much it was almost like a game. A child's game. What was easier than tracking them down? Most of their victims where inexperienced and scared, which gave their elite team the clear advantage.
"There were four of them. A man, a woman, a Welf and a boy. Bring them to me.", he ordered, describing their preys.
"Dead or alive.", he dryly added, brandishing his curved sword for emphasis.
The toon nodded as one man, and all of them got out their various weapons. A teenager in the back, a new recruit, dusted his new crossbow, his blue eyes glowing with excitement. The chase promised to be exhilirating, even if it should end quickly.
"Colonel, you take the north side of the Terra. Group 5, to the South. I'll take my squadron to the East. And..."
The commander turned to his right to face a red-headed adolescent. Although his team was composed of young people, they had proved their worth on multiple missions, and their skills were praised throughout the Atmos. The elder knew he could trust them.
"Storm Hawks, you take the west.", he announced, his blade glittering in the moonlight.
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They ran as fast as they could, but after their battle, all of them suffered from wounds or simple exhaustion, and their pace slackened after three good minutes.
"Can't...go...faster..", groaned Lyo, the hands clutching his stomach turning a sickening dark red color.
"We need to hide. They have skimmers anyway, we can't outrun them.", proposed Miriam, searching the muddy wasteland for any form of cover.
"No... The'll search..", gasped the red-head painfully, every word a little agony.
Jillian's brain was almost fuming with his active thinking, but even his precocious mind couldn't come up with a plan. Lyo was usually the one with the brilliant plans. Lyo was the tactician. It didn't look as if he was really in a fit state to work though.
Canem's dark blue pupils became slits as his long ears picked up a faraway sound. Intant, he stopped on his tracks and listened, his fangs becoming bigger. After a few seconds, he identified it without a trace of doubt- the sound of a skimmer, approaching fast.
"We got trouble", he whispered, turning to their leader.
Miriam didn't let the huge canines bother her, she was used to them. What did bother her though was that she knew they only appeared in a perilous situation. The needed to get out of here- FAST.
"Canem, you take Lyo's feet. I take the middle. Jillian, you get the head. We're getting to those bushes over there.", she indicated, a nod of her head toward a little section of the land which contained a little amount of shrubs. The plant growth was meager and dispersed, but it was their best shot.
They all grabbed Lyo at the same moment, and although the wounded man's triangular face expressed pure pain, he never let out more than a wimper. Jillian supported the red-headed's face with as much strength as his frail body could muster, grunting under the weight. Miriam, used to physical labor, was still having trouble with the area sporting a reddish shirt, (as much from the blood as from the original color). Canem, his breathing harsh and heavy, elevated the legs, still covered with Lyo's favorite pair of enormous boots.
They went as fast as any of them could go after such trials, which was not a desirable speed to accomplish when chased by one of fastest skimmers invented. They all heard the sound of the speed crystal- powered jets in a matter of moments, and their run started to get more desperate. The odds of getting into the brushes without being spotted were very thin. Nonetheless, all of them, including Jillian, collapsing under the effort, sped up. In their eyes- purple, azure, brown and navy blue- was reflected one thing and one thing only- the skeletal botanic growth to their right.
"Hurry, hurry..", muttered Miriam, sweat running down like a fountain under her shoulder-length chestnut hair.
Hope made their hearts boom, lighting bolts inside their chests, setting the rythm for their desperate flight. The noise got louder and something metallic glittered in the moonlight... Their muscles were throbbing, their legs buckled, their vision was obscured by matted hair, but they continued, bearing their friend. They were now ten paces away from the bushes... So close... They could make it...
The skimmers were now visible. They were five of them, all bearing the same insigna. The insigna... A bird, victorious, its wings stretched... Its claws extending towards... them. The sound of crossbow arrows rang in the night, multiple points of light descending on them...
In a flash, Miriam dropped Lyo and grabbed the mirror shield strapped to her back. She brandished it, successfully protecting them from the missiles. As an added bonus to the various crystal powering her defense mechanism, the smooth surface of her shield sent back the arrows to their previous owner. The person in the skimmer swerved to avoid the oncoming shots and prepared his weapon for another attack.
"In the bushes, Go!", ordered the woman, pushing all of them towards the ground, thus succesfully avoiding some staff blasts.
From his position, Canem quickly established the crystal embedded in the staff of the attacker to be a poisoner. Most honest people used icers. At least with icers, the victim didn't die writhing on the ground, yelling like a struck boar. At least with icers, you lived. The Welf bit his lips. Those people didn't come here for prisoners. This was a battle to the finish. He grabbed his long-bow and took a stack of arrows from his quiver. In a fluid movement, he shooted towards the flying menace.
Lyo's stomach was spouting more blood, and his groans got more and more unbearable. Jilian, lacking any helpful activity since he had previously lost his boomerang, inched his way toward his companion, stearing clear of the electric blue shots now being fired by someone who looked to be the leader of the group. He tore his long yellow pants, which had seen better days, and employed himself to stop the blood flow. Lyo, although he appreciated his help deeply, couldn't help but hope for someone a little more qualified in medicine than their pilot and technician. His brown eyes were determinately closed, and he whispered to the twelve-years old crouching next to him, asking him to describe their position. Jilian, with his intelligent outview on the attack, supplied their tactician with all the information he needed.
"It's hopeless. Hopeless. I can't possibly make a plan that would save us... We're all going to die!", realized Lyo.
He kept his sinister view of their dilemna to himself as his face met Jilian's. His expression was so innocent- so scared. Jilian was terrified. He was a kid after all. A genius, but still a kid.
"My staff is tucked away inside my right boot. It can shoot accurately, but not very far. I also... By Atmos, look how much blood I...!... Left boot. Swarm Crystal.", uttered Lyo, doing his best to give something to do to Jilian. He had learned long ago that all men needed dreams. If there were no more dreams then, all men needed hope. If there was no more hope... All men just needed something to do.
Those were his dark ponderings as Jilian searched his leather shoes, feeling for the cold metal. His hand finally connected with it. Now that the green-haired youth held the staff, he needed the Swarm Crystal to activate it. He turned the second boot upside down and collected the falling rock before it made contact with the ground. He fit the crystal into an opening in the metal, and he felt the weapon suddenly getting warm, filling him with courage. Jilian adjusted the now-deployed staff and aimed carefully for one of their ennemies. It looked to be a strong, wide warrior, abnormally huge, and he constantly dropped what looked like cannon balls, which exploded as they made their impact with anything. So far, the group was able to dodge them, but their destructive power worried Jilian. It was therefore why the child, a determined look on his face, launched the first shot. Incredibly, it made contact with the flying motorcycle, which was suddenly changed into a swarm of crystal-powered bees. They rushed upon the first person they saw- the mysterious rider, now deprived from his skimmer.
A scream of rage came from the red-head and his team, and with an unexpected twist of events, three of their opponents landed, their flying machines transforming into large ground rides. They were speeding up towards the little resistance, gaining speed on the even ground, splashing mud about as their course lay unchanged- straight for the group. Miriam and the others watched with horror as they didn't slow down, as their faces came closer and closer...
"They're going to crush us. They're going to crush us!", thought Miriam,eyes wide open. She needed to move. To jump away from the collision course. But her insides seemed nonexistant, and her legs wouldn't support her. She wanted to scream, to run, to do SOMETHING! But her body seemed unwilling to obey her. She raised her face slowly, panicked into shock, and her purple eyes met with her ennemy's green ones. It was too late.